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Has anyone recently taken comsae form D?
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Comsae
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I think you might be missing the point of using a comsae. You shouldnt take them already knowing what is on them. That would be a waste of time and a waste of money.
Okay, so In my curiosity about form D I was not able to find that much information so I thought I would try and help out a few others with a little information. If you want straight Test details read bolded/ lower paragraphs, I tried to give some reference as to what I have been doing so that you can compare your strategies, and form an idea about the form D test that way in what you have been doing to prep, and maybe how those resources will have prepared you.
I took it today and accomplished my goal of > 600 with about 20 days left before my real test. I have taken form A as well and did > 600 on that as well just as a reference point.
As a starting point I have not read First Aid as of yet, I see it as more of an index than resource, but plan to start reading it as of today until my actually test. Completed DIT, Pathoma, 80% Combank 300?s left on UW.
Resources: Doctors in Training(Highest Yield that could have been possible for todays exam, overall not great for Form D), Pathoma/some Goljan, Uworld(HY concepts, friends said form D was similar in difficulty, I agree about difficulty not to content presented), & Combank(similar to the random questions out of nowhere), Sketchy Micro(minimal help for form D, I love it overall though)
Pathoma vs Goljan I like Goljan more personally as he was the original and more in depth review source. He teaches everything not just pathology, so if you want an amazing amount of pictures and a lot of them plus more written explanations of text, I recommend using his book side by side with Pathoma, you will notice an odd amount of overlap/ exact same concepts taught.) -I dont recommend using Goljan however in your intensive board review however, maybe just as a reference, but I will use him more and more throughout the next two years personally.
Pathoma is higher yield for boards in my experience so far and easier to learn from with his excellent book and online series so Im not saying anything bad about Pathoma as I love Dr. Sattar too, but just let it be known Goljan was the 1st, the Master, and still deserves a spot in every medical students heart.)- unfortunately not much of what I learned from Pathoma or Goljan was tested on form D which does not reflect upon this resource, but more of the stupidity of the form D.
Sketchy Micro(I hate picmonic sort of things, however Sketchy Micro is in a class of their own, by far the best and most comprehensive review of micro. You can say what you want, but this by far is the most in depth detailed with explanation micro review source available and no one on the market currently even comes close to touching this resource. I actually feel bad for anyone who does not use this overall, however that being said, the Micro, one of my best subjects, was a joke on the Comsae phase 1 form D. Nothing that you would ever think is clinically important is tested on this test micro wise(maybe 1 question) and same goes for form A, both of the exams sincerely chose the worst possible choices of items to test for micro, either they were stupidly simple, or somewhere in outer space irrelevant to what a physician will face everyday. It was a joke of an assessment of my micro knowledge.)
Enough Rambling, Test Thoughts, If you prefer to experience it as is, I suggest not reading ahead just FYI for those of you who :
Starting off the test hit me really hard without going into too many details, so just like on real test day I imagine we should expect this, one of the highlights of this test I think in actually preparing me was this point, however if you are not ready for this, it may throw you too, and for those of you that have to meet a cut off for your school, I might have liked to know this. After the first block I settled in and things starting feeling smoother and more relevant to what I have been taught/ studied. I personally feel like the form D covers some information that is in First aid, however majority of it to me was either too vague to truly know, or is not covered in the first aid. There were very few just straight forward answers, but there always seems to be a best answer. I personally love Uworld and hate Combank, but having almost completed both, they both added to my test ability today.
Uworld makes you think, however if you know it, then you are solid and its easy. Uworld also tests/ teaches concepts that are brilliant once you figure them out, or they make you feel brilliant for a fleeting moment.
Combank, it helps you because it teaches you on things you have never heard or seen before and are not in the first aid along with preparing you to face a test where your best odds are at times to narrow things down to 50/50 shot then guess to the best of your ability, or that is my experience so far on form A & D. Hopefully it helps me for the actual test come test day. However, Form D feels much harder than Combank on majority of material, but I was pleasantly surprised with my score, so if things dont feel that good for you, I suggest just keep rolling, dont freak, and answer to the best of your ability, dont second guess yourself, go with the things you know. If you answer all the questions right that you actually/ most likely have been taught, then you should crush this thing.
