Most difficult year of med school

[Auspicious]

I've heard different years referred to as the most difficult year for med students, and I assume that's because the program just differs from school to school. I'm curious how it went for most people, though.

And I guess by "difficult" I mean the year that placed the greatest strain on them.

Also, feel free to say below which was the second-most-difficult year.

My DH said third year of med school was the most difficult because it was such an adjustment (going from the classroom into the hospital and having all new responsibilities) and was the most time consuming. His second hardest was the second year because of Step I and because he wanted to get out of the classroom and into the hospital.

Another interesting question is: what year of residency is the hardest?

[DCJenn]

My husband said that 3rd year was the most difficult because of the switch to clinical medicine. But he also enjoyed the change. As for residency- Year number one was the absolute worst. and we didn't even have it that badly!

Jenn

[Amiens]

As far as medical school- third year was the worse I thought (as does Matt). It was such an adjustment for our marriage, and for Matt's life- new responsibilities, etc.

For residency- for us intern year was the worst. Even next year (Matt's R3 year) is supposed to be harder, but it will not be anything in comparison to his IM internship- at least he will get post call days off, instead of going 11 days sometimes without a day off.

Crystal

For us the second year of med school was the hardest. It was the combination of how much more info Russ had to absorb (he studied constantly), the stress of the boards and we also had a baby born that year. I am sure it all depends on the program though. I thought the third year was great! Russ was so excited to be out of the classroom.

As far as residency .... I am going to say internship year ... even though that is where we are now and we haven't experienced the rest of residency. Just looking at next year's schedule gives me hope!!!! This Q3 stuff is getting old!!!

Robin

[SueC]

Yes, I agree about intern year--it sucked! We didn't have kids yet, so I can't imagine doing that with a baby to take care of. First year of fellowship either ties or is a close second.

[DCJenn]

Great...because it was so much fun the first time! Something to look forward to, I guess. At least for fellowship I'll be home!

Jenn

[mommax3]

I voted for third year of med school because of the switch to actually being in the hospital and giving up control of your schedule for the first time -- also not knowing what a particular rotation would entail schedule-wise until the first day, so it was hard to plan ahead from month to month. (At least during residency, I KNEW he wouldn't be home!)

The first six weeks of intern year were really hard, not only because of the work, but because he was scared to death (HUGE learning curve) and was learning military acronyms and procedures on top of everything else. In his specialty, though, (OB/GYN) the interns spent a lot of time off-service (out of the OB/GYN dept.) doing rotations in Ambulatory Care, Trauma Surgery, Endocrinology, Family Practice, E.R., and Internal Medicine, and some of those rotations, actually most of them, except for Trauma Surgery, were pretty sweet. Of course, I didn't know how good it was at the time -- it was still hard and from all I had heard about "intern year", I figured second year would be better. WRONG! Once he was in the OB/GYN Dept. pretty much full time, the hours were more predictable, but they were uniformly bad.
I have heard, since we have been done, that the residency program where we were is particularly malignant and painful, so don't be discouraged by this -- but I think you have to take the specialty into consideration when you think about which year is the worst of residency. For us, the ratings (horrible to tolerable) go like this: 2, 1, 4, 3.

Sally