OB-Gyn Shelf Exam

This forum made possible through the generous support of SDN members, donors, and sponsors. Thank you.

Books Preferred for Ob-Gyn Shelf Exam

  • Blueprints

    Votes: 24 70.6%

  • NMS

    Votes: 2 5.9%

  • First Aid

    Votes: 2 5.9%

  • PreTest

    Votes: 4 11.8%

  • Boards and Wards

    Votes: 0 0.0%

  • Appleton and Lange

    Votes: 2 5.9%
  • Total voters
    34
  • Poll closed .
Members don't see this ad.
Kaplan Step 2 notes for basic clinical principles

Kaplan Step 3 notes for management protocol

(I am being dead serious.. you will understand why when you obtain the Step 3 notes.. essentially more concise-to-the-point and more case varied than Case Files)
 
Anyone do the 100 questions at end of Blueprints? What did you guys think about these? These seem pretty hard to me, harder than UWorld, meaning they ask lots of minute details.
 
Would love to hear someone's thoughts on this shelf from someone who actually took it this year. Seems that most of the helpful comments are from 2011. Some are even way older.

This rotation is VERY busy for me, so I need to choose only one of these resources:

Uworld
Uwise
case files
blueprints

if you had to choose one, which would you go with? Not looking to honor - just trying to pass this annoying shelf.

Thanks in advance.
 
ohyeahbaby said:
Would love to hear someone's thoughts on this shelf from someone who actually took it this year. Seems that most of the helpful comments are from 2011. Some are even way older.

This rotation is VERY busy for me, so I need to choose only one of these resources:

Uworld
Uwise
case files
blueprints

if you had to choose one, which would you go with? Not looking to honor - just trying to pass this annoying shelf.

Thanks in advance.
Click to expand...

I actually used all four those. ... You should be able to knock out Uworld in 1-3 days even if you are busy. Especially if your school gives you one day before the test to study. It's not that many questions. Do it on timed tutor.

However, I suppose otherwise, I would look at using Case files it was very helpful and you could knock out cases in downtime (or on call, etc.). Blueprints was good, but its a text-book and if you don't have time, you just don't have time to read it. Uwise was good, but less helpful than uworld. I would try to do some if finish Case files or uworld and are looking for more to do.
 
Dr McSexy said:
I actually used all four those. ... You should be able to knock out Uworld in 1-3 days even if you are busy. Especially if your school gives you one day before the test to study. It's not that many questions. Do it on timed tutor.

However, I suppose otherwise, I would look at using Case files it was very helpful and you could knock out cases in downtime (or on call, etc.). Blueprints was good, but its a text-book and if you don't have time, you just don't have time to read it. Uwise was good, but less helpful than uworld. I would try to do some if finish Case files or uworld and are looking for more to do.
Click to expand...

I really appreciate your reply. I guess I was under the impression that uwise > uworld.

In that case I'm going to go ahead and do all the uworld questions (just realized they are about 200 questions only), and go through case files while on call.

Yeah, our school gives us one day to study for the shelf, so I am hoping I will be done with both resources by then and will spend that whole day knocking out as many uwise questions as I can. Thanks again for your advice.
 
I noticed a lot of people mention the uwise questions. What are they, and where can I get them?
 
I just got my shelf score back today (took two weeks) and scored a 75 (for reference my Step 1 is a 233). I read Blueprints twice during the rotation (once over the first month then again in the last six weeks), went through all of the UWorld Qs on OB/GYN (204) and reviewed them again, and did 14 of the APGO quizzes. I used OB/GYN Recall during the rotation for pimping questions and it was helpful despite having incorrect information (eg. ovaries receive blood primarily from the ovarian arteries off the aorta or renal artery, not primarily from anastomoses with uterine arteries as the book states).

