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Updated the document to account for this last CBSE. Hope it helps 🙂
Historical CBSE exam data and Score Comparison Tool
- Thread starter Bereno
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It's unfortunate that not all dental schools have an integrated medical curriculum. It really puts students at schools without medical education at a disadvantage in terms of taking the CBSE. People say that OMFS programs know which schools teach to the NBME and which ones don't, but overall that is not the case. I had a high NBME score, largely due to the medical curriculum integrated into my dental school. Of the ~20 interviews I went on, I think maybe 3 of the programs knew that my school provided us with 2 years of medical school (I mentioned the medical school training in my answers to interviewers asking how I did so well, and they were shocked to hear that I took med school classes). Being in an OMFS program currently, I can tell you with certainty that our program director/chair does not know which dental schools integrate medical school classes. They see the CBSE number and that is it. They don't care how you got it.
Dental schools such as Harvard, Columbia, UConn, Stony Brook, etc. will always have a leg up on this exam and OMFS admissions. It's not a coincidence that these schools match a very high % of their applicants.
Dental schools such as Harvard, Columbia, UConn, Stony Brook, etc. will always have a leg up on this exam and OMFS admissions. It's not a coincidence that these schools match a very high % of their applicants.
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2 questions.
1. What was your score?
2. Why did you go on ~20 interviews with this beastly score?
I would also add that many of said schools with medical school curriculums also give time off to take board exams. This is not the case at many schools. Taking into consideration pass/fail grades + med. school curriculum + time off to take the exam. Simple to see that it's clearly not an even playing field. The prospect that directors don't know this is strange to me, as it is pivotal to fair evaluation of an applicant in my opinion. Bottom line is that you have to find a way to pass the exam to be competitive.
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I don't know which schools do that, but it's not our school. They don't give us time to study for CBSE. THey give us time for NBDE part 1, but not the CBSE. A lot of kids in the upper level classes had to skip many classes to study for this exam. The good thing is that our classes are P/F/H. So you can afford to neglect some classes. But most students have to sacrifice something. I don't know any student who studied and prepped well for the CBSE and kept honoring classes. At the end of the day, our dean told us that our grades don't really matter. Just our scores on CBSE.
Thanks for the responses guys. Let me clarify a couple of things. When I was speaking of time off, I was talking specifically about "board exams," ie. NBDE 1 and 2. I think we can all agree that a month+ off to study for these is not needed as these are pass/fail, and what a lot of students did (friends of mine at Ivy's and other pass/fail schools), was use all this time to study for the CBSE.
Many schools also have mandatory attendance for clinic year-round, so there is no option to skip.
The reality is you have to find a way to do well on this exam even if you have it tougher than those at other dental schools. I suspect program directors won't be interested in your excuses.
Many schools also have mandatory attendance for clinic year-round, so there is no option to skip.
The reality is you have to find a way to do well on this exam even if you have it tougher than those at other dental schools. I suspect program directors won't be interested in your excuses.
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I got a 78. And I went on 20 interviews for a few reasons. Firstly, my program doesn't rank, so I wasn't sure how that would play into my chances. Second, the way I thought about it was why risk it? You never know who might like you and who might not. What's an extra 1000 dollars in applications and travel if it guarantees your career? Most of the programs I applied to were driving distance from my home so travel wasn't too much of an issue. Finally, and maybe most importantly, I'd rather be on OMFS interviews than taking final impressions for RPDs. We had I think 12 days off dedicated to interviews and its a use it or lose it situation
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That's true. She had a sitdown session with each of us and asked us what specialty we were interested in and she pretty much told us that unless we want to do Ortho, our grades don't matter. Very surprised by that. I won't complain, but it was interesting to hear.
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Thanks for the reply. I got a similar score but I heard that the odds of matching if you rank 8 places are over 90%. From last year's rank results, 50% of the applicants matched into their #1 choice, while 80% matched into one of their top 3 choices. My school does rank, but we don't take the classes with the med students.
You're right with the apply broadly and you'll never know what happens, but there is a point of diminishing returns, and I believe that it's around 10 interviews. I don't have much funds nor vacation time to go to 20 interviews so that's out of the question. Plus, I need every single one of those clinic days to complete my requirements on time. Assuming a score of 75+, which puts you in the 95th+ percentile of test takers, you'd be an all star applicant and you'd most likely match into your top 3.
Either way, if you have the time and money, might as well increase those odds to close to 100% as possible. But many of us had to take a more calculated approach since we had neither of those. Did you match into one of your top 3 choices?
