I'm a physician, with an undergrad in physics. My research is very applied and very math heavy. When applying to med schools, I asked a couple very senior mathematicians at my college as to whether I should take a stats class. They assured me I would not need a stats class.

The first time I got a biostats lecture in medical school, I genuinely questioned their advice. By the third class, I was convinced I knew nothing about math. Luckily our biochem prof was a physics major and assured me I didn't need to worry about the stats.

Somewhere in residency, I realized I really had been getting all the stats questions right. But not because I did anything like the other residents. They have all these crazy stories and mnemonics to keep track of what kind of problem they're looking at. They seriously try to classify their way out of basic math. They classify. Everything.

I now agree with my profs. I didn't need a stats class. But the stats education in medical school seems designed to convince physicians that they need statisticians. Which is probably a coup for biostatisticians, but it's a damn shame for physicians trying to break into research outside major academic centers.

Medical school hopefuls are a major source, probably the major source, of biology undergrads, and the pre-reqs for medical school, with few exceptions, are standardized under the AAMC. It's 2 semesters of calc, no stats required.

And quite frankly, the PPV trope is just that, a trope. The biostatisticians found a little trick to lord over their masters. If you only have 15 seconds to solve after reading the question, and you know you only do this once every 6 months, and you know most people get it wrong, answer C, next question.

Christ, the story that docs suck at stats is part of medical education. They don't teach biostatistics, they teach "you suck at biostats".