I recommend doing all of the APGO quizzes, and also trying to really intentionally learn from your experiences rather than do the work and study on your off-hours. Seems obvious, but I think if I'd been more invested during the rotation and really aggressively learned about each topic, the final would've gone down smoother. Everyone I took it with (and everyone I asked) needed the entire time and felt terrible about it upon finishing (but it was my first shelf exam, 2nd rotation), so don't be surprised if you have a similar experience. Good luck to everyone taking it, I used this thread and hope my post was useful. The test itself seemed to address more tertiary level information, as in they're not going to test whether you know that metronidazole is the treatment for BV, but that you know that topical will have the same efficacy as oral, or they won't test you on identifying DVT in a gravid patient, but on knowing what the best confirmatory test is. There were three breast cancer questions on mine also, along with at least three urinary incontinence questions, so I thought Blueprints (despite having some typos itself and my view that textbooks are an overall inefficient modality for learning) reflected how the exam weighted material nicely.
 
This shelf exam was honestly probably one of the nitpickiest I'd taken. Scored mid 80s raw.
 
Hi Everybody,

Does anyone have any experience with the Kaplan Videos for OBGYN? I used them for peds and they were great for the shelf.

Also, I noticed from this forum that people dont seem to use Pretest for obgyn? Is it not good? Again for peds i thought it was great.

We're required to read parts of the Beck book. In addition I was planning on using CF, UWise, and Uworld. Will that suffice to do well?

Thanks!
 
kaplan videos were great. straight to the point, no fluff, and easy to watch multiple times to drive the points home
 
thanks! downloaded what i thought was OBGYN lectures, but apparently it was 5 gbs of gyn only and i suspect there's seperate OB lectures as well.

I found the notes also for OB, but not for gyn lectures. any suggestions would be greatly appreciated!
 
word on the street is that this shelf is OB heavy. Any insight would be appreciated...
 
ohyeahbaby said:
word on the street is that this shelf is OB heavy. Any insight would be appreciated...
Click to expand...

From what I remember, which is not much because I never felt 2.5 hours end so quickly, it was a pretty good mixture of both ob and gyn.
 
BlueElmo said:
From what I remember, which is not much because I never felt 2.5 hours end so quickly, it was a pretty good mixture of both ob and gyn.
Click to expand...

thanks for sharing that!

if you were me right now, and your shelf was in 2 days, what book would you be reading and/or which Q bank would you be using?

thanks again
 
Does anyone have any input as to whether or not the 2nd edition of Blueprints for OBGYN is good enough for the shelf? I was able to borrow the 2nd edition, but it is from 2002 and I know clinical things can change... I can buy the most recent 5th edition if it's worth it.
 
Case Files leisurely during the first few weeks

APGO uwise questions x 2 in the last 2 1/2 wks

raw score 90
percentile 96th
 
shelf is in about 30 hours from now... any last minute tips? any info you could post in this thread or PM me would be extremely appreciated.

I took the OBGYN form 2 (the 20 dollar NBME clinical mastery subject) and scored 68%, so I'm sort of freaking out. Especially since the questions seemed easy as I was doing them.
 
ohyeahbaby said:
shelf is in about 30 hours from now... any last minute tips? any info you could post in this thread or PM me would be extremely appreciated.

I took the OBGYN form 2 (the 20 dollar NBME clinical mastery subject) and scored 68%, so I'm sort of freaking out. Especially since the questions seemed easy as I was doing them.
Click to expand...

uworld do all 206 of them. and move fast during the exam, I had like 20 minutes for the last 30 questions or something, stupid of me.
 
Uworld was good WITH casefiles. I quickly read through blueprints and I mean quickly. Casefiles after blueprints was what helped the most along with the Uworld questions, which are more simple after. There's enough time to do all three. I rushed through them during the last week. Did Uworld during the first 5 weeks and blue prints. Then the incorrect uworld and case files before the exam.
 
LaCasta said:
Does anyone have any input as to whether or not the 2nd edition of Blueprints for OBGYN is good enough for the shelf? I was able to borrow the 2nd edition, but it is from 2002 and I know clinical things can change... I can buy the most recent 5th edition if it's worth it.
Click to expand...

I think 2002 is ten years too out of date. The practice guidelines changes every 2-3 years in obgyn which is annoying but I found that in my shelf exam they didn't ask any questions which required knowing the latest guideline updates. I didn't have time to read blueprints it's really long, watch some kaplan videos and read case files on ur downtime at the ward and you should be fine. The complicated questions on the shelf required you really knew how to differentiate similarly presenting conditions and when u limited down to 2 options, picked the best one.....reading all of blue prints wouldn't help.....only salvation there is Uworld and some luck.
 