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Thanks bud.
Quick question though. How does one interpret the "rank" number. So for instance someone like me who messed up and got a 62, what does a '31' mean? I apologize if this seems like a very simple question. Thanks.
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It means you were ranked 31/100 or you had the 31st highest score.. granted there were probably more than 100 ppl that took the test that day but I think you get the point. That's actually a pretty good score so I wouldn't say you "messed up"
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I would not worry about what the 31 means. I am debating on taking out the rank column since it appears that I can no longer obtain the number of test takers per exam. If you look at your percentile, you will see that they correlate perfectly, so just go off that. Also know that the percentile is based on the mean and SD, assuming a perfect bell curve, which I highly doubt it is. Just food for thought. 🙂
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How did the "Big 5" dental schools do on this exam? The kids at my school got pwned...
EDIT: Nvm saw gn4's post above, that's depressing and unfair
EDIT: Nvm saw gn4's post above, that's depressing and unfair
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Yea I felt the same way. Until the #2 guy in my class with a 70 score matched at his 11th choice. He went on 15 interviews total. Idk if he doesn't interview well or what, but it's scary. I also know a guy who got an 82 on the nbme and didn't match with 7 interviews. Postmatched with no problem but he had to deal with all the stress of getting that sorry you didn't match email.
My advice, regardless of your standing, is apply to as many places as you can afford. Cancel interviews (in a timely fashion for the programs and other applicants sake), if you can't make them. And realize the extra money to apply broadly is worth it. I'd say 10 interviews would make you safe, but my classmate would tell you otherwise. You are never safe. You just have a higher probability of matching. Any one of can hit the lottery. The opposite is always true as well.
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On the same token, someone can score high on the CBSE and not be all that interested in OMFS or even may not have the physical/mental stamina to make it through an OMFS residency. However, they can apply and possibly match just because of their score. So, I guess all we can hope for is that we the applicants get evaluated "holistically" as opposed to just off of one single test score. Sure the score is important but so should the rest of the application.
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Well, I went to a very clinically oriented, accelerated (3 yr curriculum school- UoP) and I definitely agree finding time is a huge issue. Nevertheless, here I am after graduation having taken the test several times and I can get into the mid 70s (btw I have a terrible class rank). However, I don't think a sub 65 score + high class rank will cause problems at most 4 year programs -- I saw it happen with multiple people at UoP. You will run into problems with 6 yr programs that have less time to devote to the med school 2nd yr portion (e.g. I have heard this of Case Western, Louisville and LSU). Logically they would favor someone who has proof they can 'pass' Step 1 by a comfortable margin (70+).
I actually get pissed off (obviously since my rank isn't stellar) at candidates who ARE top 10 % at their school, yet can't even break 60 after multiple attempts. To me that seems obvious that rank is not a similar comparison whatsoever across the board.
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Well if they don't have the physical/mental stamina to make it through a self taught basic science exam, learn from their mistakes and do better, then what makes you think that they will do any differently in residency where much of the learning is NOT handed to you on a silver platter like dental school. Maybe they just have good hand skills and excellent short term memory.
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Not sure how UOP is but having everything handed to you on a silver platter in dental school? Boy would that be nice.
Anyways, I'm just simply stating an opinion. For example, I know a few students who studied for 6 weeks with minimal effort and broke a 60 (they were extremely good test takers and/or came from a dental school who was in with the med school). Therefore, just because you scored well on that test does not necessarily prove you have a lot of physical/mental stamina nor does it prove you have a genuine passion for OMFS. And you are exactly right, some people have excellent short term memory. So what? How does that make you a better surgeon?
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I don't understand why people are making excuses for subpar scores on this test. If I can get 81 coming from a pathetically weak didactic school (studied for 6-7 weeks while on clinic duty), then anyone can. I'm not the best test taker either, as my DAT scores can attest.
Regardless of which school you came from, the CBSE requires enormous amounts of time dedication and effort that many dental students shy away from. That in itself shows genuine passion for OMFS. We should be grateful that CBSE was instituted because it is basically a filter for the self-selecting group of people that are willing to sacrifice many sleepless nights to study for this one test, and that same attitude will likely translate into a better resident anyway.
And yes, a surgeon that knows more basic sciences IS, in fact, the better surgeon. The breadth of knowledge required to perform well on the CBSE (and USMLE) is directly applicable to surgical care for patients. Some of the bread and butter OMFS procedures are highly invasive and require absolute command of medical knowledge for optimal preoperative, perioperative, and postoperative care. It was amazing how much of First Aid and UWorld I actually saw in practice during my externships.
