Official 2010 USMLE Step 1 Experiences and Scores Thread

[FMD212]

Good luck all. I have my exam end of March and hope to be the 1st one to post here for 2010.

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[runnerdoc7]

Wild20,

I also felt less than excited after my NBMEs but of course then I got the score immediately (and I was very happy with those scores) so it was short lived. With the real thing it is a similar feeling but without that instant relief of knowing what I got it is easy and tempting to rehash the ones I know I missed, etc.

 

[MoscowAbe]

To those who've taken the test, in retrospect do you guys/gals think the RR blue margin notes and tables worth the time?

 

[MilkmanAl]

Very.

 

[drizzt3117]

Done, it felt like the nbmes in difficulty with a few more "WTF"
questions. If you're doing well on uworld it won't be too bad! Bit more biochem than I expected but then again I'd thought I'd overstudied for it. FA is nowhere near enough for it for biochem.

 

[okgo2503]

Done, it felt like the nbmes in difficulty with a few more "WTF"
questions. If you're doing well on uworld it won't be too bad! Bit more biochem than I expected but then again I'd thought I'd overstudied for it. FA is nowhere near enough for it for biochem.

Was the biochem more like molecular/cell bio type stuff? Or was it more like detailed pathway or disease stuff? Do you have any suggestions for what might be a good source?

 

[MoscowAbe]

Very.

That's encouraging. Thanks milkman

 

[drizzt3117]

Was the biochem more like molecular/cell bio type stuff? Or was it more like detailed pathway or disease stuff? Do you have any suggestions for what might be a good source?

I used rapid review biochem, but there was some things on the test I'd never even heard of, and I've done the entirety of kaplan, Uw, and rx. I think rr I'd a pretty good guide though. I would say 60% of the test was pharm, path, or phys, but there was a lot more neuroanatomy, biochem, and micro than I expected.

 

[Dirt]

Just want to throw out there that July 14 cannot come soon enough. Once you get used to the instant gratification of Uworld waiting sucks that much more.

 

[greg1184]

By some remote chance, has anyone who took it ~May 15 gotten their score back. This is annoying. I understand that with the new format they need to get a new accumulation of results, but geez.

Oh well, better get it right than rush it.

 

[drizzt3117]

What IS the turnaround time right now anyways? They said on the test form thing it was 8 weeks, but it seems like they've been getting results to people before that, right?

 

[greg1184]

What IS the turnaround time right now anyways? They said on the test form thing it was 8 weeks, but it seems like they've been getting results to people before that, right?

That is a maximum time. Most people who took the old format got their results in 3 weeks.

 

[jj52786]

So I figured I used this thread when I was studying, and would update it with my experiences. Sorry if its rambling/disoriented - finished the test today and just got home from celebratin. Overall I didn't do all that well first year, second year got a little more serious. I mainly focused on classes, the extent of my board studying through second year was reading the relevant Goljan chapters. I also bought Kaplan around Dec and went along with each systems, did about half of it by the time board studying rolled around.

I took NBME 7 2 weeks before finals, got a 220.
NBME 5 (1 week into board studying) got a 222 - this was real disheartening to see after a week no change
NBME 6 - (2 and a half weeks into board studying) got a 247 - this obviously was amazing.
Free 150 (2 days before actual test) 91%

So basically the first week of studying I did biochem/embryo/behavioral/path/immuno/micro - the non-systems stuff. Mostly FA/Goljan. After I had finished that took the first NBME. After that I really ramped it up, went through all the Goljan audio, one pass of RR path, and one FA pass in about a week and a half. Took another NBME after that and did real well. In the last week and a half I did another pass of FA and really focused on doing usmle world questions. I did 100% of world (mostly random 48) and finished with a 70% overall (averaging mid70s to mid80s by the end). After I had finished that first pass of world, I redid all the wrong questions. I also read HY neuroanatomy and brs path at some point during studying.

As for the test itself? World is MONEY. It was so similar to the real thing. The length and difficulty was on par, I normally finished each world block with about 10 minutes to spare and the real thing was the exact same. I found world to be maybe a little more detail based and the real thing to be a little more intellectual/analytical.

