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Hi all,
Both as part of a research project I'm part of as well as for my own learning, I have spent a huge amount of time surveying and reviewing medical school resources over the past year. I wrote up a resource recommendation guide for my medical school and edited it for the broader SDN audience below. Enjoy!
Jordan222’s Medical School Resource Recommendation Guide
Preface
In 2016-2017, I spent a substantial amount of time testing out the wide variety of third-party medical student resources available for learning, review, assessment, and scheduling. The following document is written by me with considerable input from fellow medical students, online forums, and informally surveying students at other medical schools. The world of medical student resources is quickly evolving, and this document is up to date as of July 2017.
For each resources discussed below, I will include:
· The name, website, and cost of the resource
· My main sources of exposure to the tool
· A brief description of the resource and its features, including my thoughts on the its value in general for a medical student.
· A categorization of the tool’s function as a learning, review, assessment, or scheduling tool
· My personal opinion of the resource’s holistic evaluation for a medical student at some point in their four years.
o Virtually Essential > Strongly Recommended > Recommended > Somewhat Useful > Not Recommended
Summary of Holistic Evaluations
· Virtually Essential
o Pathoma
o Boards and Beyond
o First Aid Book
o UWorld
o OnlineMedEd Free
o UpToDate
· Strongly Recommended
o Osmosis YouTube Videos
o Firecracker
o USMLERx QMax
o OnlineMedEd Premium
o Physeo
o Pastest USMLE
o Harrison’s Principles of Internal Medicine Book
o DynaMed
o Step-Up to Medicine Book
· Recommended
o Dr. Najeeb
o Lecturio
o Anki
o Picmomic
o SketchyMedical
o USMLERx Rx360
o Kaplan Qbank
o Stanford Medicine 25
o Clinical Key
· Somewhat Useful
o Osmosis Prime
o Figure 1
· Not Recommended
o Doctors in Training (DIT)
o Kaplan Step 1 High Yield Lectures
The Resources (in no particular order)
· Sample Resource:
o Website:
o Cost:
o Exposure:
o Description:
o Categorization:
o Holistic evaluation:
· Dr. Najeeb
o Website: World's Most Popular Medical Lectures
o Cost: Lifetime subscription price varies by the week, but usually between $59 and $89.
o Exposure: Dr. Najeeb was among the first resources I purchased this year. I bought a lifetime membership for $59 and have had it for the majority of the year. Several of my peers also purchased lifetime memberships and have used it more than me. I’ve also read quite a bit about Dr. Najeeb and am a member of the reasonably useful Facebook group associated with the resource.
o Description and value in general: Dr. Najeeb has over 800 lectures and counting, with roughly 100 coming in the past year alone. Each lecture is roughly 40 minutes long and the goal of his lectures is to cover all Step 1 content starting from scratch. Dr. Najeeb uses a traditional white board and draws up every concept with the intent of requiring no roughly no background information on a given topic. Therefore, his lectures are great if you have poor background on a particular field or topic. For example, I had a relatively weak biochemistry background entering medical school, and wanted to learn Step 1 biochemistry content first to hopefully turn that weakness into a strength. I was able to get through all of Dr. Najeeb’s biochemistry lectures, I understood them as I went along since he is a relatively high quality communicator of content, and I left the lecture set feeling pretty capable in terms of my foundational understanding of biochemistry at the medical student level. The downside is time. Dr. Najeeb’s biochemistry lecture series is roughly 70 hours long, and even at 2x playback speed (which I trained myself to get used to because it seemed like the only way), this venture still took several months of studying in the background. For a student with a weak science background, this is probably a worthwhile resource even if you only use it for a smattering of topics. For a student with a dearth of learning video lecture resources, this is a cheap and decent solution. Dr. Najeeb is a character and you will remember much of what he says, though be warned he sometimes does make unfortunately misogynistic quips. The community of users seems to agree that his phyiology, biochemistry, and neuroanatomy videos are best, and that his pathology videos are quite weak.
o Categorization: Learning. Dr. Najeeb is meant for a first-pass of a topic. It takes time, but you will indeed learn. There are no flashcards or practice questions associated.
o Holistic evaluation: Recommend. It is likely most useful for first year students, with its worth likely to taper off over time.
· Pathoma
o Website: pathoma.com
o Cost: $120/21 months. I was able to secure 32 months—the length I preferred at the time—for $100, so it is likely worth emailing to check for deals. There is a free trial version which allows you to view a small sample of videos.
o Exposure: I bought Pathoma about eight months ago and have used it fairly often since. Several of my peers have also been using Pathoma. I have read quite a bit online since Pathoma has such a massive following.
o Description: Pathoma is a 35-hour long crash course of video lectures teaching pathology with an associated textbook. Pathoma breaks up Step 1-level pathology into 19 chapters, each with roughly two hours of video lectures. The lectures are in PPT format with writing and voiceover by their author, Dr. Sattar. Dr. Sattar is a pathologist at the University of Chicago and he is both well-known and fantastic. In my opinion, Dr. Sattar is perhaps the best medical lecturer I have heard, and he is well respected in the medical student community. His textbook comes free with any subscription purchase and following along and taking notes in the text while watching lectures is quite helpful. The focus of the lectures is obviously pathology, though they do engage with biochemistry, pharmacology, physiology, histology, and other fields fairly often which is great for making connections.
o Categorization: Learning and review. Dr. Sattar moves pretty fast, so it is likely best as a second-pass learning resource on a topic. Over your four years, you will want to go through each Pathoma lecture multiple times.
o Holistic evaluation: Virtually essential. Pathoma would be fairly useful in MS1 and quite useful in MS2. It is a must for pre-dedicated board study.
