USMLE Rumors that Micro is insane

[Redpancreas]

Before I begin, I just want to say I don't want anyone giving my specifics or even types of questions that showed up but apparently everyone I've talked to is saying micro is insane. For me, I'm trying to get through FA in the next three days while doing Uworld concurrently (I have slides so it's literally click, click, click).
Just did biochem and was wondering, is the general consensus that micro is on some new level or is that just a warped perception. I'm asking so I can know if I should try to dissect FA very carefully for micro tomorrow.

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[jqueb29]

They definitely asked me several unexpectedly obscure micro questions.

 

[darklabel]

It just means that SketchyMicro is no longer the end all be all. Sadly the exam makers have wised up and trying to test more obscure micro then just the most commonly seen. If you have time (early in 2nd year) then Micro Made Ridiculously Easy will help you out. If not, then the Micro section in FA is more than sufficient. I made the mistake of glossing it over while just focusing on SketchyMicro. Though good news is SketchyPharm is really helpful and helped my classmates so I would highly recommend it for visual learners as well.

 

[DOmed16]

I agree with Darklabel that MMRS early in second year is a huge help. My micro was very tough on step but nothing too crazy and nothing that couldn't be found in FA. I discourage Sketchy Micro use other than initially helping to memorize names of medication indications because the step exam I had, Sketchy wouldn't have helped at all especially with all of the images I had.

 

[Mad Jack]

I had exactly zero micro questions that I couldn't successfully answer on my exam with what I learned from Sketch. There were obscure presentations of things from Sketchy, but no pathogens I had not been exposed to.

 

[DOmed16]

I had exactly zero micro questions that I couldn't successfully answer on my exam with what I learned from Sketch. There were obscure presentations of things from Sketchy, but no pathogens I had not been exposed to.

Did you have a new exam or old exam?

 

[Mad Jack]

Did you have a new exam or old exam?

New.

 

[DOmed16]

New.

Ahh cool deal, I didn't really have that many micro questions on mine, but the ones I did were either asking an immuno perspective or disease process associated so I just didn't feel like sketchy helped much for mine is all, Guess it just depends on the form you get.

 

[Mad Jack]

Ahh cool deal, I didn't really have that many micro questions on mine, but the ones I did were either asking an immuno perspective or disease process associated so I just didn't feel like sketchy helped much for mine is all, Guess it just depends on the form you get.

Many of mine were combined micro-pharm or micro-biochem. Without Sketchy I wouldn't have the starting point from which to extract my answers. The odd presentations though- that was just the right neurons rubbing together at the right time.

 

[Pholston]

.......but no pathogens I had not been exposed to.

Hmmmm.....

 

[Pholston]

Many of mine were combined micro-pharm or micro-biochem.

Any hypothetical examples?

 

[DOmed16]

Many of mine were combined micro-pharm or micro-biochem. Without Sketchy I wouldn't have the starting point from which to extract my answers. The odd presentations though- that was just the right neurons rubbing together at the right time.

I agree with you on it being a great starting place for organizing micro though! Yeah presentations were unlike any question bank I had seen, but somehow usually figured out the direction they were going, so they weren't "insane" in my opinion.

 

[Mad Jack]

Any hypothetical examples?

Let's just say it was a pathogen that was WAYYYYYY off of where one would expect it to present. Like, having enterococcus in the canal of Schlemm levels of weird, something really out there that should never happen.

 

[jnmdz]

UWorld, First Aid, and SketchyMicro were more than enough for me (took Step 1 in mid June).

 

[parcus]

Micro was pretty easy on my exam, a couple of tough question I remember, but nothing UFAP couldn't handle, 1 nothing I could had done would have handled.

 

[Reperfused]

What about bacterial genetics? I'm not asking for specific questions, but just for an idea about how high/low yield that unit is. Did you guys get a lot of questions from that chapter? Were they super difficult?
I'm asking about this particular topic because it seems to be high yield in the older NBMEs. Not sure about the latest ones, haven't gone that far yet.

 

[parcus]

The questions were all over the place. There is no part of the FA chapter I could pinpoint as high yield. Most of the questions were straight forward, 1 had an obscure clinical case I believe I figured out what it probably was. I didn't feel as if I was tested on minor details too often (but at times I was).

It was not heavy on bacterial genetics though.

 

[Elevencents]

Almost all of my micro questions were anti-microbials. Really annoying.

 

[Redpancreas]

My friend told me (keeping this vague as possible) that a question asked about how large something was in a body excretion and his/her choices were stuff like 1 mm, 5 mm, etc.

This makes you wonder if the NBME puts questions in there just to serve as a method to detect anyone who's cheating by getting friends/etc. to tell them questions.

If they get these questions right but then get new, yet less challenging questions wrong, perhaps data could be used to make a statement like "95% chance that this person has access to illegal questions/etc."

Sent from my iPhone using SDN mobile

 

[Mad Jack]

My friend told me (keeping this vague as possible) that a question asked about how large something was in a body excretion and his/her choices were stuff like 1 mm, 5 mm, etc.

This makes you wonder if the NBME puts questions in there just to serve as a method to detect anyone who's cheating by getting friends/etc. to tell them questions.

If they get these questions right but then get new, yet less challenging questions wrong, perhaps data could be used to make a statement like "95% chance that this person has access to illegal questions/etc."

Sent from my iPhone using SDN mobile

Unlikely. There are some weird test questions in every exam though.

 

[parcus]

My friend told me (keeping this vague as possible) that a question asked about how large something was in a body excretion and his/her choices were stuff like 1 mm, 5 mm, etc.

This makes you wonder if the NBME puts questions in there just to serve as a method to detect anyone who's cheating by getting friends/etc. to tell them questions.

If they get these questions right but then get new, yet less challenging questions wrong, perhaps data could be used to make a statement like "95% chance that this person has access to illegal questions/etc."

Sent from my iPhone using SDN mobile

Yes, unlikely. I think I know exactly what the 1mm, 5mm is about (wasn't in my exam). It was covered somewhere in UW (just 1 question though). Besides, there is always random chance.