The test itself was SO random. I had 3 questions on I-cell disease, a ton of random experiment designs, a crapload of fairly advanced genetics (I took a genetics class as an undergrad and that helped alot. But seriously it was pretty rough for my test at least FA would NOT have cut it). I had maybe 15 pharm questions the entire test, almost no neuro. The murmurs sucked, I was good with them on world and listened to them ahead of time but the ones they had I found to be significantly harder. The hardest thing for me was the stamina, it was draining being there all day. I also had a block from hell where I ran out of time. The randomness is tough to deal with. Oh and the micro. I did FA so many times because I knew it was my weakest subject. It was tough on the real thing FA was sufficient for a majority of the questions, but for a significant minority they wanted a level of detail which I didn't know. As for each block itself, it came down maybe 1-3 questions I really didn't know, another handful that I wasn't too sure about, a bunch that I was pretty sure about but not gimme, and maybe about half of the block was gimmes. The gimmes are really really easy. Insanely easy. Another nice thing I noticed is that the answer choices were all different. For example for a young nonsmoker with emphysema and cirrohsis, along with antitrypsin they had other random enzymes that had NO bearing on anything.

But man being done is amazing. I'm just glad the test is over. I started hoping for a 240, I think I'm at the point where I'd be ecstatic if I got over 250, happy over 240, and ok with over 230. I did have the good nbme scores but I did those tests fairly relaxed (ie two blocks, then an hour break or something). Fatigue played a pretty big role for me and hopefully didn't affect my scores too badly. Good luck to those of you who still have to take it!

 

[TheFranchise]

So I figured I used this thread when I was studying, and would update it with my experiences. Sorry if its rambling/disoriented - finished the test today and just got home from celebratin. Overall I didn't do all that well first year, second year got a little more serious. I mainly focused on classes, the extent of my board studying through second year was reading the relevant Goljan chapters. I also bought Kaplan around Dec and went along with each systems, did about half of it by the time board studying rolled around.

I took NBME 7 2 weeks before finals, got a 220.
NBME 5 (1 week into board studying) got a 222 - this was real disheartening to see after a week no change
NBME 6 - (2 and a half weeks into board studying) got a 247 - this obviously was amazing.
Free 150 (2 days before actual test) 91%

So basically the first week of studying I did biochem/embryo/behavioral/path/immuno/micro - the non-systems stuff. Mostly FA/Goljan. After I had finished that took the first NBME. After that I really ramped it up, went through all the Goljan audio, one pass of RR path, and one FA pass in about a week and a half. Took another NBME after that and did real well. In the last week and a half I did another pass of FA and really focused on doing usmle world questions. I did 100% of world (mostly random 48) and finished with a 70% overall (averaging mid70s to mid80s by the end). After I had finished that first pass of world, I redid all the wrong questions. I also read HY neuroanatomy and brs path at some point during studying.

As for the test itself? World is MONEY. It was so similar to the real thing. The length and difficulty was on par, I normally finished each world block with about 10 minutes to spare and the real thing was the exact same. I found world to be maybe a little more detail based and the real thing to be a little more intellectual/analytical.

The test itself was SO random. I had 3 questions on I-cell disease, a ton of random experiment designs, a crapload of fairly advanced genetics (I took a genetics class as an undergrad and that helped alot. But seriously it was pretty rough for my test at least FA would NOT have cut it). I had maybe 15 pharm questions the entire test, almost no neuro. The murmurs sucked, I was good with them on world and listened to them ahead of time but the ones they had I found to be significantly harder. The hardest thing for me was the stamina, it was draining being there all day. I also had a block from hell where I ran out of time. The randomness is tough to deal with. Oh and the micro. I did FA so many times because I knew it was my weakest subject. It was tough on the real thing FA was sufficient for a majority of the questions, but for a significant minority they wanted a level of detail which I didn't know. As for each block itself, it came down maybe 1-3 questions I really didn't know, another handful that I wasn't too sure about, a bunch that I was pretty sure about but not gimme, and maybe about half of the block was gimmes. The gimmes are really really easy. Insanely easy. Another nice thing I noticed is that the answer choices were all different. For example for a young nonsmoker with emphysema and cirrohsis, along with antitrypsin they had other random enzymes that had NO bearing on anything.

But man being done is amazing. I'm just glad the test is over. I started hoping for a 240, I think I'm at the point where I'd be ecstatic if I got over 250, happy over 240, and ok with over 230. I did have the good nbme scores but I did those tests fairly relaxed (ie two blocks, then an hour break or something). Fatigue played a pretty big role for me and hopefully didn't affect my scores too badly. Good luck to those of you who still have to take it!

Man, the actual set of questions may be random, but the overall test itself may be duplicated. I also had 3 questions on I-cell disease and couldnt believe it. There's not way they did that twice by accident.

 

[drizzt3117]

Yeah, I had a couple qs about the same really random drug (bosentan) haha, good thing I knew what it does.

 

[cushie]

.

 

[golfman]

I talked to a guy who writes questions for the exam, and he said are 3 questions about something, like I-Cell disease, that are almost identical, it's pretty certain that 2 of them will be thrown out (experimental questions).

