Brs?

[chandler742]

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What BRS books are considered good?

 

[TommyGunn04]

What BRS books are considered good?

BRS Path, DEFINITELY! That said, I didn't appreciate the BRS books during my first year (which at Duke is the only basic science year since we do our clerkships during the 2nd year). If you asked me back then I certainly wouldn't have called it a "good book," as I tried to use it to review for the shelf exam and it was just way too long and detailed. But for step 1 it's a GREAT review book. It seems to have just about every detail in it, but is exceedingly short compared to Robbins! You can pretty comfortably go through it in a week or two.

I can't comment first-hand on other BRS books...I've heard BRS Phys is great for the boards as well. I have BRS Micro/Immuno, and I think it's too long/detailed for step 1 purposes.

 

[bonefixr]

I really got alot of use out of the BRS path and phys books. They really are a great, boiled-down, concise read. Actually, I still use them as a quick-reference on rotations as well.

 

[12R34Y]

BRS path, physio, and behavioral are gold.

Behavioral is amazing because of the questions. Barbara Fadeem writes questions for STep 1 and her questions are absolutely GOLDEN for the shelf and/or step 1. All I did was her questions and read the responses in a 2 day period and got a 97% on shelf and did great on step1.

There were a few questions that were almost verbatim on the behavioral shelf.

later

 

[TommyGunn04]

When do you take Step 1 at Duke? It seems to me students at Duke might be at disadvantage with only one year of basic science, then again with a DUKE M.D. that might be worth it. How are the 4 years of school mapped out? Just curious

We take Step 1 pretty much whenever we want, but that usually means during the 3rd year. It's actually never been a graduation requirement at Duke either, although they finally made it "required" this year in order to include it in the student budget for financial aid purposes. I'm in the middle of my 3rd year (Duke's research year), and will be taking Step 1 during my winter break between classes, as I'm working on a master's degree. Actually, I find it to be an ADVANTAGE that we get to take Step 1 after having done our clerkships, as the exam is enormously clinical despite being a "basic science" test. So many of the prompts contain clinical information, and after spending a year on the wards I feel extremely comfortable with very quickly processing signs, symptoms, labs, and getting a quick impression of what the question is getting at. This is a skill that's not easily learned during a typical basic science curriculum, and I think it really pays off for Duke students.

And given that we really spend almost 11 months doing basic science and have longer days than many schools, Duke really isn't "two years in one" as many would have you believe. I'm about 3 weeks into my Step 1 studying and I honestly don't feel disadvantaged one bit...we learned all of this stuff during first year, and I had plenty of free time, friends, and a life too! Everyone's always scared of our first year, but honestly after talking to friends at other schools, including other top-tier ones, I've found that we don't work any harder than anyone else - we just work more EFFICIENTLY. Plus, I'm on track to graduate in 4 years with an MD AND a master's degree, without having to do anything particularly crazy! That's why I LOVE Duke!!! 🙂

Incidentally, I actually heard recently that Duke's board score average is #2 in the country, behind Penn. I don't know if that's only Step 1, and I don't know where that data came from, so it might be suspect, but nonetheless I keep hearing that statistic from different people.

 

[slickrikk]

What BRS books are considered good?

memorize BRS path and you'll be guaranteed to pass boards period. don't screw w/ robbins, you'll get buried in detail and lose sight of important key facts

i studied brs path all second year and i attribute my success on boards to this and q bank