Preparing for Medical School - Page 4
In summary, while the premedical core studies in
the sciences will usually absorb
the greatest portion of one's time and energy,
one must place these in the proper per-
spective of the entire program of undergraduate
education. For just as the patient should
be viewed as a whole rather than as merely a
collection of organ systems, so too should
the person be educated as a whole in order to
face both the academic as well as the
nonacademic challenges that lie ahead. In
essence this means that the student should
attempt to secure a meaningful balance between
the physical and biological sciences,
and the humanities and social sciences. In this
way, not only will the college experience
be more pleasurable, but also one's sense of
purpose and ethical values will be devel-
oped, and a more humanistic physician can
evolve in a mechanistically oriented society.
Table 3.1
SUMMARY OF REQUIRED COURSES
+ required by more than 100
schools
– required by fewer than 20
schools
Course
Chemistry
Inorganic (or General) Chemistry
+
Organic Chemistry
+
Qualitative Analysis
–
Quantitative Analysis
–
Physical Chemistry/Quantitative
Analysis
–
*Biochemistry
–
Other
–
Biology
General Biology (or Zoology)
+
Embryology
–
Genetics
–
Comparative Anatomy
–
Cell Biology
–
Molecular Biology
–
Other
–
Physics
General Physics
+
Other
–
Mathematics
College Mathematics
–
College Algebra
–
Analytical Geometry
–
Trigonometry
–
Calculus
–
Other
–
Humanities
English
+
Language
–
Other
–
Social and Behavioral Sciences
Sociology
–
Psychology
–
Behavioral Science
–
Social Science
–
Other
–
*For some schools biochemistry is required or
may be used as a sub-
stitute for one semester of organic
chemistry.
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