 

[DrVanNostran]

son of a...I wrote my entire summary last night and SDN went down for maintenance. I'll write another full report once I get my score.

Quick summary: The exam is fair. I felt that a majority of the information could be obtained from FA/World. Knowing CTs/Arteriograms of the pelvis and brain are high yield IMO. I did about 8000 questions (World, Rx, NBME, and Kaplan) from the beginning of second year. Hope I can post a respectable SDN score.

 

[MilkmanAl]

Yeah, I had a couple qs about the same really random drug (bosentan) haha, good thing I knew what it does.

Dude, I had 2 bosentan questions, too. Thank God for UWorld is all I have to say about that one. I also had a lot of other weird concepts repeated like lead poisoning, Chagas disease, and Von Gierke's.

Here's a question that's been eating at me for awhile: Why does the the ventricle stretch less easily with increased filling pressure? Is it due to connective tissue restriction or myocardial contratcion in response to stretch?

 

[_T_]

Took the exam yesterday.. let me just say.. being done is one of best feelings of my life.. I honestly didn't know what to do with myself. I considered looking up answers that I was confused about but figured why blow my high..

So I'll try to keep this as simple as possible..

I think I truly realized how important it is to learn the material BEFORE Step 1.. meaning that you should actually learn/do well during classes b/c it makes your life sooo much easier. I think I slacked excessively 1st year (barely passed a lot of classes) and kinda slacked beginning of 2nd year making it really tough to learn brand new material within 6 weeks..

With that said.. like everyone says FA + UWorld + RR + BRS Phys are money.. I used some of the Kaplan vids and would only recommend cking out the Pharm one and bhvrl sciences one if you have access (The Behavioral Vid was gold)

Biochem: Very little actual biochemistry.. I had a couple straight fwd questions about glycogen storage diseases and stuff.. only 1 vitamin q.. had 2 qs on ICell Dz. Had a decent amount of molecular bio which I probably got wrong.. really nit picky facts that I probably wouldve gotten wrong anyway.. know your receptors (FA is not good enough for this)!!

Microbio: There was a TON of microbio.. as in "This protein is made by what cell and whats its purpose and what kind of processing does it go through"... blahh I feel like I'll lose most of my points here.. barely looked at this stuff and it'll show..

Path: Not as much as I was expecting.. surprisingly only had 2-3 renal qs.. and most path qs were mixed w/ pathophys.. uworld/rr really prep you well.. there was 1 q I had identical to UWorld and one q that goljan mentioned in his audio that was nearly identical. Had at least 10 Derm questions.. which were probably in FA.. but I just didn't learn em well enough

Pathophys/Phys: I had 4 EKG QS!!!? I was soo pissed.. one was straight forward.. it was peaked T Waves but the other ones had no U/Q waves.. one had an ST Elevation but they wanted me to figure out if it was inferior/anterior/etc.. didn't look at EKGs at all so this hurt.. 2 heart sound questions.. one was really easy.. the other was actually really difficult.. i made my guess of the question step more so then the actual heart sound. Didn't have as many arrow questions but a lot of thinking questions.. know your pathophys.. I feel like it made the most of my test.. had to use a cardiac equation twice and used it wrong both times now that I look back : /

Pharm: I wanna say I had 10 pharm questions.. 2 of which asked for specific details amongst drug classes. Ie, in the fluoroquinolones which of the following causes X blahh.. super pissed cause I spent a ton of time on pharm.. 2/10 of which i got wrong

Micro: Really straight forward.. right out of FA.. I annotated some of CMMS but dont think its really necessary.. know ur viral genomes.. I had two qs on Campylobacter in a row with basically the exam same stem .. oh y
ea.. a handful of detailed HIV stuff.. this is the one thing that FA did not cover well enough.. might wanna read up a little bit about HIV (& related drugs as well)


Anatomy/Embryo: Not much at all.. maybe 2 per block.. most were straight out of FA.. a couple I wouldn't have gotten even if I had spent a day on anatomy.. had some really tough neuro arteriogram qs.. very little embryo.. all of it straight out of FA

Stats/Bhvrl/Ethics: FA was more then enough.. wish I had more of this stuff cause they def weren't as challenging as Uworld.. Ethics was okay overall but a couple were really tough.. Kaplan's 20 rules are great for bioethics..

Overall.. they really throw some curve balls at you.. I wanna say 40% of the test has stuff that is straight fwd & pretty easy.. 35% can be figured out but is really challenging while the rest is stuff u wont see anywhere else..

I was actually really surprised by the poor quality of some of the histology/pathology slides.. I had two blood smears which were literally just smeared and one of them was really low zoom.. I was expecting better slides..