· Osmosis Prime and Osmosis YouTube Videos
o Website: osmosis.org
o Cost: Most of the videos themselves are FREE and available on YouTube. Osmosis Prime, their full service, costs about $300 for 2 years or about $450 for four years. There are frequent discount codes and there is a two-week free trial of the full product.
o Exposure: I have used the Osmosis videos frequently this year in preparing for PBL groups and when learning new topics. I have used Osmosis Prime in the last few weeks. Several of my peers have used trials of Osmosis Prime or purchased it throughout the year.
o Description: Osmosis is a service first and foremost meant to link in resources to your medical school’s lectures. They have a fairly sophisticated algorithm where you upload your daily lecture PPT and Osmosis provides you whole-lecture or slide-by-slide resources including videos, flashcards, and practice questions. Osmosis also has a good search function which allows you to find videos, flashcards, and practice questions by topic. They have a decent system of interleaving for flashcards and practice questions seemingly inspired by Anki. Osmosis also has a quality scheduling feature, either to fit with your school’s blocks or to your Step 1 preparation. The Osmosis videos, which are linked into Osmosis Prime but are virtually all also free on YouTube, are 8-ish minute videos on a particular diagnosis. They are digitally drawn with a voiceover presenting the pathophysiology, diagnosis, and management of the disease in question and are quite engaging if only decently deep.
o Categorization: Osmosis Pime-Learning, Review, Assessment, and Scheduling; Free Osmosis YouTube Videos-Learning. The Osmosis videos are a great first-pass learning resource. The flashcards and practice questions allow for interleaved review. You can build quizzes by field or including all Step 1 or Step 2 content. The quiz interface is good, the explanations are helpful, and there are several thousand questions. The only downside to the quizzes is you have no option to take a whole block of questions and then view answers, with each explanation following directly after the question. The scheduling system in Osmosis Prime is straightforward but well made. The Step 1 schedule automatically fills in topics to review each day and some resources to use in order to review them which is nice.
o Holistic evaluation: Osmosis Prime: Somewhat Useful. If you are not concerned about your resource budget, Osmosis Prime does provide benefit for IQ studying in MS1. The videos are the best part of Osmosis, and they are free on YouTube, so even if you don’t buy Osmosis Prime I would highly recommend checking for YouTube Osmosis videos associated with each IQ topic in MS1. Osmosis Prime, with its flashcards and topical practice questions, is a decent replacement for Firecracker, but you probably don’t need to purchase both. The Step 1 scheduler is a nice feature that might make a short subscription in pre-dedicated time worthwhile. Free Osmosis YouTube videos: Strongly Recommended.
· Doctors in Training (DIT)
o Website: Doctors In Training | USMLE : Step 1, Step 2 CK :: COMLEX : Level 1, Level 2 :: Pharmacology, Anatomy, Internal Medicine, OB/GYN
o Cost: Step 1 course is $825 for one year, Step 2 course is $799 for one year
o Exposure: I never purchased DIT, but I read about it extensively online and I did have a phone call with a member of the DIT team to discuss its potential fit for students in our program. I spent a bit of time working with the limited DIT trial version.
o Description: DIT is mainly a video lecture course, with 100 or so hours of 20 minute videos broken up by topic. In watching a few trial videos, they seem okay and do include some questions in each video to break up the slog of the lecture. In reading about DIT, people complain that the videos are essentially just the speaker reading First Aid to you without much added benefit, and I can believe that. The videos are informative but not super engaging in my opinion. In addition, DIT provides a few hundred questions broken up into daily 10-question chunks. They also provide a study calendar, though I haven’t had the chance to try it out. Do notice the price, however. DIT is expensive!
o Categorization: Learning and Review. DIT lectures you through all First Aid topics and then provides you with a few questions to check your understanding. It would probably be a decent first- or more likely second-pass learning tool with the tools to review content as well.
o Holistic evaluation: Not Recommended. DIT could be worth trying out for $100 over two years or something, but at its price point it is ludicrous and seemingly aimed at those who didn’t do their homework in resource shopping.
· Kaplan Step 1 High Yield Lectures
o Website: Studying for Your Boards? Kaplan's Got You Covered From USMLE Step 1 Through Step 3
o Cost: $450 for 3 months
o Exposure: I spoke to the folks at Kaplan and I was able to get a brief trial of their service. I saw a few videos and tried out their practice questions. I’ve also read extensively about Kaplan on forums. I’ve also had a chance to skim through a friend’s copy of the lecture note books.
o Description: Much like DIT, Kaplan is a beast in terms of its cost. It is not cheap, and its subscriptions are shockingly abbreviated. The core product here is a set of 55 hours of videos covering all Step 1 content with accompanying textbooks which they call lecture notes. The lectures seem mildly inspired and so go beyond just reciting First Aid, but they didn’t seem groundbreaking. Of note, the pharmacology lectures led by Raymon are supposed to be top-notch and hold the respect of the medical student community, especially since there are a dearth of good pharmacology resources. I have watched a few hours of Raymon and definitely learned a fair bit, though he does move a bit slowly. The lecture notes are good, but are too concise to be a good first-pass without having the videos as well. Kaplan also provides short multiple choice quizzes following each video.
o Categorization: Learning. I think the videos and accompanying texts could be a decent first-pass of a topic, and the quizzes enable a check for understanding review.
o Holistic evaluation: Not Recommended. I would say “somewhat useful” if not for the price.
· Boards and Beyond
o Website: boardsandbeyond.com
o Cost: $149 for one year, although I had talks with someone from Boards and Beyond and they told me we could work out a longer term subscription (2 years or 3 years) at an appropriate price.
o Exposure: Boards and Beyond offered me five months free to try out the product and see how it fits our curriculum. I have used the resource heavily. I have also read about it extensively online.
o Description: Boards and Beyond is a relatively new tool, having come out about two years ago. It is a fairly straightforward product, aiming to be much like Pathoma but covering all Step 1 content instead of just pathology. Boards and Beyond includes about 300 videos including about 100 hours of PPT lectures with writing and voiceover by Dr. Ryan, a cardiologist at the University of Connecticut College of Medicine. The videos are of excellent quality, and are the best balance of concise and detailed I have seen in medical education. In my opinion, Boards and Beyond is simply fantastic. There are also print-outs of each PPT for you to follow along with for taking notes if you so choose. The video lecture catalog is quickly expanding, with psychiatry and MSK videos published in the last few months. The videos are high energy and Dr. Ryan is a talented lecturer who injects clinical know-how into his work. The depth of the videos is quite good as well, as Dr. Ryan does not gloss over important details.
o Categorization: Learning. Boards and Beyond is the quintessential first-pass learning tool. Pause and take notes frequently and you will leave a 20 minute lecture with tons of accessible and new-found knowledge.
o Holistic evaluation: Virtually Essential. Boards and Beyond is the tool that finally allowed me to be comfortable learning in our curriculum.