Form D seems to test you pretty hard with really good distractions, more so than many or any other test I have taken in a while. However, you were able to think through majority of them which was a really nice change from form A. I was surprised comparing form A to Form D the amount of difficulty increase, form A is vague, but the amount of first order made the test a joke, if every medical student cant diagnose an epidural hematoma on imaging or lucid interval, I dont know what they can do, but then you get questions that you have definitely never seen or heard of before on the test and that becomes a little annoying. I scored literally almost the same on both exams neither of which from what I have heard will be the best predictor on boards day, but on form A I thought that I would do decently well when submitting, and form D I hate a lump in my stomach as I thought I would be doing really poorly.
Our boards prep person said scores correlate based on if your GPA is 3.6 and above meaning that if you have studied hard and prepared throughout medical school, that more than likely you will do the same for boards, and more than likely there will be somewhat of a score correlation(their words not mine). They said that without the GPA they have seen the scores fluctuate very high meaning a person failed the cut off and then rocked the boards and vice versa. Form D covered a lot of topics not just Neuro as I have seen elsewhere amongst the forums. Form A felt more MSK related and the Neuro was a joke, form D had a little harder neuro, fair amount of Pharm, Psych, Repro, Endocrine, and actually a decent amount of Omm and more difficult questions like Sacrum and Cranial than did form A which was nice to see a few harder questions on the content. VS points was actually pretty HY as Im sure every student has been told about the real exam so that was also nice to actually see as well. Contrary to what others have said throughout the forums, I think the test was fairly dispersed and ye, it may have had a few more questions within one or two particular subjects, but the test covered a lot with 200 questions.
All in all the test did what I think it was supposed to do which was simulate a real exam experience, test you at what I perceive to be a board difficulty level regardless of the actual material tested if that makes sense(test is a little old, some things are outdated to a point, or may have been a big deal to doctors/ board writers 3/4 years ago, and may have been taught or harped on throughout the past 2 years). If your score has a requirement then my biggest suggestion is give it all you have,don't freak out or over think answers as this test was really good at making me doubt myself, and don't worry if you have not seen the question before, just take the test and answer to the best of your ability and more than likely all will be really well.
I took it today and accomplished my goal of > 600 with about 20 days left before my real test. I have taken form A as well and did > 600 on that as well just as a reference point.
As a starting point I have not read First Aid as of yet, I see it as more of an index than resource, but plan to start reading it as of today until my actually test. Completed DIT, Pathoma, 80% Combank 300?s left on UW.
Resources: Doctors in Training(Highest Yield that could have been possible for todays exam, overall not great for Form D), Pathoma/some Goljan, Uworld(HY concepts, friends said form D was similar in difficulty, I agree about difficulty not to content presented), & Combank(similar to the random questions out of nowhere), Sketchy Micro(minimal help for form D, I love it overall though)
Pathoma vs Goljan I like Goljan more personally as he was the original and more in depth review source. He teaches everything not just pathology, so if you want an amazing amount of pictures and a lot of them plus more written explanations of text, I recommend using his book side by side with Pathoma, you will notice an odd amount of overlap/ exact same concepts taught.) -I dont recommend using Goljan however in your intensive board review however, maybe just as a reference, but I will use him more and more throughout the next two years personally.
Pathoma is higher yield for boards in my experience so far and easier to learn from with his excellent book and online series so Im not saying anything bad about Pathoma as I love Dr. Sattar too, but just let it be known Goljan was the 1st, the Master, and still deserves a spot in every medical students heart.)- unfortunately not much of what I learned from Pathoma or Goljan was tested on form D which does not reflect upon this resource, but more of the stupidity of the form D.
