how much do I need to study to just pass boards?

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Is it a goal of yours to just barely slide by? This is a terrible way to think about the board examinations and about medical school in general. You're going to be a licensed physician... Work hard and learn the pathology/pharm/micro that will ultimately make you a better clinician (unless you just want to do the minimum at that as well...)
 
On a less snarky note, I believe there's some studies done by Kaplan or something that show a connection with getting >220 on the usmle and doing >2,000 questions. Not helpful but it's something I guess.


Either way it's going to depend on you entirely. If you're in your top 10% chances are you need to work a lot less to pass than someone in the bottom 90%.
 
one pass of UW and RX should do the trick if your only goal is passing.
 
Drrrrrr. Celty said:
On a less snarky note, I believe there's some studies done by Kaplan or something that show a connection with getting >220 on the usmle and doing >2,000 questions. Not helpful but it's something I guess.


Either way it's going to depend on you entirely. If you're in your top 10% chances are you need to work a lot less to pass than someone in the bottom 90%.
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..but doesn't everyone do uworld at least once?
 
lessthanjimmy said:
Step 1 and or COMLEX.
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As others have stated --- that really depends on you -- consider the following options:

1) Going to work for a non-medical career/job with ~$72K worth of debt, assuming no undergrad but maxed out medical school loans which is what you'll certainly do if you don't study at all and flunk out -- no study time required, relax, get a case of bourbon, some party girls/guys with questionable morals, good music, great finger foods, plenty of baby oil and have at it.....

2) Limit yourself to residency choices in the armpit of the medical universe because you squeaked by and barely passed and spend the rest of your career kicking yourself, hating your life and stomping kittens in frustration on occasion --- no worries, study at full speed with a half-a$$ed attitude -- you'll get there but likely be treating syphilitic hookers at a large county hospital.

3) Do a decent residency in one of your top 3 specialties and have a nice life that's acceptable -- again, no worries, study full speed and halfway pay attention but don't bother trying to learn for your personal edification, just try to memorize for the test -- you'll screw it up along the way in 3rd/4th year and achieve this goal.

4) Do a residency in a competitive specialty where you can build the life YOU want -- study smart and efficiently, learn to build you knowledge base along the way, do it in such a way that you retain it, apply it well during 3rd/4th year and really become a physician during that time, hit the ground running in residency and be badass the rest of your life --- that takes some sweat equity now.....

It's all up to you.....
 
With that attitude, I hope I'm fortunate enough to have you as my doctor one day! Nothing instills confidence like a desire to know the bare minimum.

I see std's and practicing in a building with tinted/one-way windows in your future.
 
Drrrrrr. Celty said:
A lot of people probably don't even do half of COMBANK or something. I think we need to step out of SDN's land of 240s.
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My advisor once told me that someone in my class didn't do any QBank at all. This person obviously failed, but yeah, SDN is a smaller community than people think.
 
AlbinoHawk DO said:
My advisor once told me that someone in my class didn't do any QBank at all. This person obviously failed, but yeah, SDN is a smaller community than people think.
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Do you think just busting out thousands of q's is enough to get an average score? Like, is the physical process of answering questions, learning how things are asked, and learning from the answers enough for an average score? Before people jump down my throat, I'm not implying I want just an average score..
 
surfguy84 said:
Do you think just busting out thousands of q's is enough to get an average score? Like, is the physical process of answering questions, learning how things are asked, and learning from the answers enough for an average score? Before people jump down my throat, I'm not implying I want just an average score..
Click to expand...
You need to ask yourself if you get questions wrong because you don't understand the style or because you had some gap in your knowledge. If it's a gap, you won't be filling that gap by understanding the style of question more.
 
starri said:
Ten people in my class finished COMBANK for Level 2. And I was one of them.
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I think that has more to do with how much COMBANK sucks. The poor question writing is only rivaled by my professors.
 
Rekt said:
I think that has more to do with how much COMBANK sucks. The poor question writing is only rivaled by my professors.
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Honestly, I would give that a contributing factor, but I honestly do think a larger part was people just blowing it off. I worked all the way through UWorld and COMBANK. But my methods are different.
 
AlbinoHawk DO said:
You need to ask yourself if you get questions wrong because you don't understand the style or because you had some gap in your knowledge. If it's a gap, you won't be filling that gap by understanding the style of question more.
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True, but do you think gaps will slowly become filled by doing ~5k questions?
 
surfguy84 said:
..but doesn't everyone do uworld at least once?
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No definitely not. I new a guy that did 20 questions a day even a couple weeks out from his exam. Wasn't close to halfway through one qbank the week of his exam. I think he passed, but who knows what he got.