· Lecturio
o Website: lecturio.com
o Cost: $240/year. There is a free trial which allows access to about 500 videos.
o Exposure: I spent a fair amount of time checking out the reasonably substantial free trial to get a feel for Lecturio. One of my fellow peers subscribed to the full program and has used it much more extensively.
o Description: Lecturio is a video lecture series including over 3,000 videos which range from 1 to 40 minutes each, with many about five minutes long. These bite-sized chunks cover a huge breadth of topics from MCAT content to Step 1 to Step 2 to nursing NCLEX material. Lecturio is a German company which caters to not only American but also international medical students. There are a wide variety of lecturers who vary in quality. The user interface and search functionality are quite good. Each video topic is associated with several Firecracker-like recall questions to quickly check if you were paying attention. In addition, there are about 500 USMLE-style multiple choice practice questions to review the content. The online community is notably split on Lecturio. Some people enjoy the product, but I’ve heard numerous complaints that the lectures cover only surface level content and do not dive deep enough for Step 1 or Step 2 understanding. With that said, my colleague found the resource useful for a first-pass learning of new topics.
o Categorization: Learning and Review. Lecturio seems to be built as a first-pass learning tool, with some level of post-video review of content.
o Holistic evaluation: Recommended. I don’t personally think Lecturio is necessary if you are purchasing other first-pass learning resources, but it is a reasonable alternative.
· First Aid Book
o Website: Amazon product ASIN 1259837637
o Cost: $37
o Exposure: I have been using a copy of First Aid 2016 through much of my first year to gain an appreciation for its value this early in medical school. I have also read about First Aid at length and there seems to be relative consensus of opinion.
o Description: First Aid is very straightforward. It is an 800-page book outlining all Step 1 content. It has been written in yearly additions for more than 20 years and is the gold standard for what it does. It is commonly referred to as the “bible” of Step 1. As I have found this year, it is a terrible learning resource. The content is crammed in to help the reader remember, make connections, and memorize. It is not a useful read if you have never learned about the topic in question. With that said, it is decent as an interleaved review source either after studying right or as a check in the weeks and months thereafter.
o Categorization: Review. Plain and simple, First Aid is useful if you have learned a topic and want to refresh yourself on the most vital, concise associated content.
o Holistic evaluation: Virtually Essential. With that said, you won’t likely need it in MS1. You probably want to buy a copy for your pre-dedicated and dedicated time.
· Anki
o Website: Anki - powerful, intelligent flashcards
o Cost: Free for computers, $25 for phone app
o Exposure: I downloaded Anki about six months ago and have used it sporadically since. Dedicated Anki users will tell you that dedication is everything, that it is a product only useful when utilized daily. I have not done that for more than a week at a time, and I am confident I would see more value in the product if I was more consistent. I have read extensively online about Anki.
o Description: Anki is a flashcard-making and flashcard-using program which has uses for learning any topic but is most famous for medical school flashcards. There are two chief ways Anki is used by medical students. Some medical students create thousands of their own flashcards over the course of their curriculum, making flashcards associated with each school lecture and sometime sharing them with their peers. Many who do this claim that the making of the flashcards is as educational as the recall-testing, but it is a quite time-consuming process. The other way Anki tends to get used is by downloading a popular deck of flash cards made by someone else and recall-testing interleaved flashcards to review content that way. The most famous Anki deck by far is the brosencephalon deck, which was made several years ago but has been updated several times by the dedicated Anki community. The brosencephalon deck (or Bros for short) is a set of several thousand flashcards intended to cover all First Aid and Pathoma material. The user can easily add more and more Bros flashcards into their personal deck as they cover topics in First Aid or chapters in Pathoma. I used the Bros deck several times as I was going through Pathoma and I found the questions specific and well-made. The newest Bros updates also include images associated with some flashcards. Anki has a relatively antiquated user interface, but for the price (free) you really can’t complain. In many ways, I feel like Anki is the Linux to Microsoft’s and Apple’s of medical education review tools like Firecracker and Osmosis Prime.
o Categorization: Review. Anki is the quintessential flashcard review tool. The medical student community seems polarized on if flashcards are awesome or suboptimal, but if you are a flashcard person or think you might become one, Anki is free and worth checking out.
o Holistic evaluation: Recommended. If you remain dedicated, I think Anki could be quite helpful at maintaining and expanding your understanding of needed facts in medicine. It does not replace assessment tools, but for review it has great potential.
· Picmonic
o Website: picmonic.com
o Cost: $288 for two years, though there are discounts available.
o Exposure: I tried out Picmonic Free, the limited version of Picmonic, early in the on and didn’t really appreciate the product. I read more about it over the months and ultimately purchased a full subscription mid-way through the year. I also signed on as an ambassador for my school and as such I’ve gotten to communicate more with the Picmonic staff and other ambassadors.
o Description: Picmonic is best as a review tool. It uses very brief 1-2 minute elaborate drawings to teach medical concepts. A self-described “visual storytelling platform,” Picmonic teaches content by creating an associated story which links various facts associated with the concept. The videos look a bit silly in how they use a beta fish licking a lollipop to symbolize beta blockers (like metoprolol), for example, but they do work. This seemingly odd modality is heavily influenced by the dual coding effect and research on multimodal processing which show pretty strongly that we remember better when presented with visual and audio connections to an idea. Further, the connected narrative of phonetically related facets of an image plays into the picture superiority effect, which says that pictures are easier to remember and quicker to retrieve than words. In this way, Picmonic is perhaps a more efficient way to remember and recall material than word-based modalities like Anki or First Aid alone. With that said, a combination of these resources is likely best. Of note, unlike most of the resources on this list, there actually has been some published research on the effect of Picmonic which found it to be effective when compared to lecture note studying. Picmonic also has brief recall-style “quizzes” alongside each video to provide one more opportunity for multimodal integration. I have heard it said that Picmonic is most useful at a concept-to-concept level the fewer Picmonics you use. While this is a bit paradoxical and I’m not sure I totally agree, I can see the logic in the idea. Picmonic is best for topics which you struggle to remember otherwise, and if you tried to cram hundreds of Picmonics in your head at once it might be less effective. Unlike its main competitor in the multimodal review field, SketchyMedical, Picmonic includes not only pharmacology and microbiology but also essentially all Step 1 topics from anatomy to physiology to pathology. Picmonic as a company seems to be quickly evolving and in the time I’ve had the product there have been several updates and additions, with more likely to come.
