How many weeks of dedicated?

[fldoctorgirl]

Hey friends! I can't believe I'm at the point where I'm getting ready to schedule my board exams, but somehow it's here. I'm trying to decide how many weeks of 100% dedicated I'd like to give myself, keeping in mind that I would like a week or two off before starting my rotations.

According to the tentative schedule our school gave us at the beginning of the year, we should finish coursework the second week of April, spend 2 weeks wrapping up our OMM and doctoring courses, then another couple of weeks doing BCLS/ACS certification, and then a ~3 week "transition to clerkship" course (from what I understand, this only consists of a couple of hours a week of stuff). That would mean 100% dedicated would start around June 1st.

So far, I have been doing Zanki and am on track to complete the deck before dedicated. I haven't touched any qbanks yet (bought Rx but just haven't been able to find the time). I'm doing above average in my courses this year. I'd like to score a 230+, as I'm not going for anything competitive. I'd be satisfied with 220+. I initially thought about taking the exam the week of July 5th, which would give me 5 weeks of pure dedicated, but am now considering taking it a week earlier. I will be taking Step 1 first, with ideally 3 days in between it and COMLEX. Since real coursework seems to end mid-April, I feel like I would be able to study throughout April and May as well, even though it won't be 100% pure dedicated. Basically, just looking for a bit of input about whether or not the extra week will make a difference, because obviously the longer my break, the happier I'll be lol

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[YouKnowNothing]

With scheduling, you can always push it back if you don't feel ready when the time comes so I'd say schedule the earlier date first. I personally advocate for 6 weeks, I think that's a decent amount of dedicated time, but you'll have a better feel for that when the date is closer. Honestly though, this is your one shot and you need to make it count and do the best you possibly can. I wouldn't worry too much about trying to maximize your break time or anything.

 

[neurodjent]

I took USMLE 8 weeks from the end of the last blocks final, which was about 3 weeks of 100% dedicated and that was honestly too much time. I was burning out at the end of week 6. If your schedule is anything like ours was, you should have plenty of time in the weeks where you're wrapping up OMM and PCM. that gave me about 2.5 weeks between boards and the first rotation.

 

[EMDoc22]

I am aiming for a similar score as you, and right now I am planning on taking 4 weeks of pure dedicated. We get done with ACLS in mid May and have 7 weeks of time off before starting clinical stuff in early July so my plan is to take it mid June so I have 2 weeks off. Like you, I'm shooting for a Monday Step 1 and Friday Level 1 so that will give me 3 days to cram OMM. I have started Kaplan but haven't made much progress on it so far, am starting UWorld in January and also should have Zanki done before dedicated so I feel like our base knowledge should be solid by then. I think 4-5 weeks is what most people do and we can always move it back if we feel it's necessary.

 

[Neopolymath]

Start doing questions!!! But you really only need like 4 weeks ideally and less if you have been balling out during the year. I had a grand total of about 2 weeks and excelled.

 

[Ho0v-man]

I got 6 weeks and it was honestly too much. At like 4 weeks I was trying to move up my exam. I peaked at about 4.5-5 weeks.

 

[fldoctorgirl]

With scheduling, you can always push it back if you don't feel ready when the time comes so I'd say schedule the earlier date first. I personally advocate for 6 weeks, I think that's a decent amount of dedicated time, but you'll have a better feel for that when the date is closer. Honestly though, this is your one shot and you need to make it count and do the best you possibly can. I wouldn't worry too much about trying to maximize your break time or anything.

That's a good point about being able to push it back. I agree about wanting to my best, but I'm more concerned with getting burnt out. If I had full on classes until end of May, I'd definitely be taking every single week given to us. But, since I'll basically have a month and a half of time that I can start studying before pure dedicated starts, I don't want to burn out and would really love a bit of a break haha.

I took USMLE 8 weeks from the end of the last blocks final, which was about 3 weeks of 100% dedicated and that was honestly too much time. I was burning out at the end of week 6. If your schedule is anything like ours was, you should have plenty of time in the weeks where you're wrapping up OMM and PCM. that gave me about 2.5 weeks between boards and the first rotation.

I think the schedule might be a bit different? We don't have our official schedule out yet, but as of now last real block final is scheduled for April 10th. 8 weeks out from that would be the second week of June, which would only give me 1 week of pure dedicated. Based on what you've written, though, definitely leaning towards the 4 weeks of pure dedicated (with like 7 weeks of not pure dedicated). There's just a ton of time between last block and dedicated this year.

I am aiming for a similar score as you, and right now I am planning on taking 4 weeks of pure dedicated. We get done with ACLS in mid May and have 7 weeks of time off before starting clinical stuff in early July so my plan is to take it mid June so I have 2 weeks off. Like you, I'm shooting for a Monday Step 1 and Friday Level 1 so that will give me 3 days to cram OMM. I have started Kaplan but haven't made much progress on it so far, am starting UWorld in January and also should have Zanki done before dedicated so I feel like our base knowledge should be solid by then. I think 4-5 weeks is what most people do and we can always move it back if we feel it's necessary.

