Everything HPAT and medicine for 2010 (R1 points post #1247)

Scoobydooo

What revision course is the best, Institute one or the one in Griffith College ?

Sallywest

Anyone here doing medicine in galway? Thinking of putting it no 1 on my cao as i really dont want to go to dub!?

OxfordComma

Sallywest wrote: »

Anyone here doing medicine in galway? Thinking of putting it no 1 on my cao as i really dont want to go to dub!?

Yeah, I'm in Pre-Med in Galway I absolutely love it so far. NUIG's a great college - the lecturers are top notch, there's a fantastic nightlife (very important ) and I've made so many new friends in the past two months - everyone's really friendly and easy to talk to. We've got a really nice timetable - I'm finished for the day at 1 pm most days:) We have four subjects (Early Patient Contact, Physics, Chemistry and Biology), plus things like practical Communications sessions with students from other health disciplines (Nursing, Speech and Language Therapy, Occupational Therapy, Midwifery etc), and clinical activities where you meet patients and take histories. We also learn practical skills such as CPR and measuring blood pressure.

In terms of Medicine, it's literally right beside UCHG hospital (no other med school has this to offer as far as I know) and you learn how to talk to patients and take histories almost immediately - you begin your clinical activity in the first semester. Because we're in Pre-Med, most of our lectures are on the main campus with the 1st Science and Engineering students, but most of the Medicine lectures in later years are held in the Clinical Sciences Institute, a new building that's attached to the hospital.

Of course, NUIG mightn't be for you if you want to finish the course in five years, because not many people are offered the chance to skip Pre-Med and go straight into 1st Med (and of those who do, a lot drop down because they can't handle the workload and aren't really given a chance to settle in to college life). Personally, I really don't see the point of doing the degree in five years, but if you do then you might prefer somewhere like Trinity or UCC where they don't have a Pre-Med year.

Obviously, I can't discuss the pros and cons of other med schools, not having experienced them myself (I presume they're all just as worthy of praise), but I really do love NUIG. It was my first choice on the CAO, and I'm glad I decided to go there instead of UCD or Trinity.

whadabouchasir

1fahy4 wrote: »

It's theoretically possible to get in to Med with less than 500 points, but in practice,

There's a lad in my class who got 217 in the Hpat so they could have scraped in to NUIG with 495 however I thnk that this was the highest Hpat score in the country so he would have been the only one in the country that could have gotten in with less than 500 points.

andypandy40

lizt wrote: »

I don't really think I need to worry about myself as I'm already in university doing the course I want to do.

I only meant the reason they introduced the HPAT was to give people with the aptitude who can't regurgitate two years worth of material in two hours a fair chance to get medicine. In my opinion it should be introduced for more courses.

doin the course you wana do.. you mean apart from medicine.. y r u even on this forum.. y do u wan mre apptitude tests, wud dat have made it easier for u to get n2 arts??

Either your right about your first statement that people aren't cut out for medicine without this apptitude, or your not. The fact remains you could only make a reasonable opinion after sitting the Hpat. Meaning your right, and you did bad in the Hpat, or your completley wrong and you don't know what your talking about because you never sat the Hpat.

whadabouchasir

andypandy40 wrote: »

doin the course you wana do.. you mean apart from medicine.. y r u even on this forum.. y do u wan mre apptitude tests, wud dat have made it easier for u to get n2 arts??

Anyone can post on this forum,so long as theyre not trolling.

Malmedicine

1fahy4 wrote: »

In terms of Medicine, it's literally right beside UCHG hospital (no other med school has this to offer as far as I know)

Vincents is pretty close to UCD around 300 m or so

bythewoods

whadabouchasir wrote: »

There's a lad in my class who got 217 in the Hpat so they could have scraped in to NUIG with 495 however I thnk that this was the highest Hpat score in the country so he would have been the only one in the country that could have gotten in with less than 500 points.

The top score in the country was 230 actually, and a girl in Waterford got it.

randylonghorn

andypandy40 wrote: »

doin the course you wana do.. you mean apart from medicine.. y r u even on this forum.. y do u wan mre apptitude tests, wud dat have made it easier for u to get n2 arts??

