Average hours of sleep during first year?

[DocSMA617]

Hi. I’m starting my first year pretty soon and I was wondering how many hours of sleep did y’all get during the first year of med school?

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[Espressso]

However much you want to prioritize. I got a routine 7 hours of sleep each night. Probably one of the most important things you can do imo. People during first year who threw their sleep out of the window really suffered and it was obvious.

 

[Hippocrates II]

I get ~7 hours of sleep a night. Other than a few select times like neuro, first year isn't bad at all if you adopt efficient studying techniques.

 

[hallowmann]

7-9 hrs/night, except when I stayed up to watch something or cram, and it became 4-6 hrs. Ahh how nice the nights before children were...

Seriously, there's plenty of time for sleep if you prioritize it, which you should.

 

[watermelon master]

8 hours per night years 1 and 2 and during dedicated. Haven't started 3rd year yet

 

[EmilKraepelin55]

Stopped studying at 10 pm most nights, slept till 6 am every day. It’s good to have a routine to stick to so that you can remain disciplined as well as maintain a good sleeping schedule. Remember the more REM sleep you get after you study, the more your memories will be strengthened, the better your active recall will be in the long run. It’s all about efficiency young one

 

[KeikoTanaka]

Stop taking stimulants early in the day. Switch to chamomile tea in the evenings

 

[siliso]

As many as needed and desired. Classes don’t take more than a usual workday, usually much less so that you can also study during working/waking hours if you treat it as a full time job. Don’t stay up all night studying, it’s counterproductive to memory/retention and overall well being.

 

[DrWhozits]

Regular week, 7-9. Week of exam, 5-7. If you are having a hard time finding ~7 hours to sleep during didactics you’re doing it wrong.

During 3rd year, depends on the rotation. But most you can continue that for sure.

 

[KeikoTanaka]

Regular week, 7-9. Week of exam, 5-7. If you are having a hard time finding ~7 hours to sleep during didactics you’re doing it wrong.

During 3rd year, depends on the rotation. But most you can continue that for sure.

"week of exam" lol - 1st year where I am there is 1-2, sometimes even 3 exams a week, if you include OSCEs and OMM practicals

 

[DrWhozits]

"week of exam" lol - 1st year where I am there is 1-2, sometimes even 3 exams a week, if you include OSCEs and OMM practicals

That’s terrible. We had block exams (which obviously still sucked). And then practicals and stuff sort of fell in the few days behind that.

 

[KeikoTanaka]

That’s terrible. We had block exams (which obviously still sucked). And then practicals and stuff sort of fell in the few days behind that.

Sometimes we'd have like Immunology Monday, OSCE Wednesday, Genetics Friday.

Yeaaah talk about staying on your toes

 

[rg2o3]

I made it a priority to get 7-8 nearly every night. Some students would say they would average some insanely low amount. Which I am not sure why they bragged about, just shows that their study habits must to have been subpar to need to lose so much sleep. However, there were some weekends, such as the one that just passed where my only sleep was naps because of a final. It was my neuro block and I definitely needed to put in more work than most other blocks.

Also the finals week at the end of first semester was pretty brutal. We finished "core" and had 4 finals, 1 each day M-Th. That was rough. But other than those rare times. I was never losing sleep.

 

[Chibucks15]

There's also diminishing returns if you don't make sure to get enough sleep. I started out waking up at 330 before big tests, then moved it back to 530 and my scores went up, and I overall felt better.

Prioritize sleep. If you find out early on you aren't AOA top of the class material, then learn it well, but make sure you take care of yourself. Its pretty obvious within the first few exams where you stand (for the most part)

 

[rg2o3]

I guess I should also say that first semester I went crazy hard and did outstanding. So that I could then gauge how much less work I could do to be successful. So, first semester was rough in that I didn't have much of a life. This semester I spend WAY more time doing fun things and my grades definitely have gone down but they're still above class average. Just have to find the balance, but it might be rough at first. Stay strong.

