The time of your life
My medical school years have been the best years of my life so far. The freedom and wealth of opportunity are exhilarating—more
than what I hoped for when I left Hong Kong in 2003. I often dream about the things I could do, and it seems that I am limited
only by the 24 hours in a day and the 52 weeks in each year (http://student.bmj.com/issues/08/05/careers/200.php). As I agonise about making the most of this time I can forget my intellectual, moral, and circumstantial limits.
Early in my student editorship I wrote as much as I could. But unedited articles started piling up as I refused to acknowledge
that I had taken on too much. If not for my colleagues’ honest confrontation an issue of the Student BMJ may have fallen to pieces. Often we owe more to those around us than we give them credit for. In this issue Simon Graham
describes how his best friend pushed him to take a dyslexia test after he struggled to read exam instructions in the allocated
time (http://student.bmj.com/issues/08/05/life/186.php). With a diagnosis of dyslexia he subsequently received the extra time that he needed in exams.
Despite the best efforts of medical schools to level the playing field, exams are never completely fair. Daniel Sokol explains
how we can approach these unfair exams in an ethical way, by examining our motivations and working from basic principles (http://student.bmj.com/issues/08/05/careers/198.php). Should we use leaked past papers? If a consultant tips you off about the content of an upcoming exam, who would you share
the information with? Or would you blow the whistle?
The value of our time at medical school depends largely on the quality of the course. There is a continuing debate about whether
a problem based learning or a conventional curriculum is better. An editorial in this issue suggests that we should move on
to accept the diversity in curriculums and measure the outcomes instead (http://student.bmj.com/issues/08/05/editorials/183.php). After all, what matters is whether graduates have “the required competencies for good medical practice.” Could these be
measured by a national qualifying exam (http://student.bmj.com/issues/08/05/life/184.php http://student.bmj.com/issues/08/05/life/185.php)?
The introduction of such an exam should not deter international students from applying to UK medical schools. Whether the
exam is set by individual medical schools or nationally, final exams are merely a hurdle to the attractive prospect of high
quality postgraduate training and employment. Unfortunately, the access of international students to postgraduate training
was jeopardised in recent months by changes in the Department of Health’s rules (http://student.bmj.com/issues/08/05/news/180.php).
Despite the tumult of policy changes, I have found the UK to be a remarkably stable place to study medicine. From a first
person account, medical student life in Iraq seems incomparable (http://student.bmj.com/issues/08/05/life/187.php). Getting to class can involve dodging bombs, hiding from mortar shells, and running from bullets. Medical students in Iraq
dream of a better life, and medicine may be their passport to working as a doctor in another country.
Hugh Ip student editor
hip@bmj.com
Student BMJ 2008;16:178 | 17
