hi

[make you smile]

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Hi all,

I am a dentist and don't know too much about the USMLE.I do know that a foreign trained medical doctor needs to take the USMLE step 1,step 2 and then clinical skills exam for him to apply to a residency.Could someone please tell me how many times a person can take USMLE after he passes the exam?(For us dentists,we cannot retake the NBDE after Jan 2010 if we pass the exam i.e if we get 75 percentile).I know that this is a very basic question for most of you but I would really appreciate it if someone could take the time to answer my question.I need to know this for a cousin from my home country.Also how much should you score to be a competetive candidate for residency?Thanks in advance!

 

[spz315]

If you pass the step 1 you generally don't take it again. If you fail, you have 2 more tries until you pass. It isn't like the mcat where you can take it again if you didn't do as well as you wanted and would like to improve your score.

 

[defcon8]

If you pass step 1, you cannot retake the exam for 7 years. The score you will need to be seriously considered, depends on the residency you are applying for and the institution to which you are applying. Having said that, all competitive residencies will consider your application with a 2 digit score of 95 or greater. Of course, whether you get an interview or get accepted will depend on what else you have offering and the what your competition is like.

If you fail step 1, you can take it over as many times as is necessary to pass. The reason why many people don't believe you can take it more than three times is because:
1) Many US based medical schools restrict the number of attempts at Step 1 before removing you from their program.
2) Many states will not allow you to practice there will >3 failed attempts at step 1.

All this information you can find by searching the forums, but hope this is helpful.

 

[make you smile]

Thanks a lot, both of you!🙂