 

[Postictal Raiden]

Med school is hard, but not that hard that you should be losing sleep over.

Thanks to the option of streaming lectures, I slept until noon everyday except for days I had tests or labs.

Now for internship...

 

[WedgeDawg]

Probably like 10 hours a night. Class wasn’t mandatory and there wasn’t usually a required attendance thing until noon or 1 so I slept until like 10 or 11 every day

 

[dial1010usa]

6-7 hours a night but I do research too which takes some time too. During exam times 4-5 hours. It varies every day.

 

[Chibucks15]

The being able to sleep until whenever is great, I've found it helpful to get up at a 'normal' time and treat the whole thing as a work day. It gives me time at night to chill (when I don't have something huge coming up), and it gets you in a good sleep cycle for rotations and all that

 

[AnatomyGrey12]

6-7 generally, but that's because I function on less sleep anyway and get up early to go to the gym. There were like maybe 3-4 nights I only got like 2 because I was cramming something.

 

[NotYou20]

7-8. Literally never stayed up past midnight studying. The people who didn't sleep enough would cram for 3 days for one class, crash after the exam, then start cramming 3 days for the next test and so on. They didn't do well. Eat your pancakes every day and you'll be fine

 

[Deecee2DO]

Hi. I’m starting my first year pretty soon and I was wondering how many hours of sleep did y’all get during the first year of med school?

Literally 8 or 9. I don't go to class I sleep and study when I want to

 

[Ho0v-man]

I get up early to cram the super stupid stuff the morning of an exam. Other than that the only reason I lost sleep was just anxiety.

 

[Medic741]

Don't think I stayed up past midnight at any point during MS1. It worked out fine.

 

[Sleepingdoc]

Hi. I’m starting my first year pretty soon and I was wondering how many hours of sleep did y’all get during the first year of med school?

Really depends on how much of gunning you wanna do, or how important is getting that derm spot... you will get 8 hours but the 3-4 days before exam is more like 4-5 hours.

 

[Isoval]

I still regularly sleep 8-9 hours a night and have mostly kept my undergraduate schedule of staying up until 3am and waking up at 11am.

The only exceptions to this are when I have something mandatory in the morning, like a quiz or an exam. In these cases, I usually go to sleep around 1 or 2am and get 5-6 hours of sleep.

I'm doing well.

All I'm going to say is the obvious: don't be dumb about your study habits and you won't get screwed into all-nighters or constant nights of low sleep. Only one week in first year have I felt like I was pushed up against the wall through no fault of my own; it appears that sometimes the monkeys got into the scheduling department. Other than that, it's been fairly mellow.

 

[Isoval]

Literally 8 or 9. I don't go to class I sleep and study when I want to

You're my spirit animal.

 

[deleted407021]

I’m genuinely pretty bad about sleep. I would say after figuring out that going to class was useless in the second half of first year I maybe would average 6 1/2 or so. I’m a night owl and can manage alright in the short term on little sleep but it’s starting to catch up with me.

 

[JimBone905]

You're my spirit animal.

at what point did u decide that you don't need to go to class anymore?

 

[Isoval]

at what point did u decide that you don't need to go to class anymore?

Freshman year of undergrad.

I started skipping class in med school from day one.

 

[PorkChopsOG]

Really depends on how much of gunning you wanna do, or how important is getting that derm spot... you will get 8 hours but the 3-4 days before exam is more like 4-5 hours.

Lol what? Why would you only get 4 hours of sleep days before the exam? The only thing that changed 3-4 days before the exam for me was instead of studying 8 hours a day, I'd bump it up to 12-13. Go to bed 1 am, wake up at 10 am, study until 11 or midnight. Not only would I still get about 9 hours of sleep, but I'd also have an hour of video games.

Granted the night before the exam I still went to bed at 1 am and woke up at 8 am for our 10 am exams, but still. Sleep is not the first thing you want to sacrifice.

