A Few Study Tricks
So here are a few specific Study Techniques I’ve learnt from people I’m grateful to for teaching them to me.
Visualising
One of the most difficult things to do is to remember what you’ve learnt.
To improve retention, when you’re reading, try to create and visualise a story around your study material.
Here’s a few examples:
So Multiple Sclerosis: Imagine a ruff buff bodyguard protecting a bent electrical man. That’s Prednisone (a steroid) that’s in front of the Lermhite Sign (Electric Pain on Bending Forwards)
MCQ: Which is the 1st Drug Started in MS?
Another example is Spiegelberg’s Criteria. How do you even remember that such a vague name refers to an Ovarian Ectopic??
Visualise it: Pretend the Director S. Spielberg is jamming his hand into someone’s abdomen and grabbing an ovary with his bare hands.
MCQ: Spiegelberg’s Criteria is used for?
This all sounds utter stupid, but the reason it works very well to recall trivial details is because, instead of just reading and letting the brain passively take data in, you’re actually making it WORK for it- by trying to figure out ways to visualise and remember it. When the brain puts in EFFORT, it remembers better. AND you have to pay attention.
The gorier the images visualised, the better. Graphic scenes fire up your Amygdala- Any fearful stimuli by nature has been designed so that it stays in memory longer.
This technique is used a LOT by the rankers.
YouTube
YouTube is a great place to learn.
Use it when you can’t grasp a concept through your notes.
Remember to play them at 1.5x-2x so you don’t waste too much time.
Another “secret” used by rankers is to google specifically of “patient testimonies” of the disease you want to learn. Here, patients suffering from the disease explain in (surprising) detail what they go through and how they deal with each of the symtoms.
Use this for niche diseases like so: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dWa-WZYqpxY
MCQ: Seizure that comes in the mornings, and has a very good prognosis- DOC?
YouTube Channels I’ve subscribed to (in my ORDER of preference):
OSMOSIS
Armando Hasudungan
MedCram
DirtyUSMLE
Medico Mnemonics
Medicowesome
Dr. Rajarathna
Roots Dental
SlideShare
Slideshare was a boon for me in Microbiology.
There’s a lot of presentations that’ll teach you just what you need through slides to get a good rank.
If you’re ever out of notes and wish to study a topic in fair amount of detail, use this.
Flash Cards
USMLE Aspirants swear by these, since they work well with spacing techniques for revision.
I used them just for Pharmacology and Physiology formulas.
MCQs are a good replacement for these, though.
You may wish to check out Anki if interested.
{This article is a part of the CostaPG publication.}
