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Ok, so I didn't exactly hit homerun on the test, but I thought it went ok to good. My experience of step 1 was actually kinda fun. I went in with a great attitude knowing that I had gotten some great advice from this board, had studied my butt off and honestly couldn't do any better than I could that day. Got to the test center along with about 10 of my classmates and two GREers...I felt bad for them. We were talking about crazy things and laughing a lot (nervous tension I guess) and they just looked at us like we were fools. Ah well. They called us in one by one, took my picture (I had a huge smile on my face), got my locker (number 13, almost asked for a new one, then realized that this experience is not going to be about luck for me; wishful thinking I know). Lady was super nice. Got randomly assigned a computer, in the back! whoohoo! sat with my 2 markers and 3 dry erase boards, put my ear plugs in, and started. First block, my hand was shaking just like I thought it would (told ya, Solace! 🙂 ) Got through the 1st block, and figured this dang test is gonna take forever. After the second, took a bathroom break. Got to walk by the kids in the sylvan center who were coloring. I would have given just about anything to be those kids. I miss coloring. Then went back for 2 more blocks. Then ate my lunch of peanut M&Ms, then went back for the last 3. By the last 15 ?s of the last block, I was praying for the easy Kaplan like questions. No avail. I had to still think. I'm pretty sure I only took about 15 min of break. Just couldn't sit and stare at the wall while I knew I still had more to do. Really not that bad. I had done about 200 ?s straight with the NBME practice tests so I was kind of prepared. In each block, I finished all the ?s by about 15-20 min left, went over all the questions again, just to solidify them in my head. Really only took ~2 min to get through them again. If I had this, "you idiot" thought, then I changed my answer. If I still thought, right.....I don't even think my pharm prof would have gotten this one, I left my original eenie, meenie, minie, moo answer to speak for itself. This second time through, made me feel better about the block. There were 2 blocks where I felt like crap after I got through it. Then realized that it wasn't as bad as I originally thought, because I had forgot the good questions in the block. On a funny side, I caught myself doing repetitive motions while answering some of the questions. I felt like rainman pulling random facts out of the air that meant nothing to anyone else but me.
As for the content, pretty fair. Dont get me wrong, the thing made me think. I'm by no means a genius, I just studied my butt off and had to have a good attitude about this or I might have thrown up 🙂 One question actually made me laugh out loud. It was about a male "cat lady". hilarious.
For a breakdown:
Path: pretty straight forward. biggest part of exam. my pictures here were histo. didn't really realize how much I liked histo until now.
Pharm: probably next biggest part of exam. There were about 5 ?s where I had never even heard of the drugs. Out of the 5 or so answer choices, I could rule out 2, then the other 3 I had never even seen the stems before. I guess FA was a good resource, but I probably could have done just as well without it. INH was super high yield, 6 ?s on it alone. really weird. good thing I like that drug. 2 were in the same block!! only 1 or 2 autonomics.
Physio: next biggest part I think. a few graphs, but most was that 3 categories with arrows yielding 6 answer choices. Not too bad.
Micro/Immuno: I really don't remember much about this, except quite a few ?s about antivirals. 3? or so on protozoa, but the easy ones. 2 or so on fungi, but the easy ones. I can't remember the immuno too well.
Anatomy: next biggest part. The MRIs left much to be desired in this section. It seemed they picked the blurriest side of the MRI to label. No brachial plexus ?s, which was good for me (although that was the 1 thing I decided to look over that morning because it's one of those things that sticks for an hour then, it leaves)
Biochem: very few ?s; 1 pathway picture; a few genetic pathway defects; as for molecular bio: ~10?s: one hox gene ?S, a few about translation, few about transcription, 1 or 2 about bacterial transduction/transformation, etc. Really not too bad, but I had a molecular genetics class in undergrad, and I had to use that knowledge to answer 2 of these questions.
Embryo: not difficult. straight from the embryo in step up.
Time I studied for: studied through last block of school (mainly reading kaplan books) ~7 weeks about 6 hrs per day on boards alone. Then for the last 3.7 weeks studied 10 hrs a day. started 6 am till 10:00 pm As for sleep, was taking 25 mg of benedryl since mid april. then kicked it up to 50 mg the sunday before my thursday test. Had NO trouble sleeping and gave myself a chance to get used to the hangover effects before test.
