** All things Medicine, HPAT etc. 2018 ** (See mod note in Post 1)

UnknownEntity

Hi will this year's HPAT sitters be getting any forum? I've noticed that the HPAT forums have been pretty quiet the last few years but regardless anyone else on here sitting the exam?





Mod note: This thread, or indeed the LC forum, is not to be used for looking for group members for discounts on HPAT prep courses etc. Go to Health Sciences Education forum for that.

randylonghorn

Thread, maybe?

Guess you just started one!

Yes, the Med thread has been quieter the last couple of years, but the whole forum has been quieter. Plus one of our former mods, QueenOfLeon, was a medical student (should be a doctor by now I reckon!) and very well up in everything to do with applying for med, so people tended to come throw questions at her.

UnknownEntity

Wow I knew it would be quiet but not this bad, hopefully we get some more people soon

steven975

I will be sitting the HPAT again this year unfortunately! I got 727 last year and missed RCSI because points went up!

UnknownEntity

steven975 wrote:

I will be sitting the HPAT again this year unfortunately! I got 727 last year and missed RCSI because points went up!

Oh man you got so close! Do you have any tips for people like me sitting it for the first time?

steven975

UnknownEntity wrote: »

Oh man you got so close! Do you have any tips for people like me sitting it for the first time?

I would say start early with a prep course. I'm not saying prep courses are necessary for everybody because they're not, I know a person who didnt use one and got in the high 80's (percentile) in the HPAT but I think for most you're mad going in with no prep. Timing was my biggest problem in section 1 its an extremely difficult section as it is and the timing makes it even harder so I would say when you start your prep early get used to the types of questions asked in each section and then begin putting yourself under tough time constraints early on in your prep.

Something I was lazy about last year that I want to do a lot more this year is work through the solutions of the questions after a trial exam. I didn't really do this much last year and I think this hugely impacts your section 1 and section 3 scores and is of great benefit for section 2 also. I read solutions but this year I want to take notes on solutions.

Nerves were a big issue for me on the day mostly due to the fact that I wanted to get medicine so badly and I spent months prepping. Again this brought my section 1 down because for the first 30 minutes of the exam I was reading things and nothing was going in even questions I would usually get easily at home like graphs and stuff I just couldn't take anything in and it set me off on a bad foot right at the start.

Another thing is making lists of words and their definitions this really helped me in section 2 which I ended up doing quite well in. Knowing the definitions allows you to tell the slight differences between the 2 answers you have left to decide between. I also did section 2 exams with a friend and we would run through the text and answer questions together because its good to hear someone else's thoughts on something and what they took away from it!

Unfortunately due to some bad events that happened to me 3 weeks prior to the exam my HPAT was what let me down so this year things will be different and hopefully it will work out better.

If theres any other questions I can try answer them as best as I can.

UnknownEntity

steven975 wrote:

Another thing is making lists of words and their definitions this really helped me in section 2 which I ended up doing quite well in. Knowing the definitions allows you to tell the slight differences between the 2 answers you have left to decide between. I also did section 2 exams with a friend and we would run through the text and answer questions together because its good to hear someone else's thoughts on something and what they took away from it!

Thanks so much for you help, personally I've been preparing on M3dentry since July. My clearest weakness is in section 2 and if I look even closer it's especially when they use abstract words in the questions that I have never seen before. I've got a hardback now and I'm slowly filling it with words that I didn't understand. It's not even the emotional understanding part of it that I'm weak at because once I understand the words, the questions become so much easier.

Section 1 is my strongest at the moment and I'm consistently scoring 90< percentile on it in practise exams and section 3 is also decent so I'm mainly focusing on section 2.

I also agree with you that going through the solutions is so crucial and that's where all the learning happens. Do you mind me asking what prep courses you did last year or are doing now?

steven975

UnknownEntity wrote: »

Thanks so much for you help, personally I've been preparing on M3dentry since July. My clearest weakness is in section 2 and if I look even closer it's especially when they use abstract words in the questions that I have never seen before. I've got a hardback now and I'm slowly filling it with words that I didn't understand. It's not even the emotional understanding part of it that I'm weak at because once I understand the words, the questions become so much easier.