Welcome to Boards, Andy ... please note that txtspit is unwelcome around here.

whadabouchasir wrote: »

Anyone can post on this forum,so long as theyre not trolling.

Exactly.

whadabouchasir

bythewoods wrote: »

The top score in the country was 230 actually, and a girl in Waterford got it.

My bad.

mohas004

I´ve heard many people say that ACER is goin to make sure and see into that this years avarege is also goin to be 150 points.

I mean how is that possible, what if our generation (those who is sitting the HPAT) is considerably smarter (or somehow) and get higher scores comparing to to last years???

mohas004

mohas004 wrote: »

I´ve heard many people say that ACER is goin to make sure and see into that this years avarege is also goin to be 150 points.

I mean how is that possible, what if our generation (those who is sitting the HPAT) is considerably smarter (or somehow) and get higher scores comparing to to last years???

Then they weight more points to the questions fewer people got right. They want the results to fit onto a bell curve. It doesn't really affect who gets in.

meow_bubble

Hi, I know this is kinda off topic but here goes.
I'm applying for medicine this year and I know all about the HPAT and points and all that... but I'm starting to doubt that I'll get mid 500 points in the LC.
So I want to put something similar to medicine as my next option on my CAO, but I'm not sure what. I was thinking biomedical sciences but I heard its not a great degree?
help please?

OxfordComma

meow_bubble wrote: »

Hi, I know this is kinda off topic but here goes.
I'm applying for medicine this year and I know all about the HPAT and points and all that... but I'm starting to doubt that I'll get mid 500 points in the LC.
So I want to put something similar to medicine as my next option on my CAO, but I'm not sure what. I was thinking biomedical sciences but I heard its not a great degree?
help please?

Well it all depends on whether you'd prefer to do a primary degree and then do Graduate Med (which involves doing the GAMSAT), or doing a Health Science degree and sticking with it.

If you want to do GEM, then I'd probably recommend doing a Science degree (undenominated, biomed etc.) You need to have a good knowledge of First Year University standard Biology and Chemistry to do well in the GAMSAT, along with LC standard Physics.

If, on the other hand, you want a similar degree to Medicine, you could consider some of the following perhaps:

• Pharmacy (TCD, UCC, RCSI)
• Dentistry (UCC, TCD...high points!)
• Veterinary Med (UCD... ditto)
• Physiotherapy (TCD, UL...probably others too?)
• Radiation Therapy (TCD)
• Speech and Language Therapy (NUIG, UCC and probably others...)
• Occupational Therapy (NUIG, probably in other places too...)
• Podiatry (NUIG)
• Psychology
• Midwifery
• General/Psychiatric/Veterinary/Dental Nursing
• Medical Physics
• Radiography

There's probably other similar degrees, but hopefully I've provided a fairly comprehensive list... Hope that helps

meow_bubble

1fahy4 wrote: »

Well it all depends on whether you'd prefer to do a primary degree and then do Graduate Med (which involves doing the GAMSAT), or doing a Health Science degree and sticking with it.

If you want to do GEM, then I'd probably recommend doing a Science degree (undenominated, biomed etc.) You need to have a good knowledge of First Year University standard Biology and Chemistry to do well in the GAMSAT, along with LC standard Physics.


If, on the other hand, you want a similar degree to Medicine, you could consider some of the following perhaps:

• Pharmacy (TCD, UCC, RCSI)
• Dentistry (UCC, TCD...high points!)
• Veterinary Med (UCD... ditto)
• Physiotherapy (TCD, UL...probably others too?)
• Radiation Therapy (TCD)
• Speech and Language Therapy (NUIG, UCC and probably others...)
• Occupational Therapy (NUIG, probably in other places too...)
• Podiatry (NUIG)
• Psychology
• Midwifery
• General/Psychiatric/Veterinary/Dental Nursing
• Medical Physics
• Radiography

There's probably other similar degrees, but hopefully I've provided a fairly comprehensive list... Hope that helps

THANKS!! =]

theowen

Podiatry:the study of the diseases of the foot. How cool.