Belleza156 said:
I think 2002 is ten years too out of date. The practice guidelines changes every 2-3 years in obgyn which is annoying but I found that in my shelf exam they didn't ask any questions which required knowing the latest guideline updates. I didn't have time to read blueprints it's really long, watch some kaplan videos and read case files on ur downtime at the ward and you should be fine. The complicated questions on the shelf required you really knew how to differentiate similarly presenting conditions and when u limited down to 2 options, picked the best one.....reading all of blue prints wouldn't help.....only salvation there is Uworld and some luck.
Click to expand...

Thanks belleza 🙂

congrats on the step 1 score too 🙂
 
Just finished taking it.

I did a combination of some uwise, all the uworld, case files X 1.5, and part of first aid for OB.

I did ~100 uwise questions. This covered 10-15% of the shelf.

I did all 200+ uworld questions. This was maybe another 20% of the shelf (more if you read the entire explanations).

Case files was awesome. Covered ~50% of the material on the shelf.

Also the boxes in the margin in first aid for OB, answered at least 10-15 questions on my test. If you have access to this book you can read them all in ~2 hrs right before the test and it will really help you locate a lot of 'buzz words' which make many questions easy.

Finally about 10-15 questions was stuff I picked up on the actual rotation.

In total I hadn't see ~10% of the material with the method.
 
Any opinion on using DIT for Step 2 on this shelf or any shelf? Thanks
 
link2swim06 said:
Just finished taking it.

I did a combination of some uwise, all the uworld, case files X 1.5, and part of first aid for OB.

I did ~100 uwise questions. This covered 10-15% of the shelf.

I did all 200+ uworld questions. This was maybe another 20% of the shelf (more if you read the entire explanations).

Case files was awesome. Covered ~50% of the material on the shelf.

Also the boxes in the margin in first aid for OB, answered at least 10-15 questions on my test. If you have access to this book you can read them all in ~2 hrs right before the test and it will really help you locate a lot of 'buzz words' which make many questions easy.

Finally about 10-15 questions was stuff I picked up on the actual rotation.

In total I hadn't see ~10% of the material with the method.
Click to expand...

How did you end up doing?
 
link2swim06 said:
Finally got my score back.

Scored 79 percentile but that only gives me a raw score of 81 (looks like you would have had to crush this thing to get an A/Honors).
Click to expand...

Got the same exact score. I used:

Uwisex1
Uworldx2
Half of Case Files
Select Kaplan lecture Videos

Not sure what I could have done differently. I really don't like reading texts like Blue print or the assigned books but maybe that is the deal breaker here.
 
Anybody take the practice NBMEs for this yet? I took Form 1 and I thought it was tough.

I'm assuming the recipe for success for this shelf is still Blueprints + UWorld + UWise (+ Casefiles)?
 
I agree, Casefiles is a great resource for ob/gyn
 
Last edited:
So what's the consensus? It seems like a lot of people really like Blueprints and Case Files. No love for FA? I was taking forever to get through Blueprints, so I went out and grabbed FA. It seems okay...I've been doing uWise questions and will start on UWorld questions after I finish FA for the first pass.

My plan is:

FA as many times as possible.
uWise x 2
UWorld x 1 with redoing my incorrects
Blueprints for stuff that I'm terrible with (like Ovarian Cancer).
 
As I'm starting this on Monday, would people recommend getting both Casefiles and Blueprints as primary studying sources, then do UWorld and UWise for the shelf?

Casefiles or Blueprints, which is better? I had always heard blueprints, but some posts in this thread support casefiles.

UWorld or UWise if I have to focus on one? They're practice questions so I'll hopefully do both, but I've heard a lot of good things about UWise from previous students at my institution.
 
evilbooyaa said:
As I'm starting this on Monday, would people recommend getting both Casefiles and Blueprints as primary studying sources, then do UWorld and UWise for the shelf?