o Categorization: Review. Picmonic does have short paragraphs to teach you the medicine behind each picture and story on a topic, but it is not intended to cover the full depth of material from start to finish. It is effective at helping you remember and quickly recall information you have previously learned elsewhere. Of note, Picmonic is decently integrated into Osmosis Prime, so if you purchase Osmosis then Picmonic has some additional value.
o Holistic evaluation: Recommended. I think that in pre-dedicated and dedicated study time when you are really needing to memorize the factoids of bugs and drugs (microbiology and pharmacology), you will need either Picmonic or SketchyMedical. Picmonic, with its wider topic set, also has a fair amount of value in MS1-2. You will likely survive without it, but I believe it has the potential to give an edge in quicker fact-processing in clinic so I think Picmonic could be an asset. Definitely a try-before-you-buy product.
· SketchyMedical
o Website: SketchyMedical - Master the USMLE STEP 1 the fast and fun way
o Cost: $170 for six months, $250 for one year.
o Exposure: I admittedly have more limited exposure to SketchyMedical than most of the products discussed here. I did get a trial version of SketchyMedical and have talked to numerous students who used the resource. I have also read a bunch online about SketchyMedical.
o Description: SketchyMedical is composed of multimodal picture-stories about content in two distinct fields, microbiology (SketchyMicro) and pharmacology (SketchyPharm). There is also a much smaller pathology video set (SketchyPath) which was just released and seems to have more less positive reviews than the other Sketchy products. Much like its main competitor, Picmonic, Sketchy has pictures with voiceovers which are meant to review a topic and expressly to remember the various factoids associated with that topic for faster recall and connection of facts. Whereas Picmonics tend to be about two minutes long, Sketchy videos tend to dive into more detail and are about 20 minutes long. This is a double-edged sword: some user say this is fantastic because it allows for more depth for learning in addition to more detail for review; others say this makes the videos overly convoluted with too much to appropriately remember. Sketchy is essentially best as a cramming source, for lack of a better word. Eventually we all need to know quick-recall microbiology and pharmacology, and Sketchy is a well-respected resource to get you there. There are about 100 SketchyMicro videos, another 100 SketchyPharm videos, and 30 new SketchyPath videos. People seem to love the micro videos, like the pharm videos, and largely dislike the path videos although they just came out two months ago so there is room for potential improvement.
o Categorization: Review. In many ways, Sketchy is like Picmonic. It is great at what it does, but is fairly specialized. Sketchy is perhaps closer to a second-pass learning tool than Picmonic given its longer and deeper videos, but it also has far fewer topics and it more expensive.
o Holistic evaluation: Recommended. As above, I would recommend buying a few months before Step if you don’t already have Picmonic, but probably not sooner.
· Firecracker
o Website: Firecracker - Learn Faster, Remember Everything
o Cost: $300 for two years, $400 for four years currently; there are frequent discounts and sometimes it is even a bit cheaper.
o Exposure: I have had a full Firecracker subscription for most of this year. I used it extensively for several months of the year. I have also read quite a bit online and gathered opinions of my fellow students.
o Description: Firecracker is built to be a full-service review tool with a fantastic topic organizer. Firecracker has built an excellent hierarchy of Step 1 and Step 2 topics, and for each of their 2,000 topics they have numerous flashcard-style recall questions, about 33,000 in total. After seeing a recall question, you click to reveal the answer and then you self-assess to determine how well you knew the answer. The recall questions themselves are of reasonably mediocre quality and are more like flashcards with surface-level material than practice problems. The recall questions play into Firecracker’s well-built interleaving algorithm that assigns a particular set of questions to you each day considering previous attempts, recently of first contact with the topic, and their subjective qualification of topic yield. In terms of user interface, topic hierarchy, and interleaving algorithm, Firecracker is the best in the business. Firecracker is great for reviewing content and trying to maintain your knowledge, but its best use might be for appreciating the scope of undergraduate medical education. After using Firecracker for months and constantly marking off new topics I’ve learned while staring at those yet to be checked off, I came to understand the scope of what I know and what I don’t yet know and this is an underappreciated but extremely vital aspect of medical school. Each Firecracker topic also has a paragraph or two of content explanation, which is decent for review but is not enough for first-pass learning. Firecracker also has about 1,000 boards-style multiple choice questions to give you a taste of assessment practice. The Firecracker company seems to be busy and quickly expanding, and in the year I’ve used the product there have been numerous new features with others likely to come in the future.
o Categorization: Review, Assessment, and Scheduling. Firecracker is first and foremost a review tool, helping students to recall and maintain information that they initially learned elsewhere. There is a small element of assessment, with a few practice blocks of Step 1 questions, although not enough to keep you from buying a real Qbank when you need one. For scheduling and topic organization in medical school, Firecracker is excellent.
o Holistic evaluation: Strongly Recommend. There are decent alternatives out there like Osmosis Prime, but I strongly recommend every MS1 should purchase Firecracker for the first three years of medical school at least if they’re willing to really put time into it.
· USMLE World (UWorld)
o Website: uworld.com
o Cost: $299/90 days, $349/180 days
o Exposure: I have not personally had the opportunity to try out UWorld, but I have talked to and read from many medical students who have and the consensus is clear.
o Description: UWorld is a question bank (Qbank) of 2400 USMLE-style multiple choice questions with associated explanations. Choosing whether or not you need UWorld looks to be one of the easiest decisions on this list. Medical students almost unanimously name UWorld as the most important resource for Step board prep. UWorld questions are widely agreed to be the most similar in style and difficulty to the real USMLE exam. Further, students say that the explanations on UWorld are the most valuable aspect of the tool. As with any Qbank, the value is in taking a block of questions and then carefully going over the question explanations to identify and address content gaps.
o Categorization: Assessment. UWorld is a pure Qbank and the most respected Qbank in the field.
o Holistic evaluation: Virtually Essential. Every medical student should buy UWorld for dedicated study time at least.