Section 1 is my strongest at the moment and I'm consistently scoring 90< percentile on it in practise exams and section 3 is also decent so I'm mainly focusing on section 2.

I also agree with you that going through the solutions is so crucial and that's where all the learning happens. Do you mind me asking what prep courses you did last year or are doing now?

what do you do for section 1 preparation? Another piece of advise I would give is to not use up all your exams too early like if you've started in july I would save most of your exams for the month or two before the exam I used up a lot of mine by December and only had like 3 left for the last few weeks! big mistake haha! I did m******* last year and will be doing that again this year.

UnknownEntity

steven975 wrote:

what do you do for section 1 preparation? Another piece of advise I would give is to not use up all your exams too early like if you've started in july I would save most of your exams for the month or two before the exam I used up a lot of mine by December and only had like 3 left for the last few weeks! big mistake haha! I did m******* last year and will be doing that again this year.

Yeah I got the extra 5 exams with the course so I'm spacing the rest out from now till the HPAT. It's true that you shouldn't get them done too early but m3dentry themselves say that one of the biggest mistakes is leaving the exams till the end and spending too much time on drills.

Honestly I haven't done that much for section 1, problem solving and that kind of thing have been something that I'm good at for a long time so it's quite natural for me, just like how section 2 could be very natural for someone else. All I can say though is that for problem solving, write down the important info and then it's possible to treat a lot of the questions like maths problems if you get me. For logical reasoning and data interpration, you just need to be 100% focused and keep practising questions. You really need to pay attention to every single piece of information given to you and never make assumptions.

As well, was your hpat score/percentile similar to what you were scoring on ********?

steven975

UnknownEntity wrote: »

Yeah I got the extra 5 exams with the course so I'm spacing the rest out from now till the HPAT. It's true that you shouldn't get them done too early but m3dentry themselves say that one of the biggest mistakes is leaving the exams till the end and spending too much time on drills.

Honestly I haven't done that much for section 1, problem solving and that kind of thing have been something that I'm good at for a long time so it's quite natural for me, just like how section 2 could be very natural for someone else. All I can say though is that for problem solving, write down the important info and then it's possible to treat a lot of the questions like maths problems if you get me. For logical reasoning and data interpration, you just need to be 100% focused and keep practising questions. You really need to pay attention to every single piece of information given to you and never make assumptions.

As well, was your hpat score/percentile similar to what you were scoring on ********?

thanks for the help! I'm good at maths I just don't like the visual problem problem solving and I think theres barely any on m******* in comparison to the exam itself! I had one or two exams where my percentile was close to what I got in the real thing most of the time it was lower! percentiles fluctuate a lot on it I don't think they're much to go on! a lot of people I know got a completely different percentile to what they were getting in the online exams some better some worse!

UnknownEntity

steven975 wrote:

thanks for the help! I'm good at maths I just don't like the visual problem problem solving and I think theres barely any on m******* in comparison to the exam itself! I had one or two exams where my percentile was close to what I got in the real thing most of the time it was lower! percentiles fluctuate a lot on it I don't think they're much to go on! a lot of people I know got a completely different percentile to what they were getting in the online exams some better some worse!

What do you mean by visual problem solving? I've seen one question on ME where they give you a rubiks cube and ask a couple of questions on it. Is that considered visual problem solving? Or is it when they give graphs/diagrams etc? Also, did you find section 1 in the HPAT easier or harder than ME?

steven975

UnknownEntity wrote: »

What do you mean by visual problem solving? I've seen one question on ME where they give you a rubiks cube and ask a couple of questions on it. Is that considered visual problem solving? Or is it when they give graphs/diagrams etc? Also, did you find section 1 in the HPAT easier or harder than ME?

Yeah kind of like that but I found the ones in the HPAT a lot harder though and there was loads of them! I found it a lot harder there was barely any logical reasoning which was what I was good at! Graphs are like data interpretation!

UnknownEntity

steven975 wrote:

Yeah kind of like that but I found the ones in the HPAT a lot harder though and there was loads of them! I found it a lot harder there was barely any logical reasoning which was what I was good at! Graphs are like data interpretation!

