Most students think that medical education is only about clearing the entrance exam and getting admission to MBBS. However, the reality is way different than this perception. Clearing the exam isn’t the final step, rather, is the beginning of the life of a medical student. A medical degree is considered one of the toughest degrees in the world. For a student, it’s definitely more work because of the unlimited workload and the time limit, which means a lot less sleep and a lot more stress.

Top Struggles of MBBS Students are:

1. Adjusting with peers: Medical colleges are responsible for ensuring that graduates are knowledgeable, skilful, and professional to meet society’s expectations. Due to this, students have to prepare themselves for the vast syllabus while also adjusting with peers. There is huge peer pressure on medical students when it comes to adjusting themselves in the new environment due to high level of competition.
2. Wow! You are smart, you should be a doctor: Medical might not be the hardest choice for aspirants but the journey is indeed very hard. Students put in all the efforts, and energy to enter the clinical world; the world that includes a lot of hard work, sleepless nights, countless hours of study, and whatnot. However, there are many students who give their 100 percent just to satisfy that One Big Dream of their family and relatives, at the cost of their happiness.
3. Do you have a social life? When it comes to a medical student’s social life, the status is quite complicated. Students get trapped with books, assignments and practices, etc. that they can’t focus much on their social life. Although medicine is a very social course and being a healthcare professional, students must know how to deal with people. To take time out for social activities, students need to maintain a schedule that allows them to manage it all.
4. Start the day and end the day with medicine: – The primary motivation is to enjoy studying. Exhaustion due to continuous studies can make medical college seem like a burden. So students must divert their attention from studies a bit and focus on “personal development.” This involves honing talents that fall outside the purview of academic study yet are nevertheless crucial for a doctor. For instance, participating in music or theatre can help students get used to performing or interacting in front of a large audience. This also helps them to confidently address and speak at a conference or simply to a group of their coworkers. There is a balance that needs to be achieved between working and enjoying life.
5. You have to memorize so many new drugs, that your brain might explode: The most problematic situation that students face is that they need to cram names of thousands of new drugs and various syndromes, which is confusing. Also since these drugs are vast along with their own different characteristics, it is easy to forget a few. This is not the end, memorizing drugs also includes knowing their purposes, advantages, and disadvantages, after effects, and what all changes can be possible, which also includes how they respond in every individual’s body.

Watch Video to learn the right way to approach Pharmacology in MBBS

6. The unending workload: – It is a popular talking point that a medical student’s life in med college is endless. The reason behind this is that medical courses are the longest courses in the educational world. It nearly takes a decade to become a fully qualified doctor. The entire journey demands a lot of hard work, sleepless nights, and a huge number of complications. It is not easy to maintain patience throughout this period and often students lose themselves in the wheel of practicals, rounds, syllabus, and examinations.
7. Finance: – Finance is a huge problem for a medical aspirant. How? Not all medical aspirants belong to financially stable families, and neither do all receive government scholarships. Many students dream to become a doctor, but again finances remain a challenge. Medical studies are considered one of the most expensive education all over the world. It is a vast and expensive course. If a student does not have an adequate amount of money, pursuing a medical degree can be challenging. If this problem arises while a student is pursuing the course, students should always have a backup option.
8. Exams Breakdown: – Exams have always been a huge load. Even the thought of it is scary because the syllabus is so vast that sometimes the duration of preparation tends to seem less. There’s no doubt medical life is filled with competitors, which makes the exam period even more stressful. Skipping topics is another aspect that makes it stressful while spending more time on important topics. Additionally, lack of sleep, headaches, and stress can easily lead to breakdowns.
9. A good night’s sleep is a wonder for you: – Back-to-back classes, practicals, and whatnot get tiresome for them. Most students have sleepless nights because of assignments, many even suffer from sleep deprivation or poor sleep quality which is common during the internship. Researchers have paid much attention to the critical function that sleep plays in preserving mental health, advanced learning, and overall welfare. From 1st year to the final year, medical students are particularly prone to sleep-related problems due to the huge syllabus. So it is very important for students to at least have 6 – 8 hours of sound sleep.

Life of Students in the 1st year of MBBS:

Medical College is nothing like high school; it is challenging not simply because there is so much knowledge to gain, but also because students get to learn new skills. Students mostly in their first year, try to understand what kind of studying technique works to cover the syllabus. The first year is all about learning, failing and again understanding where you were wrong and then starting again.

Life in college doesn’t resemble the medical drama– Grey’s Anatomy in reality. No one goes to the clinical rounds in the first year itself. In the first year, students study Biophysics, Anatomy, and Histology and prepare for tests most of the days.

In the first year, it’s not all about saving lives. The only life students can save is theirs, by fixing a decent study routine for themselves, figuring out how to adjust their studies and things they like doing beyond studying and getting sufficient rest.

Life of Students in the 2nd year of MBBS:

It’s the best time to retrospect and make a schedule that can help students manage studies, social life, and sleep. The one benefit students have in their 2nd year is that they get familiar with the environment, faculty, and course too, so it becomes a bit easy for them to communicate and discuss their problems in the class or with the faculty. It gets even easier to make a schedule that can be followed given that students get quite familiar with the frequency of classes, practicals, and tests.

Life of Students in the 3rd year of MBBS:

It is very much like climbing one more step and reaching one step near to the goal of becoming a Top Doc. Becoming more focused on studies and attending a lot of practicals are included in the 3rd year. It is time for students to get exposed to the practical technicalities of the field. Students become familiar with everyday struggles in 3^rd year; they feel the sensation of being worn out, because of classes and clinical rounds. They need to have some sort of framework, whether it be a paper journal or a schedule reminder turned on on their mobile phones.

Life of Students in the 4th year of MBBS:

The significant cause of the pressure students face in the final year is due to the major subjects like Medicine, Surgery, Pediatrics, OBGYN, Orthopaedics, etc. which are highly important for NEET PG. They experience maximum stress when they start going for rounds. Medicine is a long-distance race, not a run. Regardless of whether students complete their last year, it isn’t the end. They still need to learn a lot more because now their real life as interns and saviours begin. It’s now time to put all the knowledge into application.

Get conceptual clarity in Medicine from Dr. Archith Boloor

Passing the final exam in MBBS is crucial to starting your career as a doctor. Students must focus on conceptual clarity to clear the final exams. Discipline and dedication are the keys to mastering the syllabus. Moreover, aspirants that are pursuing the MBBS program at any medical college must complete the internship. An internship is a term of learning, or, to put it in simple words, more practical work than theoretical training. The internship phase is where you put all of the theoretical information you’ve learned over the last four years into action.

You should have a proper plan if you are going to enrol yourself as a medical student, it is a long ride with lots of struggle, hard work, failures, and whatnot. The medical course is exceptionally vast due to the volume of material that needs to be learned along with both the basic scientific principles and the clinical abilities. Keeping in mind the surreal feeling that a doctor feels while saving someone’s life is something that can’t be put into words, and furthermore, the feeling of saving somebody’s life is simply inexplicable. Once your goal is set and you are ready for it, it is definitely going to be the best chapter of your life.