UWorld first pass: 71%
UWorld 2nd pass (about 400 qs): 88%
NBME 7: 216 (2 weeks out)
NBME 6 225 (1 week out)
UWorld 1: 238 (a couple days before)
UWorld 2: 238 (a day before)

Hoping for a 220.. but thinking back at how many stupid mistakes I made I highly doubt it.. but at this point.. I could care less.. feels great to be done.. if you have any qs feel free to ask.. (btw sorry if I rambled.. its just a stream of thoughts im typing up haha)

 

[CatalystCD]

Made 2 full passes through FA, RR path + audio, Kaplan biochem/behavioral/pharm. I'll be taking it tomorrow. I'll be happy with anything above 230. Found this thread very helpful and want to thank everyone for their input/advice.

NBME 1: 231 - 5/17
NBME 2: 242 - 6/4
NBME 4: 238 - 6/9
NBME 6: 242 - 6/16
NBME 7: 247 - 6/18

UWSA 1: 244 - 6/23
UWSA 2: 256 - 6/23


Uworld finished 2x, 2nd time avg = 71%
USMLERx 38% done = 83%

 

[drizzt3117]

Dude, I had 2 bosentan questions, too. Thank God for UWorld is all I have to say about that one. I also had a lot of other weird concepts repeated like lead poisoning, Chagas disease, and Von Gierke's.

Here's a question that's been eating at me for awhile: Why does the the ventricle stretch less easily with increased filling pressure? Is it due to connective tissue restriction or myocardial contratcion in response to stretch?

It probably has to do with the whole stretching curve, where there's a toe where it'll stretch a lot under relatively low tension but requires a lot more once there's a decent amount of stretch.

 

[kryptik]

Yeah, I had a couple qs about the same really random drug (bosentan) haha, good thing I knew what it does.

bosentan is mentioned in FA 2010,but not in 09 i guess its good to get the latest version

 

[aashkab]

It probably has to do with the whole stretching curve, where there's a toe where it'll stretch a lot under relatively low tension but requires a lot more once there's a decent amount of stretch.

right, but why does that happen? i would guess that its the heart passively contracting or something while it is being filled up rather than connective tissue. this would allow for you to pump out more volume when its present and adhere to starling's mechanism. anyone know the answer?

 

[drizzt3117]

right, but why does that happen? i would guess that its the heart passively contracting or something while it is being filled up rather than connective tissue. this would allow for you to pump out more volume when its present and adhere to starling's mechanism. anyone know the answer?

Oh, what I was talking about has to do with the length tension relationship. It's an intrinsic property of muscle. When you have more preload it loads the muscle more. There's all point where you don't get more conteactility though and need to undergo eccentric hypertrophy though bc of volume overload. I'm sorry, this isn't a great explanation, I could explain it easier if I could draw a picture.

 

[aashkab]

haha yeah i know what you are talking about. but i think his question may have been asking why does that intrinsic property of muscle occur? connective tissue or passive muscle contraction? before having to undergo eccentric hypertrophy?

and maybe the answer is who the heck knows

 

[Twptophan]

I arrived to the test center 15 min early to be first in line so I could get right into the testing center. This way I did not have to wait 30 min for everyone else to be called in like when I took my practice prometric test.

I finished the first two blocks with 15 min to spare for each block. I then took a quick break to get some food.
I did 2 more blocks with 10 min to spare per block. I took my lunch break with 1 hr 45 min on the clock. I sat outside on a nice bench and ate lunch, then walked a around a few stores.
Went back in to take block 5 and finished with about 5 min left. I was really slowing down at this point and starting to space out more. I took a break and a good sized chug of starbucks iced coffee (home-brewed the day before, sitting in my locker ready to go). I could feel the caffeine kick in about 40 min into the 6th block and it my concentration did improve. Another swig of coffee before block 7 helped pull me through. I was able to leave with 1 hr on the break clock. I brought tylenol with me just in case a migraine headache would set in from staring at the computer, but I had no problems.
(I tried the 5 hour energy drink 3 days prior to the exam and had a horrible crash 2 hours after drinking it - threw that away real fast.)

I took nbme 6 two weeks into studying and got a 240. On UWorld I was about 73% and found that doing timed random 48's a week prior to the test really helped prep me for the real thing.

Now I need to make friends with Schwartz and Harrison.

 

[MoscowAbe]

H

ere's a question that's been eating at me for awhile: Why does the the ventricle stretch less easily with increased filling pressure? Is it due to connective tissue restriction or myocardial contratcion in response to stretch?

