FA vs. Crush

[LaurieB]

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I apologize in advance if this is covered in a different thread, but I was wondering which book is better as a single resource for Step 2 CK? Can you just study from one book or all multiple ones better? If it is better to use multiple books, which ones do you reccommend? Blueprints? Case Files?

Thanks in advance for your suggestions or links to relevant threads.
Laurie

 

[MeowMix]

I did not use any books except a bit of flipping through Secrets. All I did was questions and questions and more questions from USMLE World, and some more questions from Steps123. Read the answers carefully, look up what you do not know, and save the money you would have spent on books. Unless you're a person who can read the book and memorize, in which case Secrets was right on, and short.

 

[coolmavs]

Hey Meowmix, a question about usmlesteps 123? What is the quality of questions? I know it CANNOT replace UW but is it a useful additional prep source ? How does it compare with Pretest series?

 

[MeowMix]

Hey Meowmix, a question about usmlesteps 123? What is the quality of questions? I know it CANNOT replace UW but is it a useful additional prep source ? How does it compare with Pretest series?

I only bought steps123 for 1 week to supplement UW; I thought it was a good deal for $49. I am a great believer in always doing questions from multiple sources (UW, Steps, NBME, USMLE free qs).

The nice things are: the answers often have nice little tables or figures from the LWW textbooks; you can print them out (unlike UW); they have decent X-rays, EKGs, other figures that UW doesn't have; many questions will look just like the UW ones; better written qs without the awkward language that UW often has (i.e. a proficient English speaker has read and edited these qs, unlike UW); a graph showing you your score trend over time. The disadvantages: answers often very long, way too many esoteric details that you do not have time for; questions can get into the esoteric too (e.g. I don't think I had any EKGS on my entire Step 2); some questions are just missing the images or have other major problems; unlike UW, it does not point out the "extremely high yield" or "high yield" questions. I did not use Pretest at all so cannot comment.

I would use Steps earlier on in prep when you are still reviewing the content. Later on, it takes too long to read the answers.