Hmm that's fair enough but surely most people found those questions hard anyway right?

BigMac90

Hey does anyone have any tips on how to study for the hpat without any prep courses?, my parents cant really afford any of the courses especially coming up to Christmas, so does anyone know some free online material that I can use to practice??? and is it possible to get a good percentile without doing a course??
any advice would mean a lot thanks!!

leimmxvii

https://umatic.com.au/accounts/signup/
http://medstudentsonline.com.au/forum/threads/msos-umat-questions.33228/
Those are two links to free umat questions which are the same as hpat questions.

UnknownEntity

BigMac90 wrote:

Hey does anyone have any tips on how to study for the hpat without any prep courses?, my parents cant really afford any of the courses especially coming up to Christmas, so does anyone know some free online material that I can use to practice??? and is it possible to get a good percentile without doing a course?? any advice would mean a lot thanks!!

Yeah it's definetely possible as long as you're aware of the timing.

LanaBanana165

steven975 wrote: »

I will be sitting the HPAT again this year unfortunately! I got 727 last year and missed RCSI because points went up!

Oh that’s such a good score! Do you mind me asking was it mainly composed of LC points or H-Pat add on points. I’m just worried I’m not balancing the LC and the H-Pat work and preparation properly, I know they are both so important

alaskayoung

BigMac90 wrote: »

Hey does anyone have any tips on how to study for the hpat without any prep courses?, my parents cant really afford any of the courses especially coming up to Christmas, so does anyone know some free online material that I can use to practice??? and is it possible to get a good percentile without doing a course??
any advice would mean a lot thanks!!

Hey there I honestly wouldn't panic too much about the preparation courses. In my opinion, they're extremely overrated and have become something that people feel they have to do just because "everyone else is doing them" rather than them being of any real benefit. I sat the HPAT twice, the first year I did an expensive popular preparation course and a reasonable amount of study for the exam and came out with 78th percentile. I sat it again the following year with no preparation and came out with 93rd percentile. What changed? Honestly, I feel the practise the first time around was of detriment to me. Between the course and constantly being ranked in terms of scores and the huge emphasis put on the exam, I went into the exam terrified that day and was far too caught up in the hype to do myself justice. The second year, I booked my place to sit the test and honestly didn't think about it again until the week of the exam when I just refamiliarised myself with the structure and the timing using the official papers from the ACER website. As a result, I went in that day with a much clearer head and a more balanced mindset towards the exam. I've seen the papers made by these preparation courses and they're just not that comparable to the real thing. Perhaps some of the questions on their sample papers this year are similar to last years HPAT (as they get people to feed them the information AFTER the test is over) but ACER change the style of their questions slightly every year to keep an even playing field and simply, they're just not the type of thing you can "learn". Also I'll say that after practising paper after paper of their similar styled questions, it really does throw you when you are suddenly handed something completely different. I know a lot of people who say they wouldn't have gotten the scores they did, without a preparation course but there's no real way they can say that, they don't know what score they would've gotten and frankly I think they should have more faith in themselves. Many people who do preparation courses get high scores, many more get low scores, the same as those who don't. You're busy enough in leaving cert, concentrate on your subjects where study is proven to be effective. Don't buy into the hype being built by these companies just to make money off people's desperation. By all means, download ACER's practise papers, familiarize yourself with the layout, figure out your timing but after that try to just believe in yourself. It's hard to accept that you don't have much control over the exam but if you can, it's only going to be of benefit to you because the pressure's off then, keep a cool head and just do your best.