OxfordComma

theowen wrote: »

Podiatry:the study of the diseases of the foot. How cool.

Podiatrists do great work.


Have they announced the date for HPAT 2010 yet? I hope for ye're sakes that they're not holding the exam the day after most people finish their mocks, like last year

1fahy4

1fahy4 wrote: »

Podiatrists do great work.


Have they announced the date for HPAT 2010 yet? I hope for ye're sakes that they're not holding the exam the day after most people finish their mocks, like last year

27th February 2010, aka my 18th birthday

jumpguy

1fahy4 wrote: »

Well it all depends on whether you'd prefer to do a primary degree and then do Graduate Med (which involves doing the GAMSAT), or doing a Health Science degree and sticking with it.

If you want to do GEM, then I'd probably recommend doing a Science degree (undenominated, biomed etc.) You need to have a good knowledge of First Year University standard Biology and Chemistry to do well in the GAMSAT, along with LC standard Physics.

If, on the other hand, you want a similar degree to Medicine, you could consider some of the following perhaps:

• Pharmacy (TCD, UCC, RCSI)
• Dentistry (UCC, TCD...high points!)
• Veterinary Med (UCD... ditto)
• Physiotherapy (TCD, UL...probably others too?)
• Radiation Therapy (TCD)
• Speech and Language Therapy (NUIG, UCC and probably others...)
• Occupational Therapy (NUIG, probably in other places too...)
• Podiatry (NUIG)
• Psychology
• Midwifery
• General/Psychiatric/Veterinary/Dental Nursing
• Medical Physics
• Radiography

There's probably other similar degrees, but hopefully I've provided a fairly comprehensive list... Hope that helps

Thanks, great post. What do you mean "primary degree" and "graduate degree" though. What's the difference?

whadabouchasir

theowen wrote: »

Podiatry:the study of the diseases of the foot. How cool.

It would be quite similar to Medicine as well.I know that in NUIG they're in with the medicine students fot pharmacology and they do physiology too.They also spend some time on clinical placement in Merlin park hospital to.

aligleas wrote: »

<snip>

Look, you're obviously a spammer,you only joined Boards today,have no freinds and all your 4 posts are advertising revision courses,except one that's advertising music lessons.

randylonghorn

whadabouchasir wrote: »

Look, you're obviously a spammer,you only joined Boards today,have no freinds and all your 4 posts are advertising revision courses,except one that's advertising music lessons.

Then report, please ... !

IHeartChemistry

A word of advice...

DO NOT DO HPAT PREP COURSES!!!

I'm doing one atm and it is totally USELESS!!

Seriously, just practise the type of questions or whatever...but whatever ye do..do not spend the bones of €400 on prep courses...it's not worth it :rolleyes: just an easy way to make money in a recession

Thats my rant over

OxfordComma

jumpguy wrote: »

Thanks, great post. What do you mean "primary degree" and "graduate degree" though. What's the difference?

Thanks Well basically a "primary degree" or "undergraduate degree" is normally the first degree you'd do after you finish secondary school. They're "Bachelor of..." type degrees (eg. B.A., Bachelor of Arts; B.E., Bachelor of Engineering etc), and generally last 4 years (some Arts and Commerce degrees last 3 years, while Medicine takes either 5 or 6 depending on the College, whether you opt to do Pre-Med or not, etc). The vast majority of people would then go on to do a Postgrad degree such as a Master's or PhD.

In Ireland, once you've completed a primary degree, you have the option of applying to study "Graduate Entry Medicine", which is basically a shorter course (4 years long) than the standard medical degree (which, as stated previously, lasts 5-6 years).

It would be quite similar to Medicine as well.I know that in NUIG they're in with the medicine students fot pharmacology and they do physiology too.They also spend some time on clinical placement in Merlin park hospital to.

Agreed. I know a guy who's doing Podiatry and it sounds like a pretty demanding course, and obviously there's a lot of Medical subjects to study (Physiology is considered to be one of the "foundations" of Medicine, along with Anatomy and Biochem.)

