Good luck all. I have my exam end of March and hope to be the 1st one to post here for 2010.
Official 2010 USMLE Step 1 Experiences and Scores Thread
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sounds like a good decision to me, try to get through FA and some more uw, and get those practice assessments in
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Man, that was really draining. SOme basic thoughts before I go destroy some hepatocytes:
- Not nearly as much anatomy as everyone's raving about but more than it sounds like the previous test version had - maybe 3-4 questions a block
- BS was pretty tricky in some places. Not cool.
- Difficulty seemed pretty close to NBME 7, maybe a little harder
- More biostats than I expected, all of it super easy. Yay!
- 3 audio questions, 2 easy and very answerable with text alone, one difficult
- Stems weren't really that long at all. I couldn't tell a difference between them and the subject shelf exams
- maybe 2-3 WTF questions per block
- shot myself in the foot with really easy concepts a few times (Down's quad test, for example)
- not anywhere near as much path as I expected
- I don't know neuroanatomy at all
Overall, I doubt I lived up to my practice scores, but I still think I did pretty well. 240 is probably realistic with 230's more likely, if I had to guess.
- Not nearly as much anatomy as everyone's raving about but more than it sounds like the previous test version had - maybe 3-4 questions a block
- BS was pretty tricky in some places. Not cool.
- Difficulty seemed pretty close to NBME 7, maybe a little harder
- More biostats than I expected, all of it super easy. Yay!
- 3 audio questions, 2 easy and very answerable with text alone, one difficult
- Stems weren't really that long at all. I couldn't tell a difference between them and the subject shelf exams
- maybe 2-3 WTF questions per block
- shot myself in the foot with really easy concepts a few times (Down's quad test, for example)
- not anywhere near as much path as I expected
- I don't know neuroanatomy at all
Overall, I doubt I lived up to my practice scores, but I still think I did pretty well. 240 is probably realistic with 230's more likely, if I had to guess.
Today was long and tough. There were some random questions in each section that make you scratch your head.
I had three winged scapula questions, WTF? All this material you study for and they repeat questions.
I don't know how to gauge it against the USMLEWorld SA exams, I just hope that I get a score close to my SA 2. I feel like my score after leaving the test could be from a 200-240, only time will tell.
Anyone know when we should be getting the scores?
I had three winged scapula questions, WTF? All this material you study for and they repeat questions.
I don't know how to gauge it against the USMLEWorld SA exams, I just hope that I get a score close to my SA 2. I feel like my score after leaving the test could be from a 200-240, only time will tell.
Anyone know when we should be getting the scores?
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I had 3 lead poisoning questions with 2 in the same block. That didn't make any sense at all.
And yes, FA and UW should be more than enough for biostats. Know the equations, and you're all set. I'd say FA alone is pretty good.
And yes, FA and UW should be more than enough for biostats. Know the equations, and you're all set. I'd say FA alone is pretty good.
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Checking in guys. Finished up the test today.
It was tough. But definitely doable. I'd say it was like NBME 6/7 with some WTF UWORLD only 15% got this correct type of questions.
I saw plenty of repeats, or psuedo-repeats. Saw a biostats question that was exactly the same as one I saw in UWORLD (only got it right because of that). Also noticed some repeating themes, like being asked multiple times about Diptheria in the first few blocks. Also being asked about acute intermittant porphoria, not once, but 2 times in a row in one of the later blocks. I also saw an X-ray that was exactly the same as an X-ray image in NBME 6... question was the same, but answer choices were differnt (ie. NBME 6 asked which nerve was lesioned, Step 1 asked what muscular action is inhibited due to the injury).
There were PLENTY of easy questions. I was actually pretty shocked at how easy some were. Some straight up used buzzwords, and that sort of tripped me up because I wasn't expecting some of them to be that easy. I would sometimes mark super easy ones to come back and make sure I didn't miss something, lol.
Also plenty of difficult questions. Seemed like my hardest block was block 6. Absolutely brutal. But whatever. Block 3 was tough too. The rest were alright. I felt like I was doing UWORLD the whole time so overall it was a good experience.
In terms of content, I think if you know RR/FA/UWORLD, you will be solid. I don't think you really need anything else. Anatomy on my test was fine, I didn't have a huge amount like some people have been reporting. I felt like my exam was pretty well balanced.
Anyways... I am SO FREAKIN' HAPPY TO BE DONE!!!!!!!! This month has been hell. I had a big stressor in the middle of my study peroid that through me off by 2.5 days. Ended up having to reschedule, then felt like I was ready to take it earlier...... then realized I probably was not. I don't know, this whole experience had my emotions all messed up. So glad it is done.
Thanks for all the support guys/gals. This board has been amazing. So much good information flowing here and positive energy. I just want to say thanks especially to those folks that I was PM'ing this past week, it was really tough for me, thanks for the support.
Goodluck to those of you who are up next. You guys will rock it!
It was tough. But definitely doable. I'd say it was like NBME 6/7 with some WTF UWORLD only 15% got this correct type of questions.
I saw plenty of repeats, or psuedo-repeats. Saw a biostats question that was exactly the same as one I saw in UWORLD (only got it right because of that). Also noticed some repeating themes, like being asked multiple times about Diptheria in the first few blocks. Also being asked about acute intermittant porphoria, not once, but 2 times in a row in one of the later blocks. I also saw an X-ray that was exactly the same as an X-ray image in NBME 6... question was the same, but answer choices were differnt (ie. NBME 6 asked which nerve was lesioned, Step 1 asked what muscular action is inhibited due to the injury).
There were PLENTY of easy questions. I was actually pretty shocked at how easy some were. Some straight up used buzzwords, and that sort of tripped me up because I wasn't expecting some of them to be that easy. I would sometimes mark super easy ones to come back and make sure I didn't miss something, lol.
Also plenty of difficult questions. Seemed like my hardest block was block 6. Absolutely brutal. But whatever. Block 3 was tough too. The rest were alright. I felt like I was doing UWORLD the whole time so overall it was a good experience.
In terms of content, I think if you know RR/FA/UWORLD, you will be solid. I don't think you really need anything else. Anatomy on my test was fine, I didn't