Reeaaaaally waffled on there but you get my drift. I know it's hard but try not to pay much notice to what everyone else is doing. The ACER papers are enough, I honestly think you're better off and the greatest thing you can give yourself on the day is calm so shrug and leave it up to fate

steven975

LanaBanana165 wrote: »

Oh that’s such a good score! Do you mind me asking was it mainly composed of LC points or H-Pat add on points. I’m just worried I’m not balancing the LC and the H-Pat work and preparation properly, I know they are both so important

I got 613 in my leaving and then 164 in the HPAT, so annoyed I missed it by that little haha

steven975

alaskayoung wrote: »

Hey there I honestly wouldn't panic too much about the preparation courses. In my opinion, they're extremely overrated and have become something that people feel they have to do just because "everyone else is doing them" rather than them being of any real benefit. I sat the HPAT twice, the first year I did an expensive popular preparation course and a reasonable amount of study for the exam and came out with 78th percentile. I sat it again the following year with no preparation and came out with 93rd percentile. What changed? Honestly, I feel the practise the first time around was of detriment to me. Between the course and constantly being ranked in terms of scores and the huge emphasis put on the exam, I went into the exam terrified that day and was far too caught up in the hype to do myself justice. The second year, I booked my place to sit the test and honestly didn't think about it again until the week of the exam when I just refamiliarised myself with the structure and the timing using the official papers from the ACER website. As a result, I went in that day with a much clearer head and a more balanced mindset towards the exam. I've seen the papers made by these preparation courses and they're just not that comparable to the real thing. Perhaps some of the questions on their sample papers this year are similar to last years HPAT (as they get people to feed them the information AFTER the test is over) but ACER change the style of their questions slightly every year to keep an even playing field and simply, they're just not the type of thing you can "learn". Also I'll say that after practising paper after paper of their similar styled questions, it really does throw you when you are suddenly handed something completely different. I know a lot of people who say they wouldn't have gotten the scores they did, without a preparation course but there's no real way they can say that, they don't know what score they would've gotten and frankly I think they should have more faith in themselves. Many people who do preparation courses get high scores, many more get low scores, the same as those who don't. You're busy enough in leaving cert, concentrate on your subjects where study is proven to be effective. Don't buy into the hype being built by these companies just to make money off people's desperation. By all means, download ACER's practise papers, familiarize yourself with the layout, figure out your timing but after that try to just believe in yourself. It's hard to accept that you don't have much control over the exam but if you can, it's only going to be of benefit to you because the pressure's off then, keep a cool head and just do your best.

Reeaaaaally waffled on there but you get my drift. I know it's hard but try not to pay much notice to what everyone else is doing. The ACER papers are enough, I honestly think you're better off and the greatest thing you can give yourself on the day is calm so shrug and leave it up to fate

I 100% agree with this and I've seen a trend amongst people I know that the people who go in with the clearest head usually do the best. How did you forget about it though? I'd love to just forget about until the week of the exam but I find it so hard not to prepare because I'm afraid of the consequences of not preparing adequately especially for pick the middle type questions! I'm worried I'll go in stressing this year like I did last year and mess up again

alaskayoung

steven975 wrote: »

I 100% agree with this and I've seen a trend amongst people I know that the people who go in with the clearest head usually do the best. How did you forget about it though? I'd love to just forget about until the week of the exam but I find it so hard not to prepare because I'm afraid of the consequences of not preparing adequately especially for pick the middle type questions! I'm worried I'll go in stressing this year like I did last year and mess up again

Well to be honest, the reason I "forgot" about it was because I'd pretty much decided that medicine wasn't for me. I said a day or 2 before I had nothing to lose so just sat it to see what would happen so yeah, that mindset kept the pressure off me. I honestly attribute my score to that so if I was to give any advice to people it would be, as you said, try and find a way to control your nerves and stay calm under pressure. I know it sounds a little airy-fairy but I really believe things like breathing exercises and visualization etc. are of great benefit!

leimmxvii

HPAT 2018 one week to go! Is everyone excited?

Saltycrisps

Any tips for what I should do to improve my section 3 ? And how much hours I should spend on HPAT this week ?

leimmxvii

You'd be best to focus on HPAT for the week. Your leaving cert shouldn't suffer a huge loss with one week of neglect!
For section 3 Pick the middle questions, if 2 of the answer options are entirely identical, then these two options will not be in the middle. And for the other question types this also applies. Then again this scenario may never arise in the exam, but its still a tip.
For pick the middle questions you may already know of the 3/2 rule, but know that this rule only confirms that these 3 options will form the start and end and does not mean one of them will be in the middle.
A. 32323
B. 32233
C. 33223