 

[PorkChopsOG]

at what point did u decide that you don't need to go to class anymore?

First week of class when I realized I could sleep 9 hours a night, watch lectures at 2x speed and finish my zanki cards in the same amount of time everyone else was spending in class. (not counting days we had lab, which was a lot)

 

[WoundupKnight]

So, I guess followup question: How many daily hours did all of you spend studying first year?

 

[PorkChopsOG]

So, I guess followup question: How many daily hours did all of you spend studying first year?

It varies so much week by week it's not even worth it to try to figure out. Also completely depends on your school and curriculum. If there wasn't an exam coming up soon, I'd spend however much time it took for me to finish the allotted zanki cards I had for that day, watch the lectures at 2x speed, go to lab etc. Maybe 5-6 hours/day? Week before or week of an exam I'd bump it up to 10-12. It all depends. You just have to do what works for you.

 

[Isoval]

So, I guess followup question: How many daily hours did all of you spend studying first year?

Depends on the week.

Some weeks, 20 hours or less.
Some weeks, 60 hours or more.

My average is probably in the low/mid 30s.

 

[chocolatethunder]

I do my best to get 5-7 hours of sleep every day, most days leaning towards the 7 hours. Obviously if it's the night before an exam it is anywhere from 3 hours to 6 hours, depending on how confident i'm feeling. I'm in my finals week right now so not a lot of sleep

 

[BlueFeesh]

Hi. I’m starting my first year pretty soon and I was wondering how many hours of sleep did y’all get during the first year of med school?

During the normal week, 7-7.5 hours
If there is an exam in the next 2-3 days 6.5-7

 

[Deecee2DO]

Freshman year of undergrad.

I started skipping class in med school from day one.

Smart man right here^

 

[Dhooy7]

It varies so much week by week it's not even worth it to try to figure out. Also completely depends on your school and curriculum. If there wasn't an exam coming up soon, I'd spend however much time it took for me to finish the allotted zanki cards I had for that day, watch the lectures at 2x speed, go to lab etc. Maybe 5-6 hours/day? Week before or week of an exam I'd bump it up to 10-12. It all depends. You just have to do what works for you.

Did you match up your Zanki cards with what you are learning? I'm an incoming M1 student and want to make sure I am on top of Zanki to do well on boards. Thx!

 

[_Rod_of_Asclepius_]

Did you match up your Zanki cards with what you are learning? I'm an incoming M1 student and want to make sure I am on top of Zanki to do well on boards. Thx!

I'd like to hear this as well

 

[deleted645092]

6-8 hours a night depending on your personal needs. I had a few rules during preclinical years that still applied to 3rd year;

-Never study past 10pm.
-Never study before 8am.
-Never study more than 10 hours a day.
-Never pull an all-nighter.

Following the first 2 rules meant I had at least some “me-time” every day where I wasn’t obligated to study. Following the second 2 rules meant my sleep schedule was never off and I never studied too much in one day.

Try and use the 8am rule to get some gym time or running in.

 

[Osteosaur]

I got 6-7. Sometimes my free time took a hit like during neuro.

 

[deleted888443]

Got a full 8 hours every night. Sometimes more. Never slept that much in college. Night before exams however I usually had trouble sleeping due to anxiety.

 

[BobbyKoch]

For anyone interested in just how integral sleep is to performance and health, I highly recommend this three part interview with Matthew Walker, PhD.

https://peterattiamd.com/matthewwalker1/

Peter Attia often has excellent guests and interesting discussions. Check it!

 

[DarkHorizon]

About 9-10

 

[Stephanopolous]

8-9, rarely less

 

[cryhavoc]

8 on weekdays, 9 on weekend. 4 the night before a test but only because of anxiety, not because I had to.

I never studied past 10 PM. Only went to mandatory lectures and double-speeded all other lectures. Rarely did any readings. Middle of the pack rank.