Both as part of a research project I'm part of as well as for my own learning, I have spent a huge amount of time surveying and reviewing medical school resources over the past year. I wrote up a resource recommendation guide for my medical school and edited it for the broader SDN audience below. Enjoy!
Jordan222’s Medical School Resource Recommendation Guide
Preface
In 2016-2017, I spent a substantial amount of time testing out the wide variety of third-party medical student resources available for learning, review, assessment, and scheduling. The following document is written by me with considerable input from fellow medical students, online forums, and informally surveying students at other medical schools. The world of medical student resources is quickly evolving, and this document is up to date as of July 2017.
For each resources discussed below, I will include:
· The name, website, and cost of the resource
· My main sources of exposure to the tool
· A brief description of the resource and its features, including my thoughts on the its value in general for a medical student.
· A categorization of the tool’s function as a learning, review, assessment, or scheduling tool
· My personal opinion of the resource’s holistic evaluation for a medical student at some point in their four years.
o Virtually Essential > Strongly Recommended > Recommended > Somewhat Useful > Not Recommended
Summary of Holistic Evaluations
· Virtually Essential
o Pathoma
o Boards and Beyond
o First Aid Book
o UWorld
o OnlineMedEd Free
o UpToDate
· Strongly Recommended
o Osmosis YouTube Videos
o Firecracker
o USMLERx QMax
o OnlineMedEd Premium
o Physeo
o Pastest USMLE
o Harrison’s Principles of Internal Medicine Book
o DynaMed
o Step-Up to Medicine Book
· Recommended
o Dr. Najeeb
o Lecturio
o Anki
o Picmomic
o SketchyMedical
o USMLERx Rx360
o Kaplan Qbank
o Stanford Medicine 25
o Clinical Key
· Somewhat Useful
o Osmosis Prime
o Figure 1
· Not Recommended
o Doctors in Training (DIT)
o Kaplan Step 1 High Yield Lectures
The Resources (in no particular order)
· Sample Resource:
o Website:
o Cost:
o Exposure:
o Description:
o Categorization:
o Holistic evaluation:
· Dr. Najeeb
o Website: World's Most Popular Medical Lectures
o Cost: Lifetime subscription price varies by the week, but usually between $59 and $89.
o Exposure: Dr. Najeeb was among the first resources I purchased this year. I bought a lifetime membership for $59 and have had it for the majority of the year. Several of my peers also purchased lifetime memberships and have used it more than me. I’ve also read quite a bit about Dr. Najeeb and am a member of the reasonably useful Facebook group associated with the resource.
o Description and value in general: Dr. Najeeb has over 800 lectures and counting, with roughly 100 coming in the past year alone. Each lecture is roughly 40 minutes long and the goal of his lectures is to cover all Step 1 content starting from scratch. Dr. Najeeb uses a traditional white board and draws up every concept with the intent of requiring no roughly no background information on a given topic. Therefore, his lectures are great if you have poor background on a particular field or topic. For example, I had a relatively weak biochemistry background entering medical school, and wanted to learn Step 1 biochemistry content first to hopefully turn that weakness into a strength. I was able to get through all of Dr. Najeeb’s biochemistry lectures, I understood them as I went along since he is a relatively high quality communicator of content, and I left the lecture set feeling pretty capable in terms of my foundational understanding of biochemistry at the medical student level. The downside is time. Dr. Najeeb’s biochemistry lecture series is roughly 70 hours long, and even at 2x playback speed (which I trained myself to get used to because it seemed like the only way), this venture still took several months of studying in the background. For a student with a weak science background, this is probably a worthwhile resource even if you only use it for a smattering of topics. For a student with a dearth of learning video lecture resources, this is a cheap and decent solution. Dr. Najeeb is a character and you will remember much of what he says, though be warned he sometimes does make unfortunately misogynistic quips. The community of users seems to agree that his phyiology, biochemistry, and neuroanatomy videos are best, and that his pathology videos are quite weak.
o Categorization: Learning. Dr. Najeeb is meant for a first-pass of a topic. It takes time, but you will indeed learn. There are no flashcards or practice questions associated.
o Holistic evaluation: Recommend. It is likely most useful for first year students, with its worth likely to taper off over time.
· Pathoma
o Website: pathoma.com
o Cost: $120/21 months. I was able to secure 32 months—the length I preferred at the time—for $100, so it is likely worth emailing to check for deals. There is a free trial version which allows you to view a small sample of videos.
o Exposure: I bought Pathoma about eight months ago and have used it fairly often since. Several of my peers have also been using Pathoma. I have read quite a bit online since Pathoma has such a massive following.
o Description: Pathoma is a 35-hour long crash course of video lectures teaching pathology with an associated textbook. Pathoma breaks up Step 1-level pathology into 19 chapters, each with roughly two hours of video lectures. The lectures are in PPT format with writing and voiceover by their author, Dr. Sattar. Dr. Sattar is a pathologist at the University of Chicago and he is both well-known and fantastic. In my opinion, Dr. Sattar is perhaps the best medical lecturer I have heard, and he is well respected in the medical student community. His textbook comes free with any subscription purchase and following along and taking notes in the text while watching lectures is quite helpful. The focus of the lectures is obviously pathology, though they do engage with biochemistry, pharmacology, physiology, histology, and other fields fairly often which is great for making connections.
o Categorization: Learning and review. Dr. Sattar moves pretty fast, so it is likely best as a second-pass learning resource on a topic. Over your four years, you will want to go through each Pathoma lecture multiple times.
o Holistic evaluation: Virtually essential. Pathoma would be fairly useful in MS1 and quite useful in MS2. It is a must for pre-dedicated board study.