Casefiles or Blueprints, which is better? I had always heard blueprints, but some posts in this thread support casefiles.

UWorld or UWise if I have to focus on one? They're practice questions so I'll hopefully do both, but I've heard a lot of good things about UWise from previous students at my institution.
Click to expand...

I did Case Files but Blueprints seems like a great source as well. I think either should prepare you adequately. UWorld or UWise is not an acceptable question. Don't think about it; just do both. Preferably twice.
 
96th Percentile.

Blueprints X2
Casefiles X1
Uwise X2 (during last week)
Read UpToDate daily for big topics

Didn't use Uworld but heard from others that it was only marginally helpful. This was my first rotation and I felt that the exam was pretty good about keeping to Ob/gyn topics exclusively. Being my first shelf exam, I wasn't sure how to manage my time and really had to speed through the last 20 questions. I honestly thought that the question stems were going to be similar to Uwise but in fact they were much longer and convoluted. Had a few random questions on the test that I probably couldn't have found in any of my textbooks but that was expected. I felt the exam was a pretty even split between Ob and Gyn, with maybe a few more Ob questions. I was a bit disappointed that there weren't more pictures and fetal heart tracings.

If I could do it all again, I would have added Uworld to my study plan simply because I think everyone can benefit from doing more practice questions.
 
Planning to use both CF and Blueprints if I can (and of course UW/Uwise for q's). Would it be better to go through CF or Blueprints first?

Also, anyone have a good website/resource to learn fetal heart tracings? I know it's not seriously high yield for the exam, but our residents usually expect us to know the basics of reading them before we start the rotation (so I've heard).
 
kwel said:
Planning to use both CF and Blueprints if I can (and of course UW/Uwise for q's). Would it be better to go through CF or Blueprints first?

Also, anyone have a good website/resource to learn fetal heart tracings? I know it's not seriously high yield for the exam, but our residents usually expect us to know the basics of reading them before we start the rotation (so I've heard).
Click to expand...

I would say if you want to do both, it is better to do Case Files (broad overview 1st) then Blueprints.

Also, I know everyone raves about Blueprints for OB/GYN but I really did not like it. I felt it was almost too detailed on many topics. But just my opinion!
 
kwel said:
Planning to use both CF and Blueprints if I can (and of course UW/Uwise for q's). Would it be better to go through CF or Blueprints first?

Also, anyone have a good website/resource to learn fetal heart tracings? I know it's not seriously high yield for the exam, but our residents usually expect us to know the basics of reading them before we start the rotation (so I've heard).
Click to expand...

A quick read through that section in blueprints is more than enough for day-to-day L&D rotation stuff. I wouldn't bother yourself much more than that unless you are going into OB. It's not like an EKG which might be useful in a variety of fields.
 
futuredoctor10 said:
I would say if you want to do both, it is better to do Case Files (broad overview 1st) then Blueprints.

Also, I know everyone raves about Blueprints for OB/GYN but I really did not like it. I felt it was almost too detailed on many topics. But just my opinion!
Click to expand...

Agree with you on the bolded. I'm ~50 pages in right now and it seems pretty dense in terms of what would be required for the shelf. There's nuggets here and there for sure that I feel like I need to know, but maybe it gets better when I get out of the OB chapters.
 
JJMrK said:
A quick read through that section in blueprints is more than enough for day-to-day L&D rotation stuff. I wouldn't bother yourself much more than that unless you are going into OB. It's not like an EKG which might be useful in a variety of fields.
Click to expand...

are you talking about the "normal L&D" chapter? Just talks a bit about the basics of fetal accelerations/decelerations and stuff... you think that's enough for day-to-day stuff on ob/gyn? If it is, then cool. The residents at my site love to just throw students into it and pimp them on fetal heart tracings, so really all I need is enough to not look dumb. I'm not interested in ob/gyn per se, but I think if I can honor this rotation I may have a shot at AOA, so I really want to do well. thanks for the help.
 
kwel said:
are you talking about the "normal L&D" chapter? Just talks a bit about the basics of fetal accelerations/decelerations and stuff... you think that's enough for day-to-day stuff on ob/gyn? If it is, then cool. The residents at my site love to just throw students into it and pimp them on fetal heart tracings, so really all I need is enough to not look dumb. I'm not interested in ob/gyn per se, but I think if I can honor this rotation I may have a shot at AOA, so I really want to do well. thanks for the help.
Click to expand...