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/10986582

 

[Inuranic]

Well, that was fun.

Background

Baseline Score, NBME #2: 234
UWSA #1: 257
Free 150: 252-255 (~88%)
NBME #7: 253
UWSA #2 (3 days ago): 262

Went through UWorld 2+ times, with 80% correct on the second full pass. Read FA so many times I had to get it rebound. Read the standard review books (RR, HY Neuro, 1999 HY Cell&Molec, CMMRS, etc.). Listened to Goljan twice this month.

Last 6 days consisted of RR Margin notes, all of FA, Pharm Recall power review, and as many UWorld questions as I could stomach (with random tests + tests focused on subject areas I felt weak in).

Finally, and most importantly, I gunned the hell out of second year. It made board month so much easier.

Test Day

My test had a decent smattering of everything. I was really hoping for a Pathology-heavy exam, because I can do that in my sleep, but I feel like, if anything, I got a Pharm/Phys-heavy exam, which I'm also OK with.

Disclaimer:

I'll try to guess which books helped, but I have really bad source amnesia, so while I remember a lot of factoids, I don't always know where they came from...

Anatomy

I had more anatomy than I expected, but that may just be because I don't remember any of it and dread answering questions. I would say maybe 50% was in UWorld/FA, 50% wasn't? I'm not sure - I got some anatomy questions that I (think I) knew only because clinical correlates were made during second year. There was one ridiculous question that I just tried looking up in Netter, and think I may have guessed it right, but still don't know.

Biochem

Probably 50/50 biochemistry/molecular. I focused mainly on FA and didn't think they were too bad. My friend did the same and she got slaughtered (as a few other people in this thread have wrote about). Based on her experience and what I read here, I would want to say read RR Biochem just to be safe. I rolled the dice and I think it worked. I think.

Biostats

What the hell was this? I had a ton of biostats, which I was prepared for (because of this thread and friends), but there were some answers I knew only because I took stats in undergrad. FA/UW were enough for most of the questions, there were probably 4 or 5 that were curveballs.

Behavioral

Fairly standard behavioral/ethics questions, only one that gave me any pause.

Pharm

I feel like I had a decent chunk of pharm, but found them all to be fairly straightforward, mostly because UW is dickish with their practice questions ("This drug, while considered a prototype, is not often mentioned, has 7 known side effects, what is the 5th most common one?"). I used FA/UW/Pharm Recall/Pharm flash cards.

Phys

Again, I feel like I had a decent chunk of phys, which was usually tied into pharm. I used BRS Phys and FA.

Path

Didn't think it was too bad. Goes without saying that Goljan audio/RR are more than enough.

Neuroanatomy

Again, what the hell is this? I felt like there was a lot of Neuro, which, thanks to this thread, I was prepared for. I read HY Neuro and the FA Neuo chapter till my eyes bled, and then used my school's Neuro program to go over angiograms/MRIs. Awesome decision.

Micro

Decent chunk of micro, mostly out of FA. I scored almost 800 on the Micro Shelf, and reading CMMRS/FA was like seeing an old friend. Decent amount of antimicro questions, but really straightforward.

Immuno

Meh. Used Lange and FA. Not a ton on my exam.

So, yeah...

I prepared thoroughly for this, and it was a really fair exam. I found the wording to be a little tricky occasionally, but that's to be expected.

Hands down, the best preparation for this was super gunning second year. Religiously reading FA/RR, listening to Goljan, doing UW at least twice = money.

Considering my 4 practice exams ranged from 252-262, that's what I'm hoping for. I know I made stupid mistakes along the way, and had to straight-up guess every now and then, so we'll see how it goes.

Also, I'm still trying to figure out if there are different versions of Step 1 or if there's just a massive question bank. I'm sort of leaning towards question bank, but who knows. (Well, maybe someone on here does).

Anything you guys want to know, other than specific test questions, just ask.

 

[username456789]

Hands down, the best preparation for this was super gunning second year. Religiously reading FA/RR, listening to Goljan, doing UW at least twice = money.

Considering my 4 practice exams ranged from 252-262, that's what I'm hoping for. I know I made stupid mistakes along the way, and had to straight-up guess every now and then, so we'll see how it goes.

Also, I'm still trying to figure out if there are different versions of Step 1 or if there's just a massive question bank. I'm sort of leaning towards question bank, but who knows. (Well, maybe someone on here does).

Anything you guys want to know, other than specific test questions, just ask.

I'll get to my full experience/assessment soon (I took it today too), but I just wanted to say:

We had very very similar scores on practice exams it looks like, and I agree with all of this. All throughout Step prep, I realized that there is no way I'd be doing half as decent as I was if I hadn't pushed so hard during the year.

