For anybody who has taken the USMLE Step 1 and prepared using the "First Aid for the USMLE Step 1", how useful was it for preparing for the exam?
What other guides or resources do you recommend for preparing for the USMLE Step 1?
Which of the Steps (Step 1, Step 2, Step 2 CSE) is used to be selected for a residency?
Thanks!!
First Aid is, by far, the most highly recommended and most useful study source for step 1. Any study plan must involve first aid. How you use it is variable (reading it through, reading it in relation to a qbank, annotating from other books), but you will use it.
USMLE World Qbank and
Kaplan Qbank (and, more recently USMLERx is gaining ground) are also essential to your study plan. There are many threads comparing the two, try the search function.
Rapid Review Pathology is very popular because it is written by Goljan. Goljan teaches for Falcon, a competitor of Kaplan. There are pirated audio lectures floating around the internet from the early 2000s, giving credibly and fame to the book. The book is good.
Then there are series.
BRS (Physio and Behavior are good),
Rapid Review (path), and
Lippincott (biochemistry). These will give you far more detail than you need, and must be read like a book. Cover to cover.
In general, an average student from an average medical school will do average on the test when using a
Single Qbank,
First Aid, and
Rapid review path.
Spend some time in this forum reading posts from people who have taken the test, and you will learn a lot of details. This above message should be a decent primer.