Yep, the 3 types of decelerations and what they correspond to are the extent of it. I'm not sure if it's in the book, but you might quickly google category 1 vs category 2 FHT too.

And then knowing how to read them is money: 1) baseline (pick a hard and fast number, don't say 140s), 2) variability (moderate is usually safe), and 3) accelerations/decelerations.

Also, I didn't really figure this out until I read a few notes: The equivalent of "soft, NTND, NABS" (ie normal) for a FHT in a note is "150/mod/+accel/-decel." For SVE it's "closed/long/high" and for TOCO it's "quiet" or "irregular" or "irritable" (all mean different things but are basically benign findings). If they are actually having contractions you can write "q5-7 min" or whatever.
 
It is difficult for me to learn from reading. Can i simply start by doing uworld questions right away? Or is reading chapters etc. necessary to cover everything?
 
1) . Abruptio at 14 weeks is likely unheard of for the shelf (since all texts usually say >20 weeks). Cervical cancer after 2 LEEPs for CIS? Idk maybe, but unlikely? Incomplete abortion? It doesn't say anything about a defined IUIP, just that the uterus is the expected size.

I'm not sure what funneled lower uterine segment means in terms of pathology definition.

Basically, I'd guess either C, D or E at this point. I've been told that subchorionic hemorrhage is like the < 20 weeks version of abruptio placentae, so I'm kind of surprised that isn't the answer choice.

2) Hirsutism + acne makes me think extra testosterone. Beyond that, I haven't read enough in OB/GYN to review these topics. I'd go with things that are deficient rather than hyperplasias if I can, so I'd probably go with 46 XY. I think if you picked XX 46 and it was wrong you can be confident it's 46XY since Turner, Kleinfelter, and XYY don't make sense with the vignette.

3) I would've put abruptio as well... have been taught multiple times that C-sec = increased risk of previa/accreta/abruptio. That being said, if that's not the answer, then I agree that it is likely gestational diabetes due to the >4kg size of her first baby, with arrest of descent due to CPD. That's a clown question, bro..
 
do the u-wise questions on apgo.org. They are the real deal.
 
azuka said:
do the u-wise questions on apgo.org. They are the real deal.
Click to expand...

that's what i've been hearing...i have my shelf in two weeks and have been cranking out questions and learning from the answers. I have no motivation really to read as being on gyn service last two weeks was draining, albeit fun...almost done with 3rd year 😎
 
Scored an 80 - good enough!
Qbank x 1 + incorrect x 1
UWise x 1
3/4 Casefiles (Very high yield- loved this book)
2/3 Blueprints (I don't think I retained much)

Blueprints is a time suck but I think it was probably helpful since my knowledge base going in wasn't strong. I wouldn't prioritize Blueprints unless you have time. If you do choose to read it, then I would do it early and quick in the beginning. Hammering through questions the last two weeks solidified the material.

Best of luck to you all!
 
Anyone heard anythign about pretest? I know some people who used it and liked it, but they tend to like pretest for everything (and we all know pretest isn't strong for every subject). I was planning on doing UW and Uwise, but does anyone recommend adding in pretest or just focusing on those?
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Similar threads

K
Best books for Psychiatry Shelf Exam in 2024
Replies
2
Views
2K
L8rg8r
L
W
any clinical rotation program suggest for Ob/Gyn?
Replies
3
Views
5K
Clerkships
C
Fay1129
Step 2 and Shelf exam notes
Replies
3
Views
8K
pbsdrinkingwhale
pbsdrinkingwhale
Flux10567
Sports Medicine rotation: MSK exam help
Replies
0
Views
2K
Flux10567
Flux10567
Fay1129
Shelf exam notes free of cost (UW, NBME)
Replies
1
Views
5K
MILITARY OFFICER
M
Top