Theowen, I'm sure you didn't mean any harm by your comment, but you could really offend someone who's studying Podiatry if you say things like that.

IHeartChemistry

IHeartChemistry wrote: »

A word of advice...

DO NOT DO HPAT PREP COURSES!!!

I'm doing one atm and it is totally USELESS!!

Seriously, just practise the type of questions or whatever...but whatever ye do..do not spend the bones of €400 on prep courses...it's not worth it :rolleyes: just an easy way to make money in a recession

Thats my rant over

Yeah, I keep hearing this from people. I always thought there's nothing they can teach you worth €400 about an aptitude test that you couldn't figure out yourself with a practice book.

Does anyone know if the practice book that you can buy now is different or the same as the one you could buy last year? Because I already have a copy of that one.

pfannkuchen

Deleted User wrote: »

Yeah, I keep hearing this from people. I always thought there's nothing they can teach you worth €400 about an aptitude test that you couldn't figure out yourself with a practice book.

Does anyone know if the practice book that you can buy now is different or the same as the one you could buy last year? Because I already have a copy of that one.

Actually, I did a two day revision course and found it very helpful. We did a mock exam, got tips on timing, went through the best way to approach different question types and most importantly, gained some confidence. Obviously some people find them more useful than others, but I certainly didn't find it to be a waste of time/money

This year's practice book is apparently identical to last year's, bar one question.

davidor

lizt wrote: »

Hey guys, just wanted to say prep courses are a complete waste of time and money. ACER have even admitted there's nothing you can learn from it and the medical times had a front page article supporting this statement a few weeks ago. All they do with you is time management - and you can figure that out from the info online anyway. I've done a HPAT (a slightly different one for entry into SLT up north) and I know from personal experience there is ABSOLUTELY NOTHING you can learn for it. All you can do is be familiar with the layout of the paper and keep track of your timing.

Hope this helps!!

I completely disagree, just did one in the institute yesterday, it was brilliant, I dont no how people who don't do it will manage.

HQvhs

davidor wrote: »

I completely disagree, just did one in the institute yesterday, it was brilliant, I dont no how people who don't do it will manage.

Well I, and almost everyone I know currently doing medicine, did one and we got on just fine.

Anyway, I'm wary of these new users coming on with low post counts encouraging young people to spend ridiculous sums of money of HPAT prep courses.

OxfordComma

davidor wrote: »

I completely disagree, just did one in the institute yesterday, it was brilliant, I dont no how people who don't do it will manage.

Fair enough, but you don't have to do a prep course to do well. In fact, most of the Pre-Meds I know that got really high HPAT scores didn't do a prep course. I got results in the 92nd percentile last year and didn't do a prep course, so to those people who haven't done one, don't worry!! Your own natural ability is what's going to determine your score on the day, and unfortunately there ain't much you can do to improve that.

Also, I think the fact that these Prep courses are giving people a (perhaps false) sense of security is quite worrying. Last year's HPAT was really, really difficult - far more so than the official sample test we were given. You can't ever really be ready for the HPAT because of the nature of the exam, and going in thinking completely chilled out and thinking you'll be grand because you did a prep course is a very foolish mistake to make. The exam's going to test your reasoning abilities to their very limits.

I've seen the power point slides from the Institute prep course and I can tell you there's nothing amazing to be learnt from it. It only gives very basic tips on timing that you genuinely would learn yourself from doing a practice test. It's scandalous how much they're charging for so little benefit.

mohas004

IHeartChemistry wrote: »

A word of advice...

DO NOT DO HPAT PREP COURSES!!!

I'm doing one atm and it is totally USELESS!!

Seriously, just practise the type of questions or whatever...but whatever ye do..do not spend the bones of €400 on prep courses...it's not worth it :rolleyes: just an easy way to make money in a recession
Thats my rant over

I completely agree with you... those people who arrange these "prep courses" is a bunch of lairs with only one objective - run a profitable business...

Just out of curiosity.. which prep course are you talking about?