a new low for usmleworld..

[doctorFred]

..for % of people answering a question correctly. i've previously seen questions answered correctly by only 10 or 11% of test takers, but i came across one today that a whopping 8% of people answered correctly - with only 5 answers choices. meaning, a group of wild rheesus monkeys randomly throwing their own feces at a board marked A B C D E would perform better.

the question involved secondary lactose intolerance following viral gastroenteritis.

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[LadyWolverine]

..for % of people answering a question correctly. i've previously seen questions answered correctly by only 10 or 11% of test takers, but i came across one today that a whopping 8% of people answered correctly - with only 5 answers choices. meaning, a group of wild rheesus monkeys randomly throwing their own feces at a board marked A B C D E would perform better.

It means that there was a really good distractor. The worst I saw on UW was 6%. The 0-25% were usually the questions I laughed my ass off at because I had absolutely no idea what planet the question came from, let alone what the answer was.

 

[ShyRem]

I actually got that lactose intolerance one right. It's the "name that enzyme!" ones that I was getting wrong.

 

[Law2Doc]

..for % of people answering a question correctly. i've previously seen questions answered correctly by only 10 or 11% of test takers, but i came across one today that a whopping 8% of people answered correctly - with only 5 answers choices. meaning, a group of wild rheesus monkeys randomly throwing their own feces at a board marked A B C D E would perform better.

the question involved secondary lactose intolerance following viral gastroenteritis.

I think a lot of the time the really low percentages are only found on the brand new questions they add. A lot of the older ones get inflated a bit because folks seeing questions for the second time (eg if they take tests composed of things they got wrong previously) tend not to make the same mistake twice, and mat artificially augment the percentage.

 

[Doko]

yeah, that must be...

i find it unbelievable that over 85% of the UW peeps out there know that rhinovirus is a SS RNA positive virus... especially when there are 5 other choices with SS RNA negative, DS RNA positive, negative, etc.

or maybe i'm just *that* bad at micro.

 

[crazy_cavalier]

i came across one today that a whopping 8% of people answered correctly - with only 5 answers choices. meaning, a group of wild rheesus monkeys randomly throwing their own feces at a board marked A B C D E would perform better.

 

[Instatewaiter]

yeah, that must be...

i find it unbelievable that over 85% of the UW peeps out there know that rhinovirus is a SS RNA positive virus... especially when there are 5 other choices with SS RNA negative, DS RNA positive, negative, etc.

or maybe i'm just *that* bad at micro.

Yeah its a picornavirus. I have found most viral micro questions can be answered by knowing whether each family is enveloped or not, type of capsid, type of genetic material and if ss/ds/segmented/circular/+/- and then actual examples of each.

There is a chart in micro made ridiculously simple that has all of this. Memorize that and you'll be good to go.

 

[doctorFred]

I have found most viral micro questions can be answered by knowing whether each family is enveloped or not, type of capsid, type of genetic material and if ss/ds/segmented/circular/+/- and then actual examples of each

that's all??

 

[Helo]

lol, well, i think its kinda dumb to allow repeats of questions to affect the overall UW percentage correct for that question. it should be for first time question users only, as that would more accurately reflect the distribution. its great that people get a higher score the 2nd time thru (they actually learned something! which is the point of the qbank - a learning tool) but the question percentage should not be reflective of this learning factor but rather the way in which people answer the question the first time around...i dunno...

 

[Instatewaiter]

that's all??

It could be that I was already comfortable with the S/s of most of the viruses but i found that once i memorized that chart I got most of the viral micro questions right.

 

[indo]

yeah, that must be...

i find it unbelievable that over 85% of the UW peeps out there know that rhinovirus is a SS RNA positive virus... especially when there are 5 other choices with SS RNA negative, DS RNA positive, negative, etc.

or maybe i'm just *that* bad at micro.

find that whacky mneumonic for the main viruses on SDN. It involves a house and a story about trying to get to Reo or something. I used it several times on my exam.

 

[78222]

find that whacky mneumonic for the main viruses on SDN. It involves a house and a story about trying to get to Reo or something. I used it several times on my exam.

I used this too, it's great

 

[wcec]

http://www2.uic.edu/stud_orgs/prof/medclass2010/tles/ini/mnemonics.pdf

i couldn't find it searching on SDN, so i tried the world wide web and came up with this. surebreC & indo, is this the virus mnemonic you're talking about?

 

[78222]

http://www2.uic.edu/stud_orgs/prof/medclass2010/tles/ini/mnemonics.pdf

i couldn't find it searching on SDN, so i tried the world wide web and came up with this. surebreC & indo, is this the virus mnemonic you're talking about?

Thats it. I'd say that mnemonic scored me a few questions I would have otherwise missed

 

[2cr8tive]

lol loved it

 

[DrBorisCA]

Thats it. I'd say that mnemonic scored me a few questions I would have otherwise missed

Ditto! I was picturing the rubella/PDA tattoo for a few minutes after I got that question right haha....