need advice please

[sunny9505]

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Hi everyone. I was planning on getting the board simulator series for USMLE preparation. Has anyone heard or had experience with this series? Also, would you reccomend getting all 5 books or just the 3 body systems review ones? Thanks so much.

 

[AJM]

I personally liked the Boards Simulator Series, and I used 4 out of the 5 books, but only because they were hand-me-downs from my roommate who took Boards the year before. If I were to buy them myself, I would probably just buy the 3 body systems reviews. No good reason why, I guess just to save money! 😀 The 3/5 is probably the most cost effective group, and contains the most relevent questions to the Boards, although you would probably miss out on Biochem and maybe a couple other areas.
I would recommend using the Boards Simulator Series -- It's got TONS of questions, and great explanations. The one thing to keep in mind, though is that the questions are MUCH harder than the actual exam, so don't let them get you down. 🙂

 

[Winged Scapula]

AJM is right - the BSS questions are much harder than the real thing. If you do well, or even just get 65% on those exams, you'll do fine on Step 1.

best of luck! 😀

 

[sunny9505]

Thanks for the advice! So, if the questions in BSS are harder, is it worth going through or do you think I would be better off doing something more similar to the actual boards, like Kaplan's ? bank or the Appleton and Lange ? book?

 

[AJM]

Originally posted by sunny9505:
•Thanks for the advice! So, if the questions in BSS are harder, is it worth going through or do you think I would be better off doing something more similar to the actual boards, like Kaplan's ? bank or the Appleton and Lange ? book?•

I think it is still worth it to go through them (maybe not ALL of them -- they have a lot of questions). Some of the exams in there are even harder than others, and your score will vary a lot. The first exam I took I got a 55%, then I got 75%, then 55% again. 😱 But the explanations are great, and the exams are worth doing to learn from your mistakes. Everyone tends not to pay much attention to their right answers, but they dwell over what they got wrong. So I think harder exams are better learning experiences simply because you get more questions wrong to brood over. Jeez, does that sound masochistic, or what? 🙂

For a confidence booster, though, you might want to add a couple of easier practice exams at some point. I can't tell you which books are the best for those, because I only used the BSS books and the one short practice exam that we were given by the USMLE people.
Good luck!