Sketchy Micro(I hate picmonic sort of things, however Sketchy Micro is in a class of their own, by far the best and most comprehensive review of micro. You can say what you want, but this by far is the most in depth detailed with explanation micro review source available and no one on the market currently even comes close to touching this resource. I actually feel bad for anyone who does not use this overall, however that being said, the Micro, one of my best subjects, was a joke on the Comsae phase 1 form D. Nothing that you would ever think is clinically important is tested on this test micro wise(maybe 1 question) and same goes for form A, both of the exams sincerely chose the worst possible choices of items to test for micro, either they were stupidly simple, or somewhere in outer space irrelevant to what a physician will face everyday. It was a joke of an assessment of my micro knowledge.)
Enough Rambling, Test Thoughts, If you prefer to experience it as is, I suggest not reading ahead just FYI for those of you who :
Starting off the test hit me really hard without going into too many details, so just like on real test day I imagine we should expect this, one of the highlights of this test I think in actually preparing me was this point, however if you are not ready for this, it may throw you too, and for those of you that have to meet a cut off for your school, I might have liked to know this. After the first block I settled in and things starting feeling smoother and more relevant to what I have been taught/ studied. I personally feel like the form D covers some information that is in First aid, however majority of it to me was either too vague to truly know, or is not covered in the first aid. There were very few just straight forward answers, but there always seems to be a best answer. I personally love Uworld and hate Combank, but having almost completed both, they both added to my test ability today.
Uworld makes you think, however if you know it, then you are solid and its easy. Uworld also tests/ teaches concepts that are brilliant once you figure them out, or they make you feel brilliant for a fleeting moment.
Combank, it helps you because it teaches you on things you have never heard or seen before and are not in the first aid along with preparing you to face a test where your best odds are at times to narrow things down to 50/50 shot then guess to the best of your ability, or that is my experience so far on form A & D. Hopefully it helps me for the actual test come test day. However, Form D feels much harder than Combank on majority of material, but I was pleasantly surprised with my score, so if things dont feel that good for you, I suggest just keep rolling, dont freak, and answer to the best of your ability, dont second guess yourself, go with the things you know. If you answer all the questions right that you actually/ most likely have been taught, then you should crush this thing.
Form D seems to test you pretty hard with really good distractions, more so than many or any other test I have taken in a while. However, you were able to think through majority of them which was a really nice change from form A. I was surprised comparing form A to Form D the amount of difficulty increase, form A is vague, but the amount of first order made the test a joke, if every medical student cant diagnose an epidural hematoma on imaging or lucid interval, I dont know what they can do, but then you get questions that you have definitely never seen or heard of before on the test and that becomes a little annoying. I scored literally almost the same on both exams neither of which from what I have heard will be the best predictor on boards day, but on form A I thought that I would do decently well when submitting, and form D I hate a lump in my stomach as I thought I would be doing really poorly.
Our boards prep person said scores correlate based on if your GPA is 3.6 and above meaning that if you have studied hard and prepared throughout medical school, that more than likely you will do the same for boards, and more than likely there will be somewhat of a score correlation(their words not mine). They said that without the GPA they have seen the scores fluctuate very high meaning a person failed the cut off and then rocked the boards and vice versa. Form D covered a lot of topics not just Neuro as I have seen elsewhere amongst the forums. Form A felt more MSK related and the Neuro was a joke, form D had a little harder neuro, fair amount of Pharm, Psych, Repro, Endocrine, and actually a decent amount of Omm and more difficult questions like Sacrum and Cranial than did form A which was nice to see a few harder questions on the content. VS points was actually pretty HY as Im sure every student has been told about the real exam so that was also nice to actually see as well. Contrary to what others have said throughout the forums, I think the test was fairly dispersed and ye, it may have had a few more questions within one or two particular subjects, but the test covered a lot with 200 questions.
All in all the test did what I think it was supposed to do which was simulate a real exam experience, test you at what I perceive to be a board difficulty level regardless of the actual material tested if that makes sense(test is a little old, some things are outdated to a point, or may have been a big deal to doctors/ board writers 3/4 years ago, and may have been taught or harped on throughout the past 2 years). If your score has a requirement then my biggest suggestion is give it all you have,don't freak out or over think answers as this test was really good at making me doubt myself, and don't worry if you have not seen the question before, just take the test and answer to the best of your ability and more than likely all will be really well.
