For a person who wants to do medical research, how do I pick between Medical Science and Science (Advanced)?
Will knowing what I want to major in play a factor in deciding between the two courses?
UNSW Medical Science allows you to explore the different aspects of well...medical science lol and molecular bioscience. By doing this degree you would get to explore and learn more about Anatomy, Physiology, Pharmacology and Pathology (medical science part) and microbiology, biochemistry and molecular biology (molecular bioscience part) at a detailed level in 2nd year. After you complete 2nd year, hopefully after exploring all the different disciplines you would have a good idea of what you want to specialise in.
The only downside of this degree is its structure as it is very difficult to make good timetables from what I've seen. Also, it is a very demanding degree since you do all these med sci and molecular biosci units!
If you have a good or general idea of what you want to major in, then I recommend you to do Advance Science. It is very flexible as you can choose a lot of free electives so you can do other units from other schools and faculties. For a person who wants to do medical research, I would definitely recommend Advance Science as it is more research focused. They offer a good number of research internships as long as you apply and get a suitable supervisor. The degree also has a TSP and a compulsory Honours year. In relation to first year units, they are generally similar for most science degrees depending on what you major as it is mainly an extension on the basic sciences like chem, bio and maths etc.
This is mainly for UNSW btw, perhaps someone from another uni can provide some insight about the differences between their Adv Sci and Med Sci degree?