Heard from a professor during dedicated for Step 1 that said he remembers one person that wouldn't take any of his advice and wouldn't do enough questions. Girl got through only 400 questions and failed.

surfguy84 said:
Do you think just busting out thousands of q's is enough to get an average score? Like, is the physical process of answering questions, learning how things are asked, and learning from the answers enough for an average score? Before people jump down my throat, I'm not implying I want just an average score..
Click to expand...

It depends on the person. I knew people that got through way more questions than me, but just didn't absorb the material. They passed but did worse than me.

That said, on average if you hammer through the questions and really understand why you got things wrong, I imagine you should be able to get at least around average.

starri said:
Ten people in my class finished COMBANK for Level 2. And I was one of them.
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Yeah, but to be honest I felt that Uworld for Step 2 + AAFP questions were more representative of the content on Level 2 than the Combank. Now if by get through you're saying they barely did any questions, well that's craziness. Throughout the year, I got through almost all of Uworld just for studying for rotations and shelfs.
 
JustPlainBill said:
2) Limit yourself to residency choices in the armpit of the medical universe because you squeaked by and barely passed and spend the rest of your career kicking yourself, hating your life and stomping kittens in frustration on occasion --- no worries, study at full speed with a half-a$$ed attitude -- you'll get there but likely be treating syphilitic hookers at a large county hospital.
Click to expand...

Nietzsche's Barber said:
With that attitude, I hope I'm fortunate enough to have you as my doctor one day! Nothing instills confidence like a desire to know the bare minimum.

I see std's and practicing in a building with tinted/one-way windows in your future.
Click to expand...

lol, jesus christ.

@first guy: i can't believe you're a physician and you're being this rude and condescending with your comments. i guess that comes naturally to some people when anonymity is involved. i can't imagine you talking to your colleagues or patients like this in real life, so why put on a show on the internet?

@second guy: it's sad to see medical students get this type of ego and bravado in these days before they even become full fledged practicing doctors. dont be the type of doctor that values showing off with no humility or one that is not humble.

you are NOT better than other people simply because you are a doctor. people including kids look up to doctors, act like a role model, not a douchebag! utterly despicable behavior in this thread
 
allsop21 said:
lol, jesus christ.

@first guy: i can't believe you're a physician and you're being this rude and condescending with your comments. i guess that comes naturally to some people when anonymity is involved. i can't imagine you talking to your colleagues or patients like this in real life, so why put on a show on the internet?
Click to expand...

Ummm, no, has nothing to do with Internet anonymity. I've said things along this line in just about these terms straight to someone's face in an effort to snap them out of mediocrity and onto greater things that they were capable of...there was and is a method to the madness. It has nothing to do with being a douchebag. And believe me, those comments were relatively mild.
 
People come here for realistic advice, not hugs and kisses. Grow a thicker skin or never, ever set foot in NYC. My people say "F you" as a greeting there.


allsop21 said:
lol, jesus christ.

@first guy: i can't believe you're a physician and you're being this rude and condescending with your comments. i guess that comes naturally to some people when anonymity is involved. i can't imagine you talking to your colleagues or patients like this in real life, so why put on a show on the internet?

@second guy: it's sad to see medical students get this type of ego and bravado in these days before they even become full fledged practicing doctors. dont be the type of doctor that values showing off with no humility or one that is not humble.

you are NOT better than other people simply because you are a doctor. people including kids look up to doctors, act like a role model, not a douchebag! utterly despicable behavior in this thread
Click to expand...
 
I don't see how posters were thinking they're "better than other people" or being despicable by being blunt to OP on how doing the bare minimum will limit opportunities to the least sought after working environments.
 
RamsFan&FutureDO said:
Those people are stuck in their "safe spaces".
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Hmmm -- safe spaces? Like the "safe space" that occurred when my bed was blown off the wall when 175,000 gallons of JP4 went up one morning at 0730 when I was 9 and we had to evac to the parade ground since there was a 15 foot wall of flame in the drainage ditches that went through the housing area? Or when a typhoon parked over the island for 40 days and 39 nights and pretty much flooded everything? Or when the Libyans were rioting against King Idris and we drove through it in a VW Beetle? Or when the local national came after us with a machete after we inadvertently caused him to miss a taxi fare by stepping off the curb in the wrong spot when I was 16? or when a drunk came at me with a beer bottle one night because I shoved him off of me when he stumbled into in the parking lot? or.... well, you get the idea...safe spaces, what a concept....
 
Ibn Alnafis MD said:
one pass of UW and RX should do the trick if your only goal is passing.
Click to expand...


How essential is COMBANK? Like between my Kaplan, RX, UWORLD, and COMBANK. Am I even going to remotely have the time to do that many questions?
 