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Do less
Took COMSAE A a month and a half ago and got a 363. took COMSAE B recently and got a 365, utterly disappointed.I was averaging almost 60% in COMBANK and 50% in UW. I have done FA twice and am 70% done with UW and COMBANK. I took good notes from both these QBanks and review them every weekend . I was considering taking my exams in the next 4 days but I don't think that's a bright idea. What else can I do to better my performance in the next three-four weeks ? Freaking out please help.
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Have you looked at comquest? Their questions are easy but their explanation is where the money is. Do at least repro, neuro, micro of comquest and go over explanation. Your score will jump
But I'm using UWorld and as afar as explanation goes , I thought they were the best . Right ! The funny thing is sometimes my scores on Uworld are higher than COMBANK. So would you suggest buy Comquest at this point when I'm a month away and hunker down 50-100/day ?
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Reschedule your exam and do more passes through First Aid and Pathoma. That UWorld percentage and COMSAE score shows there's some major gaps in your knowledge. I'd spend more time with the basics as opposed to spinning your wheels with a new subpar qbank. Keep going with UWorld and make sure you get through it and your wrong answers.
FA twice if you didn't master the material during the year is not enough.
Thanks DrEnderW: However is it true that Pathoma is a little too much detail as far as COMLEX is concerned ? Secondly would you recommend I review FA in conjunction with Topic specific questions from UWorld in order to get a better grasp over the concepts because until now I was doing timed RANDOM questions
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Pathoma is definitely not too detailed - it's less detailed than the tougher comlex or usmle path questions (took both recently).
I did everything on random. That's what the test gives you so I think it's best to practice that way. If you encounter something you don't know well, take a moment to cover it more thoroughly in FA. I kept a list of topics/notes for UWorld to review multiple times.
Doing topic specific blocks causes you to be too predisposed to the correct answer, especially on the interdisciplinary type questions.
I did everything on random. That's what the test gives you so I think it's best to practice that way. If you encounter something you don't know well, take a moment to cover it more thoroughly in FA. I kept a list of topics/notes for UWorld to review multiple times.
Doing topic specific blocks causes you to be too predisposed to the correct answer, especially on the interdisciplinary type questions.
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Once I felt okay with timing I switched to tutor mode to make it go quicker. I was very happy I did that. With that said, make sure you take another COMSAE, NBMEs, or UWSAs to replicate the real thing.
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I was in the same boat couple of months before the exam. U world questions had enough information in their stem that you can eliminate the wrong choices. Combank was more like a factoid testing, either you know it or not.
I did 70% of the u world but weird enough everything clicked when I did comquest. Their explanations are all clinical vignettes so it was at least good in consolidating my knowledge.
As far as timing goes, I too picked up comquest a month before my exam. I knew its late so I started off with high yield topic questions - micro, Neuro, obgyn. Don't worry about the rest. If you have time after that, then you can try. And in comquest you could easily do 100q a day with a lot of spare time left. Then you can go back to u world or first aid.
At least that's what was helpful to me. So take it with a grain of salt.
Good luck!
Thanks for your advice amigo. I might just have to delay my rotations by a few weeks and hunker down!
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Here's what everyone said in the class above me and the rumors flying around. Comsae D is the hardest (that's why my school uses to see if people can or cannot take the actual test). All the others are way easier. You're supposed to get 50+ points improvement on the actual test.
Me: I did the best on Comsae D. I did like 60 points worst on Comsae A. I actually scored less on the actual test than I did on Comsae D.
Me: I did the best on Comsae D. I did like 60 points worst on Comsae A. I actually scored less on the actual test than I did on Comsae D.
Guys, I have COMLEX Level 1 in 2 weeks. I scored poorly in comsae a week ago (365) and had to reschedule it. My breakup shows that I am poor in micro, pharm, path , behavioral, GI. Average in the rest. I don;t know what went wrong, although i have never failed a test in the last 2 yrs. Now i just have 2 weeks and am confused if I should pound 100 questions from QBanks /day and review them or sit down with FA/Pathoma for each of those weak areas and really work my ass for the next 2 weeks. I don't wanna fail COMLEX 1. Please help !