· Osmosis Prime and Osmosis YouTube Videos
o Website: osmosis.org
o Cost: Most of the videos themselves are FREE and available on YouTube. Osmosis Prime, their full service, costs about $300 for 2 years or about $450 for four years. There are frequent discount codes and there is a two-week free trial of the full product.
o Exposure: I have used the Osmosis videos frequently this year in preparing for PBL groups and when learning new topics. I have used Osmosis Prime in the last few weeks. Several of my peers have used trials of Osmosis Prime or purchased it throughout the year.
o Description: Osmosis is a service first and foremost meant to link in resources to your medical school’s lectures. They have a fairly sophisticated algorithm where you upload your daily lecture PPT and Osmosis provides you whole-lecture or slide-by-slide resources including videos, flashcards, and practice questions. Osmosis also has a good search function which allows you to find videos, flashcards, and practice questions by topic. They have a decent system of interleaving for flashcards and practice questions seemingly inspired by Anki. Osmosis also has a quality scheduling feature, either to fit with your school’s blocks or to your Step 1 preparation. The Osmosis videos, which are linked into Osmosis Prime but are virtually all also free on YouTube, are 8-ish minute videos on a particular diagnosis. They are digitally drawn with a voiceover presenting the pathophysiology, diagnosis, and management of the disease in question and are quite engaging if only decently deep.
o Categorization: Osmosis Pime-Learning, Review, Assessment, and Scheduling; Free Osmosis YouTube Videos-Learning. The Osmosis videos are a great first-pass learning resource. The flashcards and practice questions allow for interleaved review. You can build quizzes by field or including all Step 1 or Step 2 content. The quiz interface is good, the explanations are helpful, and there are several thousand questions. The only downside to the quizzes is you have no option to take a whole block of questions and then view answers, with each explanation following directly after the question. The scheduling system in Osmosis Prime is straightforward but well made. The Step 1 schedule automatically fills in topics to review each day and some resources to use in order to review them which is nice.
o Holistic evaluation: Osmosis Prime: Somewhat Useful. If you are not concerned about your resource budget, Osmosis Prime does provide benefit for IQ studying in MS1. The videos are the best part of Osmosis, and they are free on YouTube, so even if you don’t buy Osmosis Prime I would highly recommend checking for YouTube Osmosis videos associated with each IQ topic in MS1. Osmosis Prime, with its flashcards and topical practice questions, is a decent replacement for Firecracker, but you probably don’t need to purchase both. The Step 1 scheduler is a nice feature that might make a short subscription in pre-dedicated time worthwhile. Free Osmosis YouTube videos: Strongly Recommended.
· Doctors in Training (DIT)
o Website: Doctors In Training | USMLE : Step 1, Step 2 CK :: COMLEX : Level 1, Level 2 :: Pharmacology, Anatomy, Internal Medicine, OB/GYN
o Cost: Step 1 course is $825 for one year, Step 2 course is $799 for one year
o Exposure: I never purchased DIT, but I read about it extensively online and I did have a phone call with a member of the DIT team to discuss its potential fit for students in our program. I spent a bit of time working with the limited DIT trial version.
o Description: DIT is mainly a video lecture course, with 100 or so hours of 20 minute videos broken up by topic. In watching a few trial videos, they seem okay and do include some questions in each video to break up the slog of the lecture. In reading about DIT, people complain that the videos are essentially just the speaker reading First Aid to you without much added benefit, and I can believe that. The videos are informative but not super engaging in my opinion. In addition, DIT provides a few hundred questions broken up into daily 10-question chunks. They also provide a study calendar, though I haven’t had the chance to try it out. Do notice the price, however. DIT is expensive!
o Categorization: Learning and Review. DIT lectures you through all First Aid topics and then provides you with a few questions to check your understanding. It would probably be a decent first- or more likely second-pass learning tool with the tools to review content as well.
o Holistic evaluation: Not Recommended. DIT could be worth trying out for $100 over two years or something, but at its price point it is ludicrous and seemingly aimed at those who didn’t do their homework in resource shopping.
· Kaplan Step 1 High Yield Lectures
o Website: Studying for Your Boards? Kaplan's Got You Covered From USMLE Step 1 Through Step 3
o Cost: $450 for 3 months
o Exposure: I spoke to the folks at Kaplan and I was able to get a brief trial of their service. I saw a few videos and tried out their practice questions. I’ve also read extensively about Kaplan on forums. I’ve also had a chance to skim through a friend’s copy of the lecture note books.
o Description: Much like DIT, Kaplan is a beast in terms of its cost. It is not cheap, and its subscriptions are shockingly abbreviated. The core product here is a set of 55 hours of videos covering all Step 1 content with accompanying textbooks which they call lecture notes. The lectures seem mildly inspired and so go beyond just reciting First Aid, but they didn’t seem groundbreaking. Of note, the pharmacology lectures led by Raymon are supposed to be top-notch and hold the respect of the medical student community, especially since there are a dearth of good pharmacology resources. I have watched a few hours of Raymon and definitely learned a fair bit, though he does move a bit slowly. The lecture notes are good, but are too concise to be a good first-pass without having the videos as well. Kaplan also provides short multiple choice quizzes following each video.
o Categorization: Learning. I think the videos and accompanying texts could be a decent first-pass of a topic, and the quizzes enable a check for understanding review.
o Holistic evaluation: Not Recommended. I would say “somewhat useful” if not for the price.
· Boards and Beyond
o Website: boardsandbeyond.com
o Cost: $149 for one year, although I had talks with someone from Boards and Beyond and they told me we could work out a longer term subscription (2 years or 3 years) at an appropriate price.
o Exposure: Boards and Beyond offered me five months free to try out the product and see how it fits our curriculum. I have used the resource heavily. I have also read about it extensively online.
o Description: Boards and Beyond is a relatively new tool, having come out about two years ago. It is a fairly straightforward product, aiming to be much like Pathoma but covering all Step 1 content instead of just pathology. Boards and Beyond includes about 300 videos including about 100 hours of PPT lectures with writing and voiceover by Dr. Ryan, a cardiologist at the University of Connecticut College of Medicine. The videos are of excellent quality, and are the best balance of concise and detailed I have seen in medical education. In my opinion, Boards and Beyond is simply fantastic. There are also print-outs of each PPT for you to follow along with for taking notes if you so choose. The video lecture catalog is quickly expanding, with psychiatry and MSK videos published in the last few months. The videos are high energy and Dr. Ryan is a talented lecturer who injects clinical know-how into his work. The depth of the videos is quite good as well, as Dr. Ryan does not gloss over important details.
o Categorization: Learning. Boards and Beyond is the quintessential first-pass learning tool. Pause and take notes frequently and you will leave a 20 minute lecture with tons of accessible and new-found knowledge.
o Holistic evaluation: Virtually Essential. Boards and Beyond is the tool that finally allowed me to be comfortable learning in our curriculum.
