Biochemistry Intercalation

Would you intercalate, given your time again?
Absolutely. Its really good to have a break from medicine, as medicine is so intense. Biochemistry has felt like a year off compared to the last two years. I’ve had time to dedicate to other things. It’s also shown me just how much I want to do medicine and not get stuck in a lab for the rest of my life.

Do you recommend subject X?
Absolutely. Though not a popular choice (everyone told me I was mad for wanting to do it) I find biochemistry fascinating. And its good to have something different. Loads of doctors will had BSc anatomy or physiology, but not biochemistry. I loved it. But I also know most ppl don’t share my passion for biochemistry. So don’t do it unless you really want to do it, and I’d say that about any subject. A year is a long time to be stuck in something you hate.

Outline of course structure (brief)
Oct-Jan 8 lectures a week, Mon, Wed, Thurs, Fri ay 9am, Tues lectures at 10,11,2:15 and 3:30. Feb and March option course so 32 lectures over 8 weeks (roughly 4 a week, but I had two full weeks at the start and finished two weeks before easter) also colloquia 3 times a term when some bigwig for outside the university comes and lectures. This isn’t compulsory but a good idea if you want the top grades. 6 core units (16 lectures each) and four option units (8 lectures each). Options are between medical biochemistry and more technical structural type stuff.

Assessment
2 projects, one a library based, read lots of papers etc (8%) one lab based where you do hands on research and then write it up (19%). 5 exams, one is a literary review (8%) and four final exams (65%). One of these paper is on the options course, the other three on two core units each. This are in mid May. I start exams 15th May and finish 22nd.

Department support
Excellent if you need it but I doubt you will. Not many ppl intercalate in biochemistry (this year there were 2) and so they look after you really well. You have a personal tutor (Kelly Moule) who is very approachable, and two academic tutors incase you want to go over anything you may have missed for the first two years. I found the course was stand alone and I didn’t need to do any extra background work.

Weekly workload
With no tutorials to read for or assignments to hand in (except the projects which are handed in after Easter) you can happily go from week to week doing no work whatsoever outside lectures. However, this does make revising a bit more difficult. For every lecture you are given extra reading for, and if, in the exam, you show no evidence of extra reading you can’t get more than 65%. So if you want a first or a high 2:1 by all means do the reading. It’s time consuming and dull. I decided early on that I didn’t want either of those classifications so didn’t do any of the extra reading. Which has meant I have had so much time to do other things (which is one of the main reasons I intercalated). However, going over the lectures you’ve just had is always a good idea, but how many of us actually do that?

Enjoyment
I love biochemistry, and I have loved being a ‘proper’ student for a year, with so much time to do other things, get involved in societies, earn some money, go on holiday etc etc. I have defiantly enjoyed myself. And I get so excited about the course! How everything works in the body is just so clever.

Subject matter: what you expected, flexible, stimulating?
The course isn’t really flexible, except for the options at the end. Erm I expected lot of biochemistry, and that’s what I got :-D I did expect more metabolic pathways but there is very little of that in the third year course. All fascinating stuff tho! Well, a few dull bits, and a few incoherent lecturers, but you’ll get that anywhere.

Projects: scope, outcomes (conferences, publications etc)
With the projects you are given a long long long list to look through and you write down your top six, and then Leo Brady takes them all home and with some fancy computer system allocates ppl to projects. So if there is an area you are really interested in, pick projects on that topic. One thing I would say though is get projects on the same topic as the core course, then you’re revising as well as doing your projects. Neither of my projects related to the course at all. A bad choice by me. The lab projects you do are continuing proper work in the aim to publish a paper. The library projects are more a review of what is out there already

Overall: Good bits and Bad bits

The only bad thing I could say about it is that as so few medics do biochemistry, you won’t know anyone, and by third year ppls friendship groups are very well established and hard to break into. I had a friend on the course already and so slipped into that circle. I wasn’t on the biochemistry society mailing list so didn’t know about any of the socials. If you want to have the social life aswell make sure you do this. 9 o’clock lectures everyday can be a pain, but it does get you up and doing stuff which is good. Tuesday can be a killer cos you get four lectures and your so used to just one. Lol, I don’t know what I’m gonna be like back in medicine…

Other comments
I had an excellent year in biochemistry. Really enjoyed it and value the experience. It’s good to do something different. It’s probably not the most relavent course to the rest of medicine (apart from the medical options) but it sure is interesting (if you like biochemistry that is)

Mark out of ten
10