JustPlainBill said:
Hmmm -- safe spaces? Like the "safe space" that occurred when my bed was blown off the wall when 175,000 gallons of JP4 went up one morning at 0730 when I was 9 and we had to evac to the parade ground since there was a 15 foot wall of flame in the drainage ditches that went through the housing area? Or when a typhoon parked over the island for 40 days and 39 nights and pretty much flooded everything? Or when the Libyans were rioting against King Idris and we drove through it in a VW Beetle? Or when the local national came after us with a machete after we inadvertently caused him to miss a taxi fare by stepping off the curb in the wrong spot when I was 16? or when a drunk came at me with a beer bottle one night because I shoved him off of me when he stumbled into in the parking lot? or.... well, you get the idea...safe spaces, what a concept....
Click to expand...

This literally has nothing to do with what I was referring to. Not to mention I agree with what you've said about people needing thicker skins. Amazing that you overcame that btw!
 
Drrrrrr. Celty said:
How essential is COMBANK? Like between my Kaplan, RX, UWORLD, and COMBANK. Am I even going to remotely have the time to do that many questions?
Click to expand...
I didn't use it. I think you're spreading yourself too thin using that many Qbanks. Do UW along with only another Qbank and preferably go through UW twice.

Remember, it's a quality vs quantity thing. Yes, you do need the volume and the sufficient exposure to different material to improve your odds at seeing stuff that will be presented on your boards. However, there's only so much you can absorb given the limited time we have to study. Therefore, you need to limit your material and try to master it.
 
allsop21 said:
lol, jesus christ.

@first guy: i can't believe you're a physician and you're being this rude and condescending with your comments. i guess that comes naturally to some people when anonymity is involved. i can't imagine you talking to your colleagues or patients like this in real life, so why put on a show on the internet?

@second guy: it's sad to see medical students get this type of ego and bravado in these days before they even become full fledged practicing doctors. dont be the type of doctor that values showing off with no humility or one that is not humble.

you are NOT better than other people simply because you are a doctor. people including kids look up to doctors, act like a role model, not a douchebag! utterly despicable behavior in this thread
Click to expand...

You're in for a rude awakening when you become an attending.
 
Ibn Alnafis MD said:
I didn't use it. I think you're spreading yourself too thin using that many Qbanks. Do UW along with only another Qbank and preferably go through UW twice.

Remember, it's a quality vs quantity thing. Yes, you do need the volume and the sufficient exposure to different material to improve your odds at seeing stuff that will be presented on your boards. However, there's only so much you can absorb given the limited time we have to study. Therefore, you need to limit your material and try to master it.
Click to expand...

Would you advise trying to go through UWorld along with classes in 2nd year? I've heard this Qbank is all encompassing (i.e. knowledge of multiple disciples need to answer the question) and so it wouldn't work until you get through most of 2nd year before you start it. I feel I may need a longer time frame to prepare and want to start 2nd year, but not sure when to start each Qbank.
 
Drrrrrr. Celty said:
How essential is COMBANK? Like between my Kaplan, RX, UWORLD, and COMBANK. Am I even going to remotely have the time to do that many questions?
Click to expand...
I only used COMBANK for the OMM. The rest of it is garbage compared to UW. All of the people I know that broke 240 didn't touch COMBANK.
 
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IslandStyle808 said:
Would you advise trying to go through UWorld along with classes in 2nd year? I've heard this Qbank is all encompassing (i.e. knowledge of multiple disciples need to answer the question) and so it wouldn't work until you get through most of 2nd year before you start it. I feel I may need a longer time frame to prepare and want to start 2nd year, but not sure when to start each Qbank.
Click to expand...
I started UW in March of my second year. At that point I had done all the systems excepts for GI and Derm. Didn't feel that my knowledge base was too lacking to answer questions. Besides, you get to choose to flag off the systems you didn't cover in school.

So, yeah, definitely start UW in the second half of your second year. The knowledge they incorporate in those 2400 qs is enormous, so you'll need multiple passes to grasp everything.
 
Mad Jack said:
I only used COMBANK for the OMM. The rest of it is garbage compared to UW. All of the people I know that broke 240 didn't touch COMBANK.
Click to expand...
yup, i agree. It's also garbage for step2. Too bad I wasted money on purchasing a subscription for their COMAT-style qs. What a waste!
 
allsop21 said:
lol, jesus christ.

@first guy: i can't believe you're a physician and you're being this rude and condescending with your comments. i guess that comes naturally to some people when anonymity is involved. i can't imagine you talking to your colleagues or patients like this in real life, so why put on a show on the internet?

@second guy: it's sad to see medical students get this type of ego and bravado in these days before they even become full fledged practicing doctors. dont be the type of doctor that values showing off with no humility or one that is not humble.

you are NOT better than other people simply because you are a doctor. people including kids look up to doctors, act like a role model, not a douchebag! utterly despicable behavior in this thread
Click to expand...
by far the best part of this post is that the usernames @first and @second are indeed real
 
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