Regardless of which school you came from, the CBSE requires enormous amounts of time dedication and effort that many dental students shy away from. That in itself shows genuine passion for OMFS. We should be grateful that CBSE was instituted because it is basically a filter for the self-selecting group of people that are willing to sacrifice many sleepless nights to study for this one test, and that same attitude will likely translate into a better resident anyway.
And yes, a surgeon that knows more basic sciences IS, in fact, the better surgeon. The breadth of knowledge required to perform well on the CBSE (and USMLE) is directly applicable to surgical care for patients. Some of the bread and butter OMFS procedures are highly invasive and require absolute command of medical knowledge for optimal preoperative, perioperative, and postoperative care. It was amazing how much of First Aid and UWorld I actually saw in practice during my externships.
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Sigh... People who are Complaining about their score are probably the same people in dental school that complain about people who get straight A's. Someone who studied 1 day and gets an A automatically studied all the time. Just like people who don't believe there are people that can be both smart and have good hand skills. Remember there are always people smarter than you out there.
Also the ones that are complaining that he might be smarter than me but I'm harder working. Remember there are always people who are even harder working than you.
Live with your score and don't compare. Use that energy to improve your study and just kill the test in Feb.
Sorry for the rant but I have seen too many of that attitude in school and it just grinds my gears.
Also the ones that are complaining that he might be smarter than me but I'm harder working. Remember there are always people who are even harder working than you.
Live with your score and don't compare. Use that energy to improve your study and just kill the test in Feb.
Sorry for the rant but I have seen too many of that attitude in school and it just grinds my gears.
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So then is there a difference between someone from a pathetically weak didactic school who scores an 81 and someone who put in a similar amount of effort and gets a 93 because they went to a dental school whose primary focus is jamming as many people into residency as possible? As the hypothetical program director selecting students to interview, which one should I choose if I don't know every dental schools individual curricula? What if in this scenario both students had an 81 and the student who passively learned everything through their schools ad-hoc medical school curriculum put in zero effort, or had 6 weeks off to study?
Actually that's measurably false. MULTIPLE studies have shown there is basically no correlation between examination scores and resident performance or actual application of medical knowledge in multiple medical fields (George 1989, Wood 1990, Crane 2000, Bell 2002, Metro 2005). I actually don't know of a single study that has shown USMLE (and by correlation, NBME/CBSE) is predictive of anything other than future multiple choice exam performance. My suspicion is that could easily be explained by examining the individuals past performance on multiple choice exams. Woods even noted a statistically significant negative correlation between USMLE score and manual dexterity and interpersonal skills!
For OMFS, the CBSE does seem to have some utility in that, as mentioned above, it is a reasonably reliable predictor of an individuals ability to pass the Step series. Though given that, and the above, I don't see why it should matter beyond the CBSE equivalent to a passing score. The University of Michigan seems to understand this as their decision to interview was uncorrelated with CBSE score in the last two years [Bae 2015 (Great name by the way)], though my personal feeling is the majority of programs do not treat it this way. For the majority of program directors in the country at 4 year programs, this correlation is completely useless.
In summary, to the best of my knowledge and consideration the CBSE is not a level playing field for our specialty given the disparity in doctoral curriculum programming, has only minimal utility in predicting future performance on a single exam series, and has no demonstrable utility in differentiating residency candidates, even at the extremes of score.
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I took the Feb 2016 exam. Havent gotten any stats about it. Its been two weeks since I took it. I read from another thread that there was some issues with some of the prometric test centers and some ppl couldnt take it and got rescheduled?! But I dont know if it is true or not.....
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Yeah my test didn't go well at all. I was schedled for 8:30am and they didn't start me until 11:30am due to server issues. i was training to be done by 1 or 2pm. by 1:30, my eyes were so dry and painful, I couldn't even read the questions. I woke up at 630 to make it to the testing center and by 11:30, coffe has alraedy worn off. Then 11:30 to 3:30 without a lunch break was brutal. i think some people got rescheduled from my testing center. I chose to stuck it out. Good thing I did decently enough because I don't have time to retake. I just thought I could have done that much better. Made stupid mistakes when you're that tired.
Just to update the stats for CBSE exam on Feb 2016. Average is 54.9 range is 26 to 92. SD is 11.8. Not sure if the curve is normal but could me bimodal if anyone is trying to figure out the percentile or ranking
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