Resources I used: Step up and First Aid. Annotated EVERY PAGE of step up. I like this one so much more than FA. but FA had better biochem, pharm, and the micro section in the back was money!! it made me remember the bugs on it's own (not in a group) because they were in alpha order, not sorted by type of bug. I tried to read MRRS, but got discouraged by the length. BRS path and BRS physio: read, and annotated Step Up as reading, then read again by themselves. Looked at the graphs in physio night before.
Read lippincott's twice, Kaplan's biochem twice and BRS biochem for biochem and molecular bio. Also, during our last block, read the entire set of Kaplan's 2000 home study books (the ones broken down by system). Anatomy, very quickly (~10 minutes) breezed through HY anatomy and memorized FA. By far my weakest subject! Embryo, used first aid and Step up. Pharm: basically used my knowledge from class and read over FA a few times. read pathophys for boards and wards for major diseases (diabetes, CAD, etc) Lange Micro/Immuno for immuno. Best immuno section I've seen. Summarizes everything and I'm pretty sure I understood some of this stuff better 2nd time around.
Questions: Q-Bank 90& done averaging about 64% in the heart of studying, then was getting 70-80% the last few days. Did repeats only the last few days. Learned my anatomy and micro through this. low:40 high 88
NMS: did the entire cd 2X. averaging low 70s. Liked these ?s, but not representative of the test at all. Good to test your knowledge.
Webpath: kind of representative, but not really. Too much lab data for subjects like heme. Recommend the pictures from here though.
BSS: got through about 60% of these books (whole basic principles book, and 50? and 2 180?s tests from each systems book) again not representative of the test, but I learned A LOT from these questions. annotated first aid and step up with this info. Great for helping me understand pathophys.
Lange micro/immuno: immuno questions were great. Gave letter answer, but no explanation.
Various scores you all can analyze to death 😀 :
Released NBME 150?s first time (before I started hard core studied): 71%
2nd time (after hard core studying): 83%
NBME $45 form 1: 590 (6 days before)
form 2: 600 (4 days before)
Q-bank: 64% average at about 80% done
Probably in the top 1/3 of my class. we're p/f so I don't have exact numbers.
MCAT:26 (just so you all don't think I was lying 😉 I probably should have studied for this a little more than I went to the mall, eh?
SAT: 1250 (600 Math, 650 verbal) did you see they are adding an essay to the SAT for next year. yikes!
Kindergarden achievement test: 24/25 (I told them a bike was faster than a car because I wanted them to give me a bike.....come on guys I was 5!!)
Things I did to stay sane: went to the gym everyday for an hour (except 3 days); watched my soap while eating lunch. for 2 hrs one thursday, I got distracted by billy madison on TV, so this was time off. whoops! but it made me happy
day before, studied for ~3 hrs. watched paris hilton and nicole richie on simple life 2 to make myself feel smarter
This got very long and if you made it this far, I think you deserve a cookie! Thanks for listening, I'll field any ?s from the audience now....by the way, thanks to Al Gore for inventing the internet, without which I wouldn't have gotten all this awesome advice from you all. THANK YOU!!!!
As for the content, pretty fair. Dont get me wrong, the thing made me think. I'm by no means a genius, I just studied my butt off and had to have a good attitude about this or I might have thrown up 🙂 One question actually made me laugh out loud. It was about a male "cat lady". hilarious.
For a breakdown:
Path: pretty straight forward. biggest part of exam. my pictures here were histo. didn't really realize how much I liked histo until now.
Pharm: probably next biggest part of exam. There were about 5 ?s where I had never even heard of the drugs. Out of the 5 or so answer choices, I could rule out 2, then the other 3 I had never even seen the stems before. I guess FA was a good resource, but I probably could have done just as well without it. INH was super high yield, 6 ?s on it alone. really weird. good thing I like that drug. 2 were in the same block!! only 1 or 2 autonomics.
Physio: next biggest part I think. a few graphs, but most was that 3 categories with arrows yielding 6 answer choices. Not too bad.
Micro/Immuno: I really don't remember much about this, except quite a few ?s about antivirals. 3? or so on protozoa, but the easy ones. 2 or so on fungi, but the easy ones. I can't remember the immuno too well.