Notice above how a 3 group is always at the start and end. And only a 3 group is in the middle in A.
For example if 3 of the answer options have smiley faces, the full answer may be:
A. Smiley, 2, Smiley, 2, Smiley
B. Smiley, 2, 2, Smiley, Smiley
C. Smiley, Smiley, 2, 2, Smiley

leimmxvii

Also for section 3 questions like pick the middle and next in the sequence, the movement of shape/elements shouldn't vary much from the following;
1,1,1,1 (moving one space each turn in the same direction)
1,0,1,0 (moving one space, staying in same spot, moving one space etc in the same direction)
1,2,1,2
2,2,2,2
2,0,2,0
1,2,3,4
3,3,3,3
2,4,6,8
1-> <-2 1-> <-2 (moving one forward, moving two backward, one forward etc)
1-> <-2 3-> <-4 (moving one forward, two backward, three forward etc)

Also note to spot the simplest pattern first of course, so a 1,1,1,1 movement would be clearly simpler than 1,2,3,4 movement

Saltycrisps

leimmxvii wrote: »

You'd be best to focus on HPAT for the week. Your leaving cert shouldn't suffer a huge loss with one week of neglect!
For section 3 Pick the middle questions, if 2 of the answer options are entirely identical, then these two options will not be in the middle. And for the other question types this also applies. Then again this scenario may never arise in the exam, but its still a tip.
For pick the middle questions you may already know of the 3/2 rule, but know that this rule only confirms that these 3 options will form the start and end and does not mean one of them will be in the middle.
A. 32323
B. 32233
C. 33223

Notice above how a 3 group is always at the start and end. And only a 3 group is in the middle in A.
For example if 3 of the answer options have smiley faces, the full answer may be:
A. Smiley, 2, Smiley, 2, Smiley
B. Smiley, 2, 2, Smiley, Smiley
C. Smiley, Smiley, 2, 2, Smiley

Thanks so much !

leimmxvii

Best of luck to everyone sitting the HPAT tommorow!
As a repeat here, my best advice would be to stay calm and have a clear head :cool:

UnknownEntity

leimmxvii wrote:

Best of luck to everyone sitting the HPAT tommorow! As a repeat here, my best advice would be to stay calm and have a clear head

Good luck to you too!

thereisacar

What did everyone think??

bicimann

thereisacar wrote: »

What did everyone think??

Section 1 and 2 seemed pretty reasonable, very clear wording in 2, 3 seemed to have some very tough questions, but also a few I was confident I did well in , and as we all know the weighting makes this less important, so overall I’d say I didn’t do too bad, seemed like a pretty approachable (not easy) paper 😅

Saltycrisps

Did anyone spot any questions that could have been trial questions ?

smartboyz

steven975 wrote: »

I got 613 in my leaving and then 164 in the HPAT, so annoyed I missed it by that little haha

How did u study for the leaving cert and what subjects did u do.im in 5th year and I got 546 in the Christmas exams .is that good for where I am rn?!?!?!??

leimmxvii

Good luck to all tommorow!

UnknownEntity

Sooooooo happy with my results, hope it went well for the rest of you too!!!!

Ae86VroomVroom

If I got 5h1''s and a h2 in the LC, how much points do you think ill need in my HPAT for rcsi or trinity

Ae86VroomVroom

UnknownEntity wrote: »

Sooooooo happy with my results, hope it went well for the rest of you too!!!!

Congrats unknown all your hard work payed off!

agoodusername

Ae86VroomVroom wrote: »

If I got 5h1''s and a h2 in the LC, how much points do you think ill need in my HPAT for rcsi or trinity

I'd say a 168 would give you a strong chance. 170 and you'd be safe

Ae86VroomVroom

Thank you good sir, someone was telling me I needed 180 and so I spent all of yesterday sulking and moaning. Hope you have a great summer, once again thanks for the reply

Ronin247

Ae86VroomVroom wrote: »

If I got 5h1''s and a h2 in the LC, how much points do you think ill need in my HPAT for rcsi or trinity

