Advice on what to do now?...

[docjohn101]

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My practice exam scores have ranged from 210 to 230, with the 210 being an NBME and the 230 being a UWSA. I'm working through first aid and uworld right now and planning on taking 2-3 more NBMEs as well.

I have about 2 weeks left, can anyone please tell me what I should be predicting for the real test?

Will my scores my high enough to pass?

 

[Brachyury]

My practice exam scores have ranged from 210 to 230, with the 210 being an NBME and the 230 being a UWSA. I'm working through first aid and uworld right now and planning on taking 2-3 more NBMEs as well.

I have about 2 weeks left, can anyone please tell me what I should be predicting for the real test?

Will my scores my high enough to pass?

Which NBME and which UWorls exams did you take? NBME 7, compared to other NBME exams, has a veru steep curve, and UWorld 1 is considered to be accurate, while UWorld 2 generally overpredicts by a lot.

With two weeks left, you still have a lot of time. What were your weakest areas in your practice tests/qbank? Keep doing questions and really focus you energy into your weak areas

Good luck

 

[docjohn101]

By steep do you mean easier to score higher or lower?

Does anyone know of anyone who did significantly better on the real test compared to the NBMEs? If so, could you post their practice and real test scores?

 

[johndoe3344]

Steep invariably means more difficult to get a higher score on.

 

[mdeast]

Steep invariably means more difficult to get a higher score on.

How is this different than the other NBMEs? I think they all have very steep curves. I got a 84% on NBME 11 and it was a 230. For comparison, a 84% on the USMLE Practice 150 is estimated to be about a 247.

 

[johndoe3344]

I was just defining "steep". I have no idea what your question is in reference to.

 

[iheartmints]

How is this different than the other NBMEs? I think they all have very steep curves. I got a 84% on NBME 11 and it was a 230. For comparison, a 84% on the USMLE Practice 150 is estimated to be about a 247.

Where did you get that estimation for the USMLE Practice 150? I don't think I've seen anything official

 

[mdeast]

Where did you get that estimation for the USMLE Practice 150? I don't think I've seen anything official

http://www.medfriends.org/step1_estimator/index.htm

 

[shan564]

http://www.medfriends.org/step1_estimator/index.htm

I don't think that estimator is reliable for the Free 150. I'm guessing that the Free 150 is the first thing that a lot of people do in their study process, and the MedFriends calculator just asks what score you got on the test and what score you got on your practice tests... so the Free 150 score based on that will be very inflated.

And that's definitely consistent with my experience. When I was in the 210-215 range, I did the Free 150 and got about 84%. There's no way I was in the 247 range at the time. But now I feel like I might be close to that, so the predictor was eventually right. I got 84% on the questions and I might subsequently get 247 on the real test, but that doesn't mean that the 84% was anywhere near a 247.

It's better to look online and find people who did the Free 150 within a few days of their test. That'll give us a better estimate of its reliability. I have a friend who took it a few days before her test and scored 91%, and then ended up somewhere in the mid-230s on the real thing.

 

[zebalong]

How is this different than the other NBMEs? I think they all have very steep curves. I got a 84% on NBME 11 and it was a 230. For comparison, a 84% on the USMLE Practice 150 is estimated to be about a 247.

How did you get your percentage correct on the NMBE's? All i get from the official ones are my 3 digit score. If you are using the offline ones, i hear they don't weigh the questions properly, so while it may give you an estimate to what your three digit score is, it isn't the same as taking the exam directly from the NMBE.

 

[shan564]

How did you get your percentage correct on the NMBE's? All i get from the official ones are my 3 digit score.

You have to pay an extra $10 for expanded feedback.

If you are using the offline ones, i hear they don't weigh the questions properly, so while it may give you an estimate to what your three digit score is, it isn't the same as taking the exam directly from the NMBE.

That's one of those commonly-circulating rumors that has no element of truth to it. There's no weighting. If you don't believe me, look at old threads where people report their %correct along with their 3-digit score... the % always correlates with the 3-digit score in the same way (except for the sudden change sometime in 2010 or 2011 when they changed the curve).

 

[johndoe3344]

That's one of those commonly-circulating rumors that has no element of truth to it. There's no weighting. If you don't believe me, look at old threads where people report their %correct along with their 3-digit score... the % always correlates with the 3-digit score in the same way (except for the sudden change sometime in 2010 or 2011 when they changed the curve).

I beg to differ.

http://www.usmle-forums.com/113609-post2.html
http://forums.studentdoctor.net/showthread.php?p=12437529#post12437529

NBME's are weighted. The real test is unweighted.

 

[RedSoxSuck]

NBME's are weighted. The real test is unweighted.

What do you mean?

 

[newdoc2013]

this is why the nbme cbssa exams are superior to any other measure:

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/20881715

when did uworld publish an article like that? if one exists, i havent seen it.

 

[anes2013]

You have to pay an extra $10 for expanded feedback.


That's one of those commonly-circulating rumors that has no element of truth to it. There's no weighting. If you don't believe me, look at old threads where people report their %correct along with their 3-digit score... the % always correlates with the 3-digit score in the same way (except for the sudden change sometime in 2010 or 2011 when they changed the curve).

Unfortunately i wasn't able to get the extended feedback for the nbme i took since it was bought with a school provided voucher but im pressure sure they are weighted.. i did well on nbme 7 which everyone says has a really hard curve.. but there is no way i got 90% (i took notes on thing i was unsure of and looked them up afterwards and definitely got more then 10% wrong) yet predicted score put me at 257.

 

[SteelResolve]

I would just continue to study first aid and do UWorld questions (in sets of 46 on timed, nontutor mode). I had 6 weeks to study and only did 2 assessments. Two weeks in after completing DIT I did the NBME 13 and got a 219. Four weeks in I did one of the UWorld assessments and got a 233. I completed the Qbank one time all the way through (mainly in sets of 46) and probably redid about 300 of the 600 questions I marked. I ended up with a 243. Bottom line is that I would use the practice tests to gauge ur progress but I wouldn't get caught up in doing too many of them. First Aid and UWorld were my bread and butter.