Anatomy: next biggest part. The MRIs left much to be desired in this section. It seemed they picked the blurriest side of the MRI to label. No brachial plexus ?s, which was good for me (although that was the 1 thing I decided to look over that morning because it's one of those things that sticks for an hour then, it leaves)
Biochem: very few ?s; 1 pathway picture; a few genetic pathway defects; as for molecular bio: ~10?s: one hox gene ?S, a few about translation, few about transcription, 1 or 2 about bacterial transduction/transformation, etc. Really not too bad, but I had a molecular genetics class in undergrad, and I had to use that knowledge to answer 2 of these questions.
Embryo: not difficult. straight from the embryo in step up.
Time I studied for: studied through last block of school (mainly reading kaplan books) ~7 weeks about 6 hrs per day on boards alone. Then for the last 3.7 weeks studied 10 hrs a day. started 6 am till 10:00 pm As for sleep, was taking 25 mg of benedryl since mid april. then kicked it up to 50 mg the sunday before my thursday test. Had NO trouble sleeping and gave myself a chance to get used to the hangover effects before test.
Resources I used: Step up and First Aid. Annotated EVERY PAGE of step up. I like this one so much more than FA. but FA had better biochem, pharm, and the micro section in the back was money!! it made me remember the bugs on it's own (not in a group) because they were in alpha order, not sorted by type of bug. I tried to read MRRS, but got discouraged by the length. BRS path and BRS physio: read, and annotated Step Up as reading, then read again by themselves. Looked at the graphs in physio night before.
Read lippincott's twice, Kaplan's biochem twice and BRS biochem for biochem and molecular bio. Also, during our last block, read the entire set of Kaplan's 2000 home study books (the ones broken down by system). Anatomy, very quickly (~10 minutes) breezed through HY anatomy and memorized FA. By far my weakest subject! Embryo, used first aid and Step up. Pharm: basically used my knowledge from class and read over FA a few times. read pathophys for boards and wards for major diseases (diabetes, CAD, etc) Lange Micro/Immuno for immuno. Best immuno section I've seen. Summarizes everything and I'm pretty sure I understood some of this stuff better 2nd time around.
Questions: Q-Bank 90& done averaging about 64% in the heart of studying, then was getting 70-80% the last few days. Did repeats only the last few days. Learned my anatomy and micro through this. low:40 high 88
NMS: did the entire cd 2X. averaging low 70s. Liked these ?s, but not representative of the test at all. Good to test your knowledge.
Webpath: kind of representative, but not really. Too much lab data for subjects like heme. Recommend the pictures from here though.
BSS: got through about 60% of these books (whole basic principles book, and 50? and 2 180?s tests from each systems book) again not representative of the test, but I learned A LOT from these questions. annotated first aid and step up with this info. Great for helping me understand pathophys.
Lange micro/immuno: immuno questions were great. Gave letter answer, but no explanation.
Various scores you all can analyze to death 😀 :
Released NBME 150?s first time (before I started hard core studied): 71%
2nd time (after hard core studying): 83%
NBME $45 form 1: 590 (6 days before)
form 2: 600 (4 days before)
Q-bank: 64% average at about 80% done
Probably in the top 1/3 of my class. we're p/f so I don't have exact numbers.
MCAT:26 (just so you all don't think I was lying 😉 I probably should have studied for this a little more than I went to the mall, eh?
SAT: 1250 (600 Math, 650 verbal) did you see they are adding an essay to the SAT for next year. yikes!
Kindergarden achievement test: 24/25 (I told them a bike was faster than a car because I wanted them to give me a bike.....come on guys I was 5!!)
Things I did to stay sane: went to the gym everyday for an hour (except 3 days); watched my soap while eating lunch. for 2 hrs one thursday, I got distracted by billy madison on TV, so this was time off. whoops! but it made me happy
day before, studied for ~3 hrs. watched paris hilton and nicole richie on simple life 2 to make myself feel smarter This got very long and if you made it this far, I think you deserve a cookie! Thanks for listening, I'll field any ?s from the audience now....by the way, thanks to Al Gore for inventing the internet, without which I wouldn't have gotten all this awesome advice from you all. THANK YOU!!!!