If one of your subjects is higher maths then you would have 613 points which when adjusting for medicine is 562 (563?).( anything over 550 counts at 20%)
Medicine in trinity last year was approximately 732 so all being equal 732 - 562 = 170 if points don't go up.
If one of your subjects wasn't higher maths then 25 bonus points gone then adjusted for medicine is 5 points gone so you might need 175.
Medicine in RCSI was 729 in so 167 or 172 depending on the maths.

kittychan

This thread is emptier than previous years
Anyhow hows everyone doing over summer?
Also, it would be nice to know how everybody found this year's hpat and were there any changes to percentiles?
Personally got 80th so not too sad nor too happy.
Many of my friends applied for medicine and except for one guy, everyone got lower than me and I cant tell ya why! I feel hpat is so unpredictable T_T

kittychan

UnknownEntity wrote: »

Sooooooo happy with my results, hope it went well for the rest of you too!!!!

Congrats!!
BTW is it okay if i can know your percentile?

UnknownEntity

kittychan wrote:

Congrats!! BTW is it okay if i can know your percentile?

I got 88th percentile, congrats to you too

kittychan

UnknownEntity wrote: »

I got 88th percentile, congrats to you too

WOW, that's amazing. My friend last year got it and is now in Trinity!


What score is 88th percentile?

Skibbboi

I’m on 719 points...should I repeat hpat?

kittychan

Skibbboi wrote: »

I’m on 719 points...should I repeat hpat?

Can I know how much of that is ur LC and how much/ what percentile is your hpat?

If you have 550+ LC points, then it makes sense to only repeat hpat but if your LC score is lower than I would recommend repeating both!

Skibbboi

kittychan wrote: »

Can I know how much of that is ur LC and how much/ what percentile is your hpat?

If you have 550+ LC points, then it makes sense to only repeat hpat but if your LC score is lower than I would recommend repeating both!

LC is 601. Hpat 158. 61st percentile.. can you tell me your section scores please so I can have an idea of how much I would need to improve by. Mine are 52,49,60

kittychan

Skibbboi wrote: »

LC is 601. Hpat 158. 61st percentile.. can you tell me your section scores please so I can have an idea of how much I would need to improve by. Mine are 52,49,60

WOah man, congrats on the LC!:) I wish I have a score like that!

Hmmm dont give up on your hpat! Last year I got 157 (60th) and this yr I got 81st so yup you can improve greatly.

Also I do think you might even have a chance this yr with Galway, hopefully:D

I got 58,54 and 62 i think. S2 is a bit hard to greatly improve as I only improved by a few points this year but I improved greatly in s3.

daretodream

Off topic, I know but... Would I be OK with physics and chemistry? No biology and only now thinking of med as an alternative to finance or engineering. Can't seem to decide for next year. Any thoughts?

Skibbboi

Ya I heard that about S2. I think I could improve greatly in S1 because I guessed about 11 questions on the day in that section. Always struggle time wise in S1. How was your timing actually and do you remember roughly how many questions you guessed?

Thanks very much and best of luck in lc results!

kittychan wrote: »

WOah man, congrats on the LC!:) I wish I have a score like that!

Hmmm dont give up on your hpat! Last year I got 157 (60th) and this yr I got 81st so yup you can improve greatly.

Also I do think you might even have a chance this yr with Galway, hopefully:D

I got 58,54 and 62 i think. S2 is a bit hard to greatly improve as I only improved by a few points this year but I improved greatly in s3.

jeonahr

daretodream wrote: »

Off topic, I know but... Would I be OK with physics and chemistry? No biology and only now thinking of med as an alternative to finance or engineering. Can't seem to decide for next year. Any thoughts?

That's fine. No med course requires biology. If they specify a lab science it's usually chemistry but you meet the requirements subject-wise for medicine anywhere seeing as you're doing two lab sciences where one is chemistry.

kittychan

daretodream wrote: »

Off topic, I know but... Would I be OK with physics and chemistry? No biology and only now thinking of med as an alternative to finance or engineering. Can't seem to decide for next year. Any thoughts?

TBH it would be fine but it would be good to look at biology course and see whether you would actually like learning all that for 5 yrs in so much detail in med.