I used Anki religiously during my first two years (and a little less during M3/M4). I'm going to put out a whole podcast on this topic Monday, but here are some highlights:
1. Be generous at first, discerning later (make more cards rather than less to start)
2. Keep it simple (bite-sized chunks on each card or you will hate when that card comes up)
6. Use cloze deletion and image occlusion (this would be a good thing to learn about and practice ahead of time!)
8. Detect and eliminate interference (when two cards are similar and you start mixing them up)
10. Use shorthand (this is also something you could start working on now – creating your flash card language)
I found that spaced repetition was really a personal thing - you have to choose whether, if you get a question right, you want to see it again the next day (for me, that meant I had way too many cards to review and it was overwhelming) or after a few days. I think my settings were usually that if a question was "hard" but I got it right, I saw it in 2-4 days, and if it was "easy" I didn't see it for a week or two.
I've said this on other threads, but I am not a fan of using other people's decks or shared decks. It sounds good in theory, but what you'll get is a deck of like 1000 cards, of which you already know 200 of the facts at least - they are in there because OTHER people didn't know it, and now you have to spend time weeding through it. They will inevitably have mistakes or shorthand you don't understand, using up more of your time. Who has time to spare in med school?!?! Besides, the act of making cards helps put info into long-term memory, and you can word it the way you want, and only include info that is new/hard to you.
Hope this helps 🙂
