High Score

[NYDOC925]

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What is the highest USMLE Step I score that you personally have ever heard of anybody getting?

 

[IIIelCid]

269

 

[Smurfette]

I also know of someone with a 269

 

[Himanshusingh]

280. some dork at ucsf med

 

[Optimistic]

I know somebody with 99th percentile. ...dont know what it means in 3-digits. BTW he is a FMG.

 

[BellKicker]

This is an old pet peeve of mine. There are 100 percentiles in a given distribution. The first one is called 1st percentile. The last one is called the 100th percentile. Yet, people seem to believe you can't go above the 99th percentile. Why why why?

I'm still rattled at the fact that my score report said "most test takers score between (insert low score) and 272".

 

[Maire]

From the Common Function Library:

The percentile refers to the percent of numbers in the set that are below the number you pass in. Therefore, If you are in the 99th percentile, 99% of people scored below you. That is why there is no 100th %ile.

Maire

 

[BellKicker]

Hmm, so there's a 0th percentile, then?

I believe you're right though, in that a person who gets a 99th percentile score beats 99% of test takers. But what would you call someone who beat all 100 percent of the distribution?

 

[neilc]

Originally posted by BellKicker
But what would you call someone who beat all 100 percent of the distribution?

the bomb 😀

 

[BellKicker]

True😀

 

[Idiopathic]

Originally posted by BellKicker
Hmm, so there's a 0th percentile, then?

I believe you're right though, in that a person who gets a 99th percentile score beats 99% of test takers. But what would you call someone who beat all 100 percent of the distribution?

You must know that, if you are included in the distribution, it is impossible to beat 100% of said distribution. The best you can do is to beat 99.9999%, which, sadly, is not 100%.

 

[Idiopathic]

Originally posted by tonkatruck
THEY DON'T give out percentiles. The two digit score is not a percentile.

That FMG is a liar.

FFMG

You can figure out % fairly easy from the mean and the SD.

Mean of 200, SD of 20. 240=97.5%, 260=99.3% (or something close)

 

[stickyrice]

actually the mean is 216 with SD of 24 according to my score report from 2002. ~90% percentile is around 246. your 240 =97.5% is way way off the mark!! That might have been true 20 years ago but the SD has been increased from 15 to 24 recently. Funny thing is the mean has hovered around 215 for at least 6 years.

 

[IIIelCid]

Originally posted by stickyrice
actually the mean is 216 with SD of 24 according to my score report from 2002. ~90% percentile is around 246. your 240 =97.5% is way way off the mark!! That might have been true 20 years ago but the SD has been increased from 15 to 24 recently. Funny thing is the mean has hovered around 215 for at least 6 years.

Yeah that's right. You can actually go to this website that computes z-scores and plots a natural distribution for any given mean and sd and plug your score in to find its percentile:

http://psych.colorado.edu/~mcclella/java/normal/normz.html

This of course assumes a natural distribution, there are rumors that bxc the USLME is designed to assess minimum competence that the curve is actually weighted to the left. Meaning that more people pass than do well, if this is the case then the higher scores will correlate to a slightly higher percentile but I suspect it doesn't make a huge difference probably only a few percentiles.

 

[Idiopathic]

Originally posted by stickyrice
actually the mean is 216 with SD of 24 according to my score report from 2002. ~90% percentile is around 246. your 240 =97.5% is way way off the mark!! That might have been true 20 years ago but the SD has been increased from 15 to 24 recently. Funny thing is the mean has hovered around 215 for at least 6 years.

Yes, this was an example of how you would figure out your percentage from the mean and SD.🙄

 

[unregistered]

270 highest at uc davis

 

[normalforce]

Someone at UHS-COM got a 265. I know lots of 230's, 240's. I think the class as a whole did very well this year, must be the new curriculum and extra time to study.

Normalforce

 

[Idiopathic]

Hard for me to imagine a 280. Anyone know if they set a max score? Since it is standardized they wouldnt have to, but 4 SD would be the highest realistic score...even another 20 ?'s right wouldnt bump you up past 285, i wouldnt think, given the distribution this year.

 

[Jalby]

High here at Keck/USC was 272 last year. With our new curriculum we got a ton of time off near the end of second year and raised our board scores 5 points. Because of this, I'm taking the rest of me second year off. I should score a 300 or so.

 

[Idiopathic]

LOL

"300 or so"

I will give someone $25 if they show me proof of a score >285. I dont think it can be done.😉

 

[Hop Toad]

Does anyone know what the relationship is to how well you do on the Step I to Step II? Do the scores more or less stay the same or is it common for them to be higher or lower?

 

[GO_MEDPEDS]

Most people have told me they did a few points better on Step 2 than Step 1. I did 4 points better, and that seems to be about the average. I wouldn't expect a large increase or decrease in a person's score unless he/she really studied like crazy! In general, it's probably not worth it. The only thing I've really heard is that doing significantly worse on your Step 2 would probably not look too good...

Well, I hope that helps a little. Personally, I think we need to find a better means of comparing medical students because (based on my experience) there can be a very large discrepancy between one's board scores and one's actual clinical ability. But I guess these residency programs need something to go by...

😉