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About The Battalion. (College Station, Tex.) 1893-current | View Entire Issue (Nov. 4, 1982)
gaH| ■ Texas A8cM . . mm The Batta ion November 4, 1982/Page 1B >" & Johns company j » > stop thtl I A&M medical school respected by Diane Yount Battalion Reporter I The Texas A&M College of Medicine began in 1977 with no building, no accreditation, no reputation, and only 32 stu dents. Now, in 1982, the school is about to move into its own new building, it has received an un usual five-year accreditation from the Liaison Committee of Medical Education, its reputa tion is growing, and more than 500 students have applied for J entrance into the Class of '87. > "We will be conducting inter views until April,” William E. Ward, associate dean for Stu dent Affairs says. “We expect to actually interview 300 students out of the hundreds of applica tions we receive. From those 500, we will get a class of about 40 that will graduate in 1987.” The process of getting in and put of medical school takes many years. Beginning with undergraduate work, entrance tests, and interviews and con tinuing with classroom studies, dinical work and more inter views, the time it takes to become doctor averages 10 years, although it can take as few as [eight and may seem more like 15. “The interviews to get into medical school aren’t very high pressure,” David Barnett, a [senior at Texas A&M says. “It's pretty relaxed but even so, you mow you have to impress the interviewer.” Starting with their first year [of college, students attempting to get into medical school must [always keep that goal in mind. ‘1 liked the medical program [at A&M my junior year in high bool,” Andy Dean, a fourth- tar medical student says. “I knew I wanted to go to A&M so 1 wasready to study hard to get in. I was accepted as a sophomore. Iliyas the only school I applied Texas A&M is one of the few Imediral schools in the country accepts applications from lundergraduate sophomores, Ward says. Most schools require accept at least junior standing. o” feel like I had a distinct advantage,” Dean said. “I didn’t have time to get burnt out on school like some other people did.” During the interviews, each student is given a tour of the school’s facilities in Temple, in addition to a tour of the Texas A&M campus. Each interview takes two days and introduces the student to the entire medical program. The Texas A&M program in volves two years of classroom work in College Station and two years of hospital work in Tem ple. The first year is mostly studying courses such as ana tomy. “I studied like Eve never stu died before,” Philip Sissons, a medical student, said. “It was class work all day. Pretty much from 8 to 4.” Sometimes study goes beyond books. “The first day of school we bad three or four classes in the morning and then we walked into lab,” Sissons said. “There was a body there.” Both Sissons and Dean recall that first day of school. Dean: “At first all you see is a big slab of skin. You never really know what to expect. It was a little easier for me because both of my partners were repeating SS the course.” Sissons: “I was the first one to 5s cut. Right down the back. You jjss have depersonalize the cadaver. ==: We named ours Elsie.” Dean: “Ours was a red- SEE headed man with a big tattoo. == He died of heart failure. You =§§ know, some of my classmates said== that they would never donate }EE their bodies to science after that == class, but I will. My mind won’t =55 be there so why should I care?” §3 Sissons: “You don’t see the EES: body’s head, until 75 percent of £5 the class is finished. It’s not that ESS bad. The first thing that strikes 5|| you as being really human is the 555 hand. What’s more human than a hand?” Phil Sissons Classes dealing with subjects such as human anatomy are taken in the first and second years of school. These classes currently are conducted in faci lities on campus, mainly in the Teague Research Center. The new medical building, located on Highway 60 past Wellborn Road, will be ready for occupan cy in February. A new medical library next to the building is in the design stage. “We hope to have ground broken for the library in a year,” Dean Ward said. “Right now our medical library is in the vet school and doesn’t get as much use as it should.” Sissons rates the current faci lities for first- and second-year students as very adequate. “As a matter of fact they are pretty,good. You can’t beat the microscopes,” he says. During the second year of studies, some of the work load occurs oitside of the classroom and laboratory. Students visit the offices of local doctors in a program that is unique to Texas A&M — the preceptorship program. “It was really nice to get a brief glimpse of the various doc tors practicing their speciali ties,” Sissons said. Ward also is enthusiastic. “The patient response to this program has been overwhelm ing,” he says. “We hope to con tinue this program. We feel it is an advantage to the student.” After second-year finals are completed, the students have about three weeks in which to move to Temple. “Boy, was that a disaster,” Sis sons said. “We had three weeks to get everything packed and over to Temple. I was lucky. My wife came and found a place fhr lllllllllllllllll OFFICIAL NOTICE General Studies Program Students who plan to Pre-Register for the Spring j== Semester in the General Studies Program are §!| URGED to pick up a Pre-registration Form in SEE Room 100 of Harrington Tower from Oct. 26 thru Sf Nov. 12. us to live.” For those students who wish to live close to the Veterans Administration Hospital, the medical school provides housing on the grounds. The price for each student is about $90 a month. “The price is pretty cheap,” Dean says. “Nothing like College Station.” The third and fourth years in volve the student in “hands-on” experience. During the junior year, each student serves various clerkships in surgery, medicine, pediatrics, psychiatry, obstetrics and gynecology. During this clerkship, the student gets to see and diagnose patients under the guidance of doctors and hospital interns. “A lot of students at other schools complain that they do scut work — I Vs, blood-drawing — we got to work closer with the interns,” Sissons says. “I would make first line decisions on some patient’s care and the intern would check my decisions. More or less, half of the service was mine.” The demands of medical school can be trying. “The third and fourth years See MEDICAL page 7B lllllllli ^eel the luxury . . . Warm water running through your hair. Cleansing. Massaging. Gentle suds rinsed out, leaving a soft, sweet scent. Now, the cut. 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