That said, I felt like there were a few more "tricks" than I expected, and definitely a couple questions where I feel two answers were equally correct (so I was obviously missing something). The problem is, I'm pretty sure some of the ones I thought were trying to trick me were really just being straightfoward.

I don't think there's a lot more I could've necessarily done to prepare, though. The stuff I got thrown on was stuff I had just never seen in class or review material.

 

[username456789]

Oh just a few more random quick thoughts:

I seriously got asked straight up the MOA of one of the simplest and most commonly used drugs out there TWO TIMES. Just flat out "A patient has these symptoms and takes this drug. What is the mechanism by which it alleviates her symptoms?"

Lots of anatomy like others have said. Or at least more %-wise than any question banks. And it was weird stuff you really probably couldn't prepare well for without spending an inordinate amount of time on (and one of them they just plain tricked me good on).

 

[Inuranic]

Oh just a few more random quick thoughts:

I seriously got asked straight up the MOA of one of the simplest and most commonly used drugs out there TWO TIMES. Just flat out "A patient has these symptoms and takes this drug. What is the mechanism by which it alleviates her symptoms?"

Lots of anatomy like others have said. Or at least more %-wise than any question banks. And it was weird stuff you really probably couldn't prepare well for without spending an inordinate amount of time on (and one of them they just plain tricked me good on).

I want to echo this. I was surprised with the anatomy because the question banks/practice tests don't really throw a lot at you (UWSA #2 is probably the closest, but that's not saying much).

As for drugs...yeah. Thanks NBME. I will answer your MOA questions all day long. Thanks.

 

[midn]

Just got out of the test and thought I'd post up my experiences.

Overall the test was straightforward, but I feel like I made a lot of dumb mistakes just because of my inability to recall a small detail. My preparation wasn't as intense as some people here, but still pretty substantial nonetheless.

I took five and a half weeks to study. I did next to none preparation before the end of MS2 because I just had no idea where to start. I think I could have done it in less time if I had reviewed a little over MS2, but whatever. Doesn't matter now .

Here are some numbers to get a good idea of my level of preparation:

UWord: 69% overall (48 random/timed/first pass); I started the qbank a bit too early before even really getting into FA so I was hitting mid 50s in the beginning. After I finished FA, my scores shot up to mid 60s and then mid 70s.

NBME 7 (two weeks of studying, barely 1/2 of FA done): 234
UWSA 1 (three weeks; most of FA done): 258
UWSA 2 (four weeks; finally finished with FA): 264 (I also did three blocks of UWorld qbank afterwards to simulate a real test and got 81%/81%/72%).

I did three passes through FA. My first pass was a bit unnecessarily slow (took me three and a half weeks), second pass was a week and a half, and my last pass was 4 days.

I listened to Goljan, but not too attentively since I was also reading RR. I made one pass through RR second edition.

I made one very quick pass through Clinical Microbiology Made Ridiculously Simple. In retrospect, this wasn't necessary since the micro on my test was largely a joke. FA was more than enough.

Now, as for the test. My goal was a 250, but I really don't think that's happening since I felt like I missed a lot of questions. We'll see though.

Anatomy: by far the hardest mostly because the questions asked were really detailed. I would have had trouble answering these questions while even taking anatomy.

Biochemistry: pretty straightforward with a couple of weird questions which I hope were experimental.

Cell bio: not sure if I got any cell bio questions. They were probably integrated in some vignette that I didn't realize.

Histology: none here that I could tell.

Embryo: I think this went okay, I can't remember. One particularly annoying question dealt with knowing when the earliest date was that a fetus could be still viable so you wouldn't abort a viable baby (weird...).

Physiology: very few pure physio questions which disappointed me since I thought physio was my strength. I had one very difficult respiratory physio question that dealt with using some positive pressure ventilator thing. I had no idea how to answer it mostly because I wasn't sure what the answers were saying.

Biostats: straightforward equation use. A couple of head-scratchers on interpreting particular variables (i.e. power, type I error, etc.).

Pharm: VERY straightforward. UWorld be damned for their ridiculous pharm questions. FA is more than enough.

The rest of the test was pretty unremarkable or I can't really remember.

I hope this was semi-informative.

Oh, and the vignettes were unnecessarily long. Sometimes there was 5-6 lines of information, and 3-4 of those lines weren't even needed for the diagnosis. Bah.

When do we get our scores?

 

[DrVanNostran]

Just got out of the test and thought I'd post up my experiences.

Overall the test was straightforward, but I feel like I made a lot of dumb mistakes just because of my inability to recall a small detail. My preparation wasn't as intense as some people here, but still pretty substantial nonetheless.

