I am a first year medical student. I did finish one year of biomedical science before I got into medical school, because I couldn't get in on my first try. To get in, you need to be able to pass an entry exam. For the past two years, there have been 300+ people taking the exam, and only 48 students have been admitted. Most of the people taking the entry exam are excellent students, and you could say that those who get through are among the smartest and most hard-working high school students in the country.
Medical school here takes six years. After the first three years, I will get a Bachelors degree. After the whole six years are finished, I will need to work one year as an intern and then I will receive my medical degree. That's seven years of school, but I'm not nearly finished after that. I'm still going to have to study 5+ more years in order to specialize in something. I will actually be working at the same time I'm specializing, but the big paychecks won't start coming in until I'm done with that. Medical school, with internship and specialization, takes about 12-14 years.
I am 24 years old now and I will be getting closer to 40 years of age by the time I'm finished. I'm not sure what I want to specialize in but it's probably going to be something related either to nutrition and the metabolic syndrome, or neurology.
In the first two years, I will learn the basics of chemistry, physics, anatomy, physiology, pretty much the basics of the proper functioning of the human body. In the third year, the emphasis is on things like pharmacology and pathology, basically about when things start to go wrong within the body. In the fourth, fifth and sixth year, I will be spending my main time in the hospital, learning the basics of every major aspect of medicine including surgery, internal medicine, psychiatry, pediatrics and more.
Medical School Curriculum
The entire six years are 360 ECTS units, where 180 units are standard for a bachelor's degree.
First Year
Chemistry 1 - General Chemistry - 6 units
Chemistry 2 - Organic Chemistry - 6 units
Chemistry 3 - Practical Chemistry - 2 units
Physics: 2 units
Anatomy of the limbs and drunk: 8 units
General Anatomy (embryology and histology): 8 units
Anatomy of the head and neck: 8 units
Cellular biology and genetics: 7 units
Physics and cellular physiology: 5 units
Clinical approach, communication - Doctor/patient I: 8 units
Clinical approach, communication - Psychology I: 2 units
Second Year
Anatomy of the organs: 8 units
Theoretical approach, gathering and processing of data: 2 units
Physiology A: 8 units
Biochemistry and Molecular Biology A: 8 units
Physiology B: 10 units
Biochemistry and Molecular Biology B: 10 units
Immunology: 5 units
General Organ Pathology: 1 unit
Clinical approach, communication - Doctor/patient II: 6 units
Clinical approach, communication - Psychology II: 2 units
Third Year
Bacteriology: 7 units
Virology: 4 units
Pathology of the organs: 13 units
Clinical approach: 4 units
Pharmacology and toxicology: 14 units
Research assignment: 18 units
Fourth Year
Immunochemistry: 2 units
Disease of the throat, nose and ear: 3 units
Internal Medicine, theoretical: 13 units
Internal Medicine, clinical: 13 units
Image Analysis: 3 units
Surgery, theoretical: 13 units
Surgery, clinical: 13 units
Fifth Year
Obstetrics and gynaecology: 12 units
Psychiatry: 14 units
Neuropathology: 10 units
Pediatrics: 12 units
Medical genetics: 4 units
Dermatology and STDs: 4 units
Sixth Year
Public health: 3 units
Practical Oncology: 2 units
Forensic medicine: 3 units
Toxicology: 2 units
Rehabilitation Medicine: 2 units
Emergency Medicine: 4 units
Management and quality control: 2 units
Medical Law: 0 units
Anaesthesiology: 4 units
General Practice: 8 units
Then at the end of the sixth year, I can choose one subject that equals 24 units, and then there is a standardized international final exam, mostly intended for comparison between different universities.
What's wrong with this picture?
You might have noticed how much time is spent on teaching people how to be healthy. If you haven't then I can save you the time of looking through the list again. The answer is almost none.
Out of six years of hard work, there's not a single subject on exercise or nutrition. In my opinion, this should be changed. I think doctors should most definitely be taught how to keep people healthy instead of just dealing with their diseases, because often those diseases are lifestyle-related and could easily be prevented by living healthy. Actually a small part of one biochemistry course in the second year is about nutrition, but it's just a few lectures, and a small course on public health in the sixth year which deals with the health of the public as a whole. I will of course make a thorough review of the nutrition lectures when I'm done with them. There may be a bit more emphasis on nutrition in other medical schools.
I'm sure doctors get questions all the time from patients about how to be healthy. The patients that would ask those questions are genuinely interested in improving their health, but the doctor may not have a clear answer for them, except for the things he has cared to learn by himself. He may reply with some form of conventional wisdom, such as going on a low fat diet or trying to lose weight by burning calories through exercise.
Doctors, more often than not having quite big egos, may not be willing to listen to a patient that has questions about such things as a low-carbohydrate diet. The doctor will probably convince the person that low-carb diets are bad. Not because they're trying to do harm but because they just don't know any better, they haven't read all the promising research. Of course there are a few doctors who have decided to spend some of their own time in learning about nutrition or exercise.
The take home message:
Your doctor probably doesn't know a lot about nutrition or exercise, so he is most likely not the right person to ask. You could ask a nutritionist or a trainer, but in my opinion the best way is to make your own research online and make your own decision about what you think is healthy and suits your lifestyle.
Author info: Kris is a medical student very interested in nutrition and exercise and would like to change the future of medicine for it to be more focused on preventing diseases instead of treating them.
Consider visiting my blog, all content is free: Kris Health Blog.
Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Kristjan_Gunnarsson
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