Bss

[Jay Jay]

Was reading about the CD-ROM that had over 3k questions, but the 5 books only have 350 questions? Some forums say they are the same though. Long Dong you around for this question? Also anybody want to sell their BSS paperbac k or CD? PM me. Thanks all.

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[Long Dong]

Was reading about the CD-ROM that had over 3k questions, but the 5 books only have 350 questions? Some forums say they are the same though. Long Dong you around for this question? Also anybody want to sell their BSS paperbac k or CD? PM me. Thanks all.

Each book has about 700 questions (770 X 5). They are exactly the same as the cd questions. I started with the cd, cuz I'm cheap, but there was no way to mark the ones you got wrong or mark the ones you've already done on the CD. So went ahead and bought the books used from amazon. Hope that helps.

 

[myershurt]

LD - I'm using the BSS in addition to other banks - do you think that the reason that these are good questions is because they are challenging and make you reason through concepts, or that you see the same details in these as on the boards? - In other words - when using the BSS as a source - do you recommend noting specific minutiae you see in the questions as sequelae or other disease associations that you didn't see anywhere else, or just use them as quick reinforcers of things you already knew, and skip over the details?

What was your strategy with the bank?

 

[Idiopathic]

These q's are ten years old and the format is not like the USMLE, but they are by far the most difficult general purpose board review questions out there. I swear by them.

 

[Long Dong]

LD - I'm using the BSS in addition to other banks - do you think that the reason that these are good questions is because they are challenging and make you reason through concepts, or that you see the same details in these as on the boards? - In other words - when using the BSS as a source - do you recommend noting specific minutiae you see in the questions as sequelae or other disease associations that you didn't see anywhere else, or just use them as quick reinforcers of things you already knew, and skip over the details?

What was your strategy with the bank?

I agree totally with Idio, in fact ido, jalby and big frank where the guys the year before me who gave great advice to the peeps my year.

1. BSS is good cuz it challenges you to reason the concepts and also have some detail that is on the boards.

2. This is a harder question cuz some of the minutiae was very important and some of it not so. I wouldn't get to bogged down with the minutiae by reading all the explantations but try to read the reason why it was not one of the 2 I narrowed down the answer to.

As a side note almost everyone my year who completed BSS got over 240+. Good enough to make it past cut offs for most competitive residencies. So keep at it. Good luck.

 

[HunterGatherer]

I agree totally with Idio, in fact ido, jalby and big frank where the guys the year before me who gave great advice to the peeps my year.

1. BSS is good cuz it challenges you to reason the concepts and also have some detail that is on the boards.

2. This is a harder question cuz some of the minutiae was very important and some of it not so. I wouldn't get to bogged down with the minutiae by reading all the explantations but try to read the reason why it was not one of the 2 I narrowed down the answer to.

As a side note almost everyone my year who completed BSS got over 240+. Good enough to make it past cut offs for most competitive residencies. So keep at it. Good luck.

I purchased 3 of the systems books off ebay since from my understanding of posts here, the basic sciences part of the series were not worth the time. I have the CD also but I'm thinking the book will be more organized as far as diagnostics and record keeping. Is it worth it to do the Basic Sciences part of BSS?

Thanks!

 

[Long Dong]

I purchased 3 of the systems books off ebay since from my understanding of posts here, the basic sciences part of the series were not worth the time. I have the CD also but I'm thinking the book will be more organized as far as diagnostics and record keeping. Is it worth it to do the Basic Sciences part of BSS?

Thanks!

Yeah the basic sci part of bss is alot of factoids and one liner questions, not as much concepts and thinking like the systems books. So do the basic sci books after the systems books and after you run out of other sources.

 

[neoucomsucks]

Hey this is for Long Dong and Idio. I know you guys did a ton of q's and I plan to do the same.

1)Did you ever take notes from your questions or its explanations (robbins review, bss, qbank, etc) and write it in first aid or just stick to reading the explanations and redoing the wrong ones?

2) Did you guys feel it was necessary to add anything into first aid?

Thanks for the continued help.

 

[N-Surge]

This BSS thing is sweet!

I had it sitting around on my computer and figured I'd give it a shot after seeing this thread. The edition I have is from 2000. However, being 3850 short answer Qs, it might be good for testing quick reasoning and recall.

[EDIT] Sorry, I guess this wasn't a BSS praise thread.

 

[myershurt]

It is now -

I have both the books and the CD just from random spurts of study material acquisition (you all understand - med student syndrome - get your hands on as many overpriced things as you can in a short amount of time and convince yourself that they will help you learn something somehow).

I prefer the CD - i think it's more convenient - and while in UW and QBank - i like to sit down and do a full set of 50 timed and under testing conditions and then look at the percentages and pretty graphs they give you - i have no problem doing like 10-25 BSS questions during lunch, or some other short interval - and have found that they sometime go really fast, and are great for rapid recall across every tested subject.

also - even though the EXCEPT questions are not tested anymore - i've found that i learn the most from those questions in BSS - really gets you to think about four or five things associated with a condition you may have only associated one or two buzzwords/concepts with - and helps you really see big-picture applications of each topic