I took five and a half weeks to study. I did next to none preparation before the end of MS2 because I just had no idea where to start. I think I could have done it in less time if I had reviewed a little over MS2, but whatever. Doesn't matter now .

Here are some numbers to get a good idea of my level of preparation:

UWord: 69% overall (48 random/timed/first pass); I started the qbank a bit too early before even really getting into FA so I was hitting mid 50s in the beginning. After I finished FA, my scores shot up to mid 60s and then mid 70s.

NBME 7 (two weeks of studying, barely 1/2 of FA done): 234
UWSA 1 (three weeks; most of FA done): 258
UWSA 2 (four weeks; finally finished with FA): 264 (I also did three blocks of UWorld qbank afterwards to simulate a real test and got 81%/81%/72%).

I did three passes through FA. My first pass was a bit unnecessarily slow (took me three and a half weeks), second pass was a week and a half, and my last pass was 4 days.

I listened to Goljan, but not too attentively since I was also reading RR. I made one pass through RR second edition.

I made one very quick pass through Clinical Microbiology Made Ridiculously Simple. In retrospect, this wasn't necessary since the micro on my test was largely a joke. FA was more than enough.

Now, as for the test. My goal was a 250, but I really don't think that's happening since I felt like I missed a lot of questions. We'll see though.

Anatomy: by far the hardest mostly because the questions asked were really detailed. I would have had trouble answering these questions while even taking anatomy.

Biochemistry: pretty straightforward with a couple of weird questions which I hope were experimental.

Cell bio: not sure if I got any cell bio questions. They were probably integrated in some vignette that I didn't realize.

Histology: none here that I could tell.

Embryo: I think this went okay, I can't remember. One particularly annoying question dealt with knowing when the earliest date was that a fetus could be still viable so you wouldn't abort a viable baby (weird...).

Physiology: very few pure physio questions which disappointed me since I thought physio was my strength. I had one very difficult respiratory physio question that dealt with using some positive pressure ventilator thing. I had no idea how to answer it mostly because I wasn't sure what the answers were saying.

Biostats: straightforward equation use. A couple of head-scratchers on interpreting particular variables (i.e. power, type I error, etc.).

Pharm: VERY straightforward. UWorld be damned for their ridiculous pharm questions. FA is more than enough.

The rest of the test was pretty unremarkable or I can't really remember.

I hope this was semi-informative.

Oh, and the vignettes were unnecessarily long. Sometimes there was 5-6 lines of information, and 3-4 of those lines weren't even needed for the diagnosis. Bah.

When do we get our scores?

Hopefully 3rd week of July

 

[NUc12]

Just took mine this afternoon, have to say biochem was definitely heavy, everything in FA though but just have to have it on the tip of your tongue.

 

[DivCurlZero]

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[frd86guy]

Long time lurker, few time poster. Anyways:


In general: on my particular form, if you knew FA cold you probably would know the answer to 50-60%. The rest were full of things that I had never seen before in my life. One question I was only able to get because one of our instructors talked about his research interests and went into detail about a particular signaling pathway which is probably only mentioned in Robbins.

Overall, I I doubt I met my practice score projections (was projected to do fairly well) but I'm not too broken up about it because I'm not sure if I could have done better even if I had had another week to prepare. Here's hoping for a generooooous curve.

Statements like this TERRIFY me. If you supposedly need to get about 60% right to pass Step 1, and you said almost half the stuff on your exam was stuff most med students probably haven't even heard of, well......you guys can do the math

 

[AppTrail]

Statements like this TERRIFY me. If you supposedly need to get about 60% right to pass Step 1, and you said almost half the stuff on your exam was stuff most med students probably haven't even heard of, well......you guys can do the math

I felt like throughout the test this was mostly true...memorizing First Aid definitely helps you for rote memorization required, but a good chunk of the questions require reasoning and process of elimination...some of them you simply "just know" from exposure to various topics throughout medical school. On several questions, I thought to myself, "there nothing I could have done to prepare myself for this qeustion, only test-taking skills"...

and I also want to echo some previous posts about some of the question wording- some questions had long almost run-on sentences that I had to re-read 5x just to understand...some questions had several prepositions and seemingly double-negative sentences...

 

[NoWayOut]

Microbio: There was a TON of microbio.. as in "This protein is made by what cell and whats its purpose and what kind of processing does it go through"... blahh I feel like I'll lose most of my points here.. barely looked at this stuff and it'll show..

Congrats on completing. Hope you get a realy nice score after all the hard work.
You mentioned "protein" being made by microorganisms in the above..can you please elaborate? Are they referring to virulence factors, toxin, stuff like that?
Thanks.

