My MPJE is in a few days. The way I am studying this exam is completely different from NAPLEX because for that one, I barely looked at the whole book once. I am not using federal book since I am so short in time, but I am reading my state's review book over and over. I was wondering how you guys are studying for MPJE. I heard that everyone thinks it's ridiculously harder than NAPLEX, which makes me worried because I thought naplex was kind of ridiculous. My state is Ohio.
Hi Iloveclementine,
I took the MPJE for another state and passed. It was an 80 but hey, it's passing. My best recommendation for you is to read the MPJE blueprint that is on the NABP website. It will taste rather generic the first time you go through it. It is not until you read it a second time that you will notice that it spells out very specific things that they are looking for. One of the competencies is to know how to handle prescriptions from a deceased physician or how to handle customized packaging. Had I not read the blueprint I would have never thought about those two competencies. Thus, the blueprint provides good thinking points and it can help you focus your studying.
Unlike most people, I also started with state law instead of federal law. I did that because state law already incorporates federal law and when state law differs from federal, state law statutes explicitly say "On this rule, we defer to federal law". I did go through the "Guide to Federal Pharmacy Law" book before the test and did the 300 questions on it.
Know the concentration limits for C-III, C-IV and C-Vs. Sure, the federal law book will tell you that the concentration of a C-III is divisible by 3. Awesome, sure, but what if they give you something just below or above the concentration and it is divisible by 3 at first sight but only because the denominator was enlearged or better yet, it may not be divisible by 3 at all. They can do this by toying with the numerator and denominator. Just know them. They are not hard to memorize. Just make a table and you will see the patterns.
My two cents on why people say the MPJE is harder - To me it seemed that way because I was not very familiar with law to begin with. Unlike the material for the NAPLEX, which we have dealt with for 4 years, most of us only had one course in pharmacy law.
Finally, if you've already read your state's review book several times, then maybe it's time to grab the blueprint and think of scenarios. I also used the Survey of Pharmacy Law CD that is published by NABP. My school gave it to use for free. That misleads people and somehow they think it's useless even though the CD is $197 dollars. The CD does a great job at pointing out unique facts about each state's pharmacy law. Once you extract the info specific for your state (which can take a while), then you can use it as an outline.
Hope this helps.
