Board Vitals q bank?

[Daitong]

Has anyone used the Board Vitals Qbank? What are you thoughts on it vs the big 3 (UW, Kaplan, USMLERx? I couldn't find much on the search function.

Thanks in advance,

---

Members don't see this ad.

 

[medicalperson123]

Has anyone used the Board Vitals Qbank? What are you thoughts on it vs the big 3 (UW, Kaplan, USMLERx? I couldn't find much on the search function.

Thanks in advance,

I used Boardvitals for Step 2/3 and the shelf exams. It's a challenging set of qbanks. In terms of comparison to the 'big 3 or 4' it's definitely on the higher end in terms of question quality. The only downside is that the user experience format looks different than the actual exam (if that makes a difference to you).
If I had to rank the question banks, it would be

1. UWorld
2. Boardvitals
3. Kaplan
4. USMLERx / USMLEeasy

At the end of the day, doing questions was better for me than anything in terms of studying. Good luck!

 

[Daitong]

I used Boardvitals for Step 2/3 and the shelf exams. It's a challenging set of qbanks. In terms of comparison to the 'big 3 or 4' it's definitely on the higher end in terms of question quality. The only downside is that the user experience format looks different than the actual exam (if that makes a difference to you).
If I had to rank the question banks, it would be

1. UWorld
2. Boardvitals
3. Kaplan
4. USMLERx / USMLEeasy

At the end of the day, doing questions was better for me than anything in terms of studying. Good luck!

Just to be clear, you only used it for Step 2/3, not 1, right?


You'd actually put Board Vitals over the tried and true Kaplan/USMLERx? Was there anything in particular about it that you enjoyed over those two?

Thanks.

 

[worldbeater]

Just curious, how come nobody uses USMLEWeapon as a third bank (after uWorld/Kaplan) if they get to the point of doing that many questions? Is it because it's too new?

 

[medicalperson123]

Right. I didn't use it for Step 1, so I can't comment on that one. For Step 2, BoardVitals had a handful of questions that were really close to the real thing. (Kind of like how there are some UWorld questions that almost show up word for word).

I also like harder questions and there were some good ones in their qbanks, and the explanations are solid. Whatever you use, make sure you're doing the multi-step questions - those probably took a chunk out of my score. ha.

Don't get me wrong, though. Kaplan is fine. I wouldn't leave it out. If I was doing it again, it would be

UWorld + FirstAid + BoardVitals + Kaplan

@worldbeater - I've never heard of USMLEWeapon. any good?

 

[worldbeater]

For Step 1, yeah weapon is great as a third line bank. I had a retired attending recommended it to me. It has really good explanations, has techniques that show you how strategies on how to deal with certain types of questions (which I haven't seen on UWorld or any other bank), and for certain types of questions like neuro it will give the same 5 answers in a row multiple times, and will show what differential fits with what answer. The "test weakness" button is brutal too, it will pinpoint exactly what you suck at.

Ultimately all the banks have the same clues and concepts, it's just more practice if you go to a 2nd or 3rd line bank. If your foundation is weak (like mine was when I first started studying), you need more practice, but if your foundation is pretty good UWorld is all you need..