 

[NoWayOut]

I felt like throughout the test this was mostly true...memorizing First Aid definitely helps you for rote memorization required, but a good chunk of the questions require reasoning and process of elimination...some of them you simply "just know" from exposure to various topics throughout medical school. On several questions, I thought to myself, "there nothing I could have done to prepare myself for this qeustion, only test-taking skills"...

and I also want to echo some previous posts about some of the question wording- some questions had long almost run-on sentences that I had to re-read 5x just to understand...some questions had several prepositions and seemingly double-negative sentences...

But isn't this where UW comes in to fill some of the gap that FA can't? That has been my understanding.

 

[aashkab]

how the heck do you prepare for anatomy then, lol this is ridiculous if its purely multiple guess.

 

[Texas4508]

Random question...if we take it in June and are waiting for the magic 14 July date....how do we get our score? Will it be on the NBME website or mailed to us or what?

 

[Studious]

I don't want to write a huge summary of my experience, and I don't have my scores yet, but I just wanted to comment and say that I used Kaplan QBank and felt really prepared. I never looked at UWorld, so I'm not sure of the specific differences, but I feel Kaplan just worked out for me.

 

[DivCurlZero]

Statements like this TERRIFY me. If you supposedly need to get about 60% right to pass Step 1, and you said almost half the stuff on your exam was stuff most med students probably haven't even heard of, well......you guys can do the math

Sorry, didn't mean to freak you out. I should probably clarify and say that while for the remaining 40% of so, rote memorization wouldn't have helped, you could still use your knowledge to probably at least cut out a lot of the answer choices that don't make any sense.

In all honesty, even though I'm sure I didn't hit my projected score, I think (hope) that I still did okay. Remember -- the vast majority of med students are using the exact same resources you are so if you haven't seen something before, odds are that they haven't either!

 

[drizzt3117]

Statements like this TERRIFY me. If you supposedly need to get about 60% right to pass Step 1, and you said almost half the stuff on your exam was stuff most med students probably haven't even heard of, well......you guys can do the math

A lot of the weird stuff was obscure side effects for stuff you have heard of. but the way they ask the qs is super sketch. There was one I should have gotten about sildenafil but the way they asked the q made it seem unlikely.

 

[drizzt3117]

Sorry, didn't mean to freak you out. I should probably clarify and say that while for the remaining 40% of so, rote memorization wouldn't have helped, you could still use your knowledge to probably at least cut out a lot of the answer choices that don't make any sense.

In all honesty, even though I'm sure I didn't hit my projected score, I think (hope) that I still did okay. Remember -- the vast majority of med students are using the exact same resources you are so if you haven't seen something before, odds are that they haven't either!

I suspect the curve is based on how many ppl got that particular question right, so if it was hard (and not experimental) it doesn't hurt you too much to get it wrong but helps you a lot to get it right.

 

[DrVanNostran]

how the heck do you prepare for anatomy then, lol this is ridiculous if its purely multiple guess.

I felt that World + FA was just enough for anatomy. If I flipped through a cross section CT book things would have been easier.

If you studied anatomy hard during med school, the anatomy is not terrible, its just tough to recall.

 

[username456789]

I suspect the curve is based on how many ppl got that particular question right, so if it was hard (and not experimental) it doesn't hurt you too much to get it wrong but helps you a lot to get it right.

Yeah this is what I'm worried about. There are at least 2 or 3 questions that I know I got wrong because I thought "NO WAY is the answer THAT easy", only to check later and find out it was, in fact, that easy.

 

[username456789]

The worst of those was one that had a solid 9-10 lines of text describing a baby with botulism in painful detail. The whole time, I was thinking, "Okay, it's botulism - just have to read through this to make sure I don't miss some weird twist in the question." At the end, it tells you the baby has botulism. To avoid giving anything away, I'll just say that it ends up being a very specific molecular biology question.

I got this question too (or at least a very similar one, I can't remember the entire stem). But I remember the very last sentence was written very poorly. It basically asked "how are these symptoms caused?", and the answer choices were 4 very obvious wrong ones (if you know how botulinum toxin works), and then one answer that explained the "normal" process of what goes on WITHOUT botulism. Either I completely misread some of the answer choices, or they completely screwed up with the question stem (I really think they meant to ask "which process is impaired and results in these symptoms?").

 

[DivCurlZero]

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[username456789]

The exact same thing happened to me too ... really, in the end, we're all our own worst enemies on this test.

That's the exact phrase I used when explaining it to a classmate yesterday. I was easily the biggest obstacle standing in between me and an awesome score.