· Lecturio
o Website: lecturio.com
o Cost: $240/year. There is a free trial which allows access to about 500 videos.
o Exposure: I spent a fair amount of time checking out the reasonably substantial free trial to get a feel for Lecturio. One of my fellow peers subscribed to the full program and has used it much more extensively.
o Description: Lecturio is a video lecture series including over 3,000 videos which range from 1 to 40 minutes each, with many about five minutes long. These bite-sized chunks cover a huge breadth of topics from MCAT content to Step 1 to Step 2 to nursing NCLEX material. Lecturio is a German company which caters to not only American but also international medical students. There are a wide variety of lecturers who vary in quality. The user interface and search functionality are quite good. Each video topic is associated with several Firecracker-like recall questions to quickly check if you were paying attention. In addition, there are about 500 USMLE-style multiple choice practice questions to review the content. The online community is notably split on Lecturio. Some people enjoy the product, but I’ve heard numerous complaints that the lectures cover only surface level content and do not dive deep enough for Step 1 or Step 2 understanding. With that said, my colleague found the resource useful for a first-pass learning of new topics.
o Categorization: Learning and Review. Lecturio seems to be built as a first-pass learning tool, with some level of post-video review of content.
o Holistic evaluation: Recommended. I don’t personally think Lecturio is necessary if you are purchasing other first-pass learning resources, but it is a reasonable alternative.
· First Aid Book
o Website: Amazon product ASIN 1259837637
o Cost: $37
o Exposure: I have been using a copy of First Aid 2016 through much of my first year to gain an appreciation for its value this early in medical school. I have also read about First Aid at length and there seems to be relative consensus of opinion.
o Description: First Aid is very straightforward. It is an 800-page book outlining all Step 1 content. It has been written in yearly additions for more than 20 years and is the gold standard for what it does. It is commonly referred to as the “bible” of Step 1. As I have found this year, it is a terrible learning resource. The content is crammed in to help the reader remember, make connections, and memorize. It is not a useful read if you have never learned about the topic in question. With that said, it is decent as an interleaved review source either after studying right or as a check in the weeks and months thereafter.
o Categorization: Review. Plain and simple, First Aid is useful if you have learned a topic and want to refresh yourself on the most vital, concise associated content.
o Holistic evaluation: Virtually Essential. With that said, you won’t likely need it in MS1. You probably want to buy a copy for your pre-dedicated and dedicated time.
· Anki
o Website: Anki - powerful, intelligent flashcards
o Cost: Free for computers, $25 for phone app
o Exposure: I downloaded Anki about six months ago and have used it sporadically since. Dedicated Anki users will tell you that dedication is everything, that it is a product only useful when utilized daily. I have not done that for more than a week at a time, and I am confident I would see more value in the product if I was more consistent. I have read extensively online about Anki.
o Description: Anki is a flashcard-making and flashcard-using program which has uses for learning any topic but is most famous for medical school flashcards. There are two chief ways Anki is used by medical students. Some medical students create thousands of their own flashcards over the course of their curriculum, making flashcards associated with each school lecture and sometime sharing them with their peers. Many who do this claim that the making of the flashcards is as educational as the recall-testing, but it is a quite time-consuming process. The other way Anki tends to get used is by downloading a popular deck of flash cards made by someone else and recall-testing interleaved flashcards to review content that way. The most famous Anki deck by far is the brosencephalon deck, which was made several years ago but has been updated several times by the dedicated Anki community. The brosencephalon deck (or Bros for short) is a set of several thousand flashcards intended to cover all First Aid and Pathoma material. The user can easily add more and more Bros flashcards into their personal deck as they cover topics in First Aid or chapters in Pathoma. I used the Bros deck several times as I was going through Pathoma and I found the questions specific and well-made. The newest Bros updates also include images associated with some flashcards. Anki has a relatively antiquated user interface, but for the price (free) you really can’t complain. In many ways, I feel like Anki is the Linux to Microsoft’s and Apple’s of medical education review tools like Firecracker and Osmosis Prime.
o Categorization: Review. Anki is the quintessential flashcard review tool. The medical student community seems polarized on if flashcards are awesome or suboptimal, but if you are a flashcard person or think you might become one, Anki is free and worth checking out.
o Holistic evaluation: Recommended. If you remain dedicated, I think Anki could be quite helpful at maintaining and expanding your understanding of needed facts in medicine. It does not replace assessment tools, but for review it has great potential.
· Picmonic
o Website: picmonic.com
o Cost: $288 for two years, though there are discounts available.
o Exposure: I tried out Picmonic Free, the limited version of Picmonic, early in the on and didn’t really appreciate the product. I read more about it over the months and ultimately purchased a full subscription mid-way through the year. I also signed on as an ambassador for my school and as such I’ve gotten to communicate more with the Picmonic staff and other ambassadors.
o Description: Picmonic is best as a review tool. It uses very brief 1-2 minute elaborate drawings to teach medical concepts. A self-described “visual storytelling platform,” Picmonic teaches content by creating an associated story which links various facts associated with the concept. The videos look a bit silly in how they use a beta fish licking a lollipop to symbolize beta blockers (like metoprolol), for example, but they do work. This seemingly odd modality is heavily influenced by the dual coding effect and research on multimodal processing which show pretty strongly that we remember better when presented with visual and audio connections to an idea. Further, the connected narrative of phonetically related facets of an image plays into the picture superiority effect, which says that pictures are easier to remember and quicker to retrieve than words. In this way, Picmonic is perhaps a more efficient way to remember and recall material than word-based modalities like Anki or First Aid alone. With that said, a combination of these resources is likely best. Of note, unlike most of the resources on this list, there actually has been some published research on the effect of Picmonic which found it to be effective when compared to lecture note studying. Picmonic also has brief recall-style “quizzes” alongside each video to provide one more opportunity for multimodal integration. I have heard it said that Picmonic is most useful at a concept-to-concept level the fewer Picmonics you use. While this is a bit paradoxical and I’m not sure I totally agree, I can see the logic in the idea. Picmonic is best for topics which you struggle to remember otherwise, and if you tried to cram hundreds of Picmonics in your head at once it might be less effective. Unlike its main competitor in the multimodal review field, SketchyMedical, Picmonic includes not only pharmacology and microbiology but also essentially all Step 1 topics from anatomy to physiology to pathology. Picmonic as a company seems to be quickly evolving and in the time I’ve had the product there have been several updates and additions, with more likely to come.
o Categorization: Review. Picmonic does have short paragraphs to teach you the medicine behind each picture and story on a topic, but it is not intended to cover the full depth of material from start to finish. It is effective at helping you remember and quickly recall information you have previously learned elsewhere. Of note, Picmonic is decently integrated into Osmosis Prime, so if you purchase Osmosis then Picmonic has some additional value.
o Holistic evaluation: Recommended. I think that in pre-dedicated and dedicated study time when you are really needing to memorize the factoids of bugs and drugs (microbiology and pharmacology), you will need either Picmonic or SketchyMedical. Picmonic, with its wider topic set, also has a fair amount of value in MS1-2. You will likely survive without it, but I believe it has the potential to give an edge in quicker fact-processing in clinic so I think Picmonic could be an asset. Definitely a try-before-you-buy product.
· SketchyMedical
o Website: SketchyMedical - Master the USMLE STEP 1 the fast and fun way
o Cost: $170 for six months, $250 for one year.
o Exposure: I admittedly have more limited exposure to SketchyMedical than most of the products discussed here. I did get a trial version of SketchyMedical and have talked to numerous students who used the resource. I have also read a bunch online about SketchyMedical.
o Description: SketchyMedical is composed of multimodal picture-stories about content in two distinct fields, microbiology (SketchyMicro) and pharmacology (SketchyPharm). There is also a much smaller pathology video set (SketchyPath) which was just released and seems to have more less positive reviews than the other Sketchy products. Much like its main competitor, Picmonic, Sketchy has pictures with voiceovers which are meant to review a topic and expressly to remember the various factoids associated with that topic for faster recall and connection of facts. Whereas Picmonics tend to be about two minutes long, Sketchy videos tend to dive into more detail and are about 20 minutes long. This is a double-edged sword: some user say this is fantastic because it allows for more depth for learning in addition to more detail for review; others say this makes the videos overly convoluted with too much to appropriately remember. Sketchy is essentially best as a cramming source, for lack of a better word. Eventually we all need to know quick-recall microbiology and pharmacology, and Sketchy is a well-respected resource to get you there. There are about 100 SketchyMicro videos, another 100 SketchyPharm videos, and 30 new SketchyPath videos. People seem to love the micro videos, like the pharm videos, and largely dislike the path videos although they just came out two months ago so there is room for potential improvement.
o Categorization: Review. In many ways, Sketchy is like Picmonic. It is great at what it does, but is fairly specialized. Sketchy is perhaps closer to a second-pass learning tool than Picmonic given its longer and deeper videos, but it also has far fewer topics and it more expensive.
o Holistic evaluation: Recommended. As above, I would recommend buying a few months before Step if you don’t already have Picmonic, but probably not sooner.
· Firecracker
o Website: Firecracker - Learn Faster, Remember Everything
o Cost: $300 for two years, $400 for four years currently; there are frequent discounts and sometimes it is even a bit cheaper.
o Exposure: I have had a full Firecracker subscription for most of this year. I used it extensively for several months of the year. I have also read quite a bit online and gathered opinions of my fellow students.
o Description: Firecracker is built to be a full-service review tool with a fantastic topic organizer. Firecracker has built an excellent hierarchy of Step 1 and Step 2 topics, and for each of their 2,000 topics they have numerous flashcard-style recall questions, about 33,000 in total. After seeing a recall question, you click to reveal the answer and then you self-assess to determine how well you knew the answer. The recall questions themselves are of reasonably mediocre quality and are more like flashcards with surface-level material than practice problems. The recall questions play into Firecracker’s well-built interleaving algorithm that assigns a particular set of questions to you each day considering previous attempts, recently of first contact with the topic, and their subjective qualification of topic yield. In terms of user interface, topic hierarchy, and interleaving algorithm, Firecracker is the best in the business. Firecracker is great for reviewing content and trying to maintain your knowledge, but its best use might be for appreciating the scope of undergraduate medical education. After using Firecracker for months and constantly marking off new topics I’ve learned while staring at those yet to be checked off, I came to understand the scope of what I know and what I don’t yet know and this is an underappreciated but extremely vital aspect of medical school. Each Firecracker topic also has a paragraph or two of content explanation, which is decent for review but is not enough for first-pass learning. Firecracker also has about 1,000 boards-style multiple choice questions to give you a taste of assessment practice. The Firecracker company seems to be busy and quickly expanding, and in the year I’ve used the product there have been numerous new features with others likely to come in the future.
o Categorization: Review, Assessment, and Scheduling. Firecracker is first and foremost a review tool, helping students to recall and maintain information that they initially learned elsewhere. There is a small element of assessment, with a few practice blocks of Step 1 questions, although not enough to keep you from buying a real Qbank when you need one. For scheduling and topic organization in medical school, Firecracker is excellent.
o Holistic evaluation: Strongly Recommend. There are decent alternatives out there like Osmosis Prime, but I strongly recommend every MS1 should purchase Firecracker for the first three years of medical school at least if they’re willing to really put time into it.
· USMLE World (UWorld)
o Website: uworld.com
o Cost: $299/90 days, $349/180 days
o Exposure: I have not personally had the opportunity to try out UWorld, but I have talked to and read from many medical students who have and the consensus is clear.
o Description: UWorld is a question bank (Qbank) of 2400 USMLE-style multiple choice questions with associated explanations. Choosing whether or not you need UWorld looks to be one of the easiest decisions on this list. Medical students almost unanimously name UWorld as the most important resource for Step board prep. UWorld questions are widely agreed to be the most similar in style and difficulty to the real USMLE exam. Further, students say that the explanations on UWorld are the most valuable aspect of the tool. As with any Qbank, the value is in taking a block of questions and then carefully going over the question explanations to identify and address content gaps.
o Categorization: Assessment. UWorld is a pure Qbank and the most respected Qbank in the field.
o Holistic evaluation: Virtually Essential. Every medical student should buy UWorld for dedicated study time at least.