According to clin ed, most rotations don't start till August 1st, although they recommend we be available up to 2 weeks before then for orientation or whatever. Agree with everything else though, I think going the 4 week route will be better for me. Actually just looked at the mock up schedule and if TTC ends before Memorial Day and all we have after that is the mock COMLEX on the 26th, I may even push it up another week lol

 

[fldoctorgirl]

Also, just realized that weekend would be July 4th so the COMLEX wouldn't be offered that Friday. Guess 2 days of OMM will have to cut it. Or, do a Friday/Tuesday setup or something like that instead of Monday/Friday.

 

[You shall know the Truth]

I did not like the TTC class, I think I had 4 weeks of dedicated and crammed omm into a few days like most students

 

[Dr.Bruh]

TTC was chill, was like 3 half days over 3 weeks. At KCU you will have plenty of time to study for boards. Even tho you have some stuff left you will be able to do basically 80% boards stuff after your last systems block which is like 8-10 weeks out.

 

[ARK1234]

If you can put in some good time studying during your "transition to clerkship" course period as well, then in all honesty, I'd recommend no more than 4 weeks of 100% dedicated board studying. That's prolly plenty, and chances are that you will peak and plateau off during that time - you will want to take your board exams then. And if you can leave a room for a mini-break before your rotations start, then I'm all for it - 3rd year is tiring in its own way, and you want to be fresh and ready going into it, rather than burning all out for boards and then starting rotations 2 days later like I did.

 

[fldoctorgirl]

Thanks everyone! You've all been super helpful, especially those of you from my school 🙂 Hopefully they post our semester schedule soon so that I can see the concrete dates, but if the mock COMLEX is the last thing we do, I'll be scheduling my exam ~1.5 weeks earlier than originally planned.

 

[Cath Up]

Most of my classmates (and myself) have started USMLERx. I think it is a good time to start now, as you're going through the systems. At least a small number a day, to get you used to thinking like that on a regular basis. But your academic performance is solid so take or leave my advice 🙂

I assume you've got a similar # as my 26,312 in Zanki. How many cards have you seen so far? I'm at nearly 50%, but with 5k pending reviews I neglected from last year 🙁

 

[fldoctorgirl]

Most of my classmates (and myself) have started USMLERx. I think it is a good time to start now, as you're going through the systems. At least a small number a day, to get you used to thinking like that on a regular basis. But your academic performance is solid so take or leave my advice 🙂

I assume you've got a similar # as my 26,312 in Zanki. How many cards have you seen so far? I'm at nearly 50%, but with 5k pending reviews I neglected from last year 🙁

I agree I definitely should start on questions, I just honestly haven't been able to find the time. I will make it a priority over the next few weeks as the semester winds down.

Yup, it might be a little more between Step Zanki, Zanki pharmacology, and lolnotacop. I've got ~45% of Step Zanki matured, 40% of pharm, and 50% of lolntoacop. I also fell behind last year in our neuro block, and didn't catch up until the beginning of this year. Just keep grinding at it! I think it's more important how many of the cards you've seen then necessarily maturing 100% of the deck...I know a lot of people who only got to 70-80% matured and still crushed it.

 

[Giovanotto]

It's different for every person. Studying about 7-9 hours/day, I peaked at 5.5 weeks. I would not recommend anything less than 4 weeks. Best of luck 🙂

 

[Espressso]

After around ~6 weeks you start to really get some diminishing returns I think. I set mine to 8 weeks of dedicated on my excel schedule but the first few weeks included some nonsense such as ALS/BLS training, OMT Final practical, etc etc. That, along with a day a week of "light" board studying where all I did was do my anki reviews and watch a few sketchy vids/b&b, I would say it came out to around 6 weeks of real true dedicated where it's a ~10h study day.

I recommend spending time to build a detailed schedule, both a daily schedule (how should your day look) and a weekly schedule. I built mine on excel and it helped tremendously in terms of keeping track of the amount of questions I did, how many left to go, etc etc.

 

[Epilepsy365]

I used 6 weeks and came out with a solid Step 1 for my specialty. I'm very happy with my IIs for this cycle thus far.

A few things from someone who's going through the current application cycle right now:
1) If there's one test that you don't want to mess up, it's Step 1. Yes, Step 1 >>> Step 2. Don't be that person who messes up Step 1 and thinks that Step 2 will compensate for that. I'm very positive at this point that 80% of the filters used in IM/Neurology ACGME programs is Step 1 > xxx.

2) The other filter is probably research or no research.

3) Once you pass these two filters, your application will then be read and assessed holistically.

Take as much time as you need to get a solid Step 1. The end.

 

[hungrydoc710]

I also use Rx. Would dig into those questions, it'll get you leafing thru FA as your first pass and hopefully you get a 2nd pass of FA from UW q's during dedicated. Also make sure you get two passes of Pathoma in along with FA as mentioned prior.

Question - do you plan on sprinkling OMM questions during dedicated or in that 3 day gap, just crush OMM anki deck + OMM q's?

 

[fldoctorgirl]

I also use Rx. Would dig into those questions, it'll get you leafing thru FA as your first pass and hopefully you get a 2nd pass of FA from UW q's during dedicated. Also make sure you get two passes of Pathoma in along with FA as mentioned prior.

Question - do you plan on sprinkling OMM questions during dedicated or in that 3 day gap, just crush OMM anki deck + OMM q's?

I've been going through the OMM deck, probably won't do any specific OMM questions till the 3 day gap honestly. Or, maybe do like 10 a day throughout dedicated. Not high on my priorities though.