101 Biggest Mistakes 3rd Year Medical Students Make: And How to Avoid Them

As an attending physician who supervises 3rd year medical students during an inpatient clerkship, I repeatedly see common mistakes. I find myself offering the same repetitive feedback to help students transition from the Basic Sciences Coursework Mode to the vastly different Clerkship Mode. This same advice, and more, is cleverly organized in an easy-to-read format in this book - 250 Biggest Mistakes 3rd Year Medical Students Make And How To Avoid Them. From my vantage as an attending on a Pediatric Service, I see certain common themes play out. 1) Shy students can sometimes receive a less than deserving evaluation - are they shy because of personality, or do they lack interest or knowledge? This is definitely an issue early on in rotations, when many students are more tentative. I found the advice in the book useful to offset these kinds of misunderstandings. 2) I find that students exhibit some behaviors that they think are appropriate (or neutral) from the student's vantage point, but are potentially negative from an evaluator's stance. The classic example for me is the student who participates infrequently during rounds. The authors quote a study which showed that medical students are often passive - in teaching rounds, they only spoke 4% of the time. In my experience, students tend to talk about their own patients but keep quiet otherwise. The book shows students ways to increase their participation in the right way. This book is a useful resource to avoid both common and not-so-obvious pitfalls, and serves as an excellent introduction to performing well on the wards. I would highly recommend this book for a beginning 3rd year student. J. Reddy, MD Physician preceptor for University of Illinois pediatric rotation

I really wish I had read this book before I started third year. The first chapter on evaluations is reason enough to buy the book-it gives you an idea of how residents and attendings evaluate and why you may receive an evaluation less than you deserve. I also have a new appreciation for how important write-ups and oral case presentations are. The authors presented data showing that many attendings never see a student actually perform a history and physical, and that's why much of your grade is based on the write-up and how you present the case. They also have a chapter on giving talks, which I haven't seen anywhere else, but six months into my third year, I realize how often this comes up. I'd also recommend the chapter on questions to ask your attending, resident, and intern during the first few days of a new rotation. If I had had this book earlier, I would have done things differently. Overall, this is a great book, and I recommend it to all third year students. Arul Thirumoorthi 3rd Year Medical Student, University of Toledo College of Medicine

As someone who just matched into dermatology, I can tell you that residencyprogram directors look closely at clerkship grades, especially for the morecompetitive residencies. '101 Biggest Mistakes 3rd Year Medical Students MakeAnd How To Avoid Them' is a book that will help you get great clerkship grades.When you first start rotations, it's tough. You're not always sure where youfit in, what you should do, and how to handle yourself. That's where this bookcomes in - it gives you great advice on what attendings and residents arelooking for in their students. It's done in the form of mistakes students makeyear after year. The idea is if you know these mistakes beforehand, you won'tmake them and you will come across as a better student. What many studentsdon't realize, however, is that a lot of the mistakes this book talks about areREALLY easy to make. That's why I recommend referring to the book regularlythroughout the rotation (like on write-up or when giving talks) to train yourmind against making them. Otherwise, you'll find yourself unknowingly makingthem and probably finding out you made them when your resident or attendingtells you so. By then, it may already hurt your evaluation. If you follow thisadvice, work hard, and read, you will be in good shape for better evaluations.

I am a med student who just started third year four months ago. My first rotation was Internal Medicine. During our clerkship orientation, the clerkship director recommended that we read this book. I had never heard of the book before then. He told us that if you follow the recs and tips, it will put you in line for great evals on all rotations. I can't speak for all rotations but it did the job for me during the Internal Med rotation. What was really helpful was the chapter on presenting newly admitted patients. I was really worried about presenting patients to my attending physician and resident but this book was a good guide, showing me where students have gotten into trouble before. It really helped me give good presentations from the get go. My attending physician even said that my presentation skills were better than most new students. I also liked the information on feedback (how to request it), how to set up meetings with the attending, tips to impress attendings, and suggestions for giving talks.

As an attending physician who works with and advises a lot of third year medical students, I'd like to offer students my thoughts about this book and compare and contrast this book with other guides. Currently, there are really only three books that deal with the third year of medical school. In addition to this one, there's also "First Aid for the Wards" and "How to be a Truly Excellent Junior Medical Student". All three have their strengths and weaknesses. "101 Biggest Mistakes" is a book that I recommend all medical students read at the start of the third year. Not only is it a quick read, it is really the only one that focuses on mistakes that third years make. I agree with the author when he says that these mistakes often prevent students from earning the best possible evaluation. I have a couple of copies of this book that I hand out to my students on the first day of the rotation. Since it is a quick read, it doesn't take them long to read it. When they are done reading it, they often say to me "this is common sense" and I agree that some of the mistakes are common sense. Despite reading it, most then go on to make some of the same mistakes that are in the book. At first, this surprised me. But then I figured out why. It's because these mistakes are so easy to make that you don't realize you're making them. Now, I encourage them to read it every week - since starting this policy, they are making less of these mistakes on their write-ups, oral case presentations, talks, and attending rounds. One student told me that he read the write-up chapter every single time he wrote a write-up to make sure he didn't make any of the mistakes.Don't get me wrong - it's not a perfect book. For example, it doesn't offer rotation-specific advice like "First Aid" does nor does it show you how to write a progress note or admit note like "How to be a truly excellent junior medical student" does. But none of these three books are perfect and that's the big take home point, in my opinion. Until that perfect book comes along, I recommend using either "First Aid" or "How to be a truly excellent junior medical student" along with "101 biggest mistakes".