NBME not correlating with qbank (a good thing)

[LADoc84]

---

Members do not see this ad.

-

 

[Scottish Chap]

The Step 1 question stems were WAY longer than NBME 2 - at least on my test. Same thing comparing WORLD to Step 1. I took Step 1 three weeks ago, and NBME 2 two weeks before that. It sounds like you are on track for success, though! Keep at it.

 

[Law2Doc]

Interesting situation...

I took the COMLEX 2 weeks ago, and finished about 70% of Kaplan USMLE qbank (averaging 60%).

Since then, I've been on rotations, but got a week off, so I decided to take my USMLE this friday. I took NBME 2 before I started review everything, and got a 490 (216). I'm happy, and I would be ecstatic to get this score on the real exam.

I don't want to look a gift horse in the mouth, but has this happened to anyone else before? It seems like a large difference from what I was getting on Kaplan, esp. since the Kaplan guys said you need ~65% to get an average score.

Well, whatever it is, I hope that NBME was a reflection of what it'll be like on test day.

One more question - is the question stem length on NBME 2 comparable to the actual exam? I was able to finish each section with only 5-10 minutes left. On Kaplan, I barely finished on time. I started doing USMLE world last week (briefly) and on average have 5-15 minutes left at the end.

Thanks!

If you look at the error bars they actually do correlate -- both are plus or minus about 13 according to the medfriends estimator site, and so the error bars overlap. But don't put too much stake in predictors. It should be used as a very very rough broadbrush idea of where you are (ie passing, passing by a lot, not passing), not suggest an actual score you will get.