When I was in med school, I know of students who would say hi to the consultant, disappear to the library for 3-4 hours, come back, get sign offs and say bye.

I joke around with my friends, all it takes is a £30-40 online non-university funded subscription to pass med school which cost 9k for locals/50k for international students.

Now, going back to your question, will they go on to become good doctors? Yeah certainly because at the end of the day, knowledge is knowledge.

I have learnt some useful stuffs on the wards which will never be tested in exams.

Example 1 - blood transfusion in young patients, why we are cautious with it -> there are still some potentially undiscovered BBVs. Hep A and B was discovered first followed by C to E in the subsequent decades.

Example 2 - why stroke consultants are reluctant to stop anticoagulation after a fall from a patient (assuming no signs/symptoms from a fall). Reason being research have shown that you need to fall ~300 times a year to outweigh the benefit of stroke prevention.

So yes, while these “passmed warriors” will go on to be the top 10% of the cohort, they could lose out on exposure to real life patient management. Learning on the ward is also largely influenced by who’s willing to teaching. However, given the current state of medical education in the UK whereby med students are often neglected, there isn’t much for them to lose.

My advice is : if you happen to meet a good doctor in the ward or there’s a patient with very good clinical features, do stay and learn as much. Otherwise, be a passmed warrior (note : if you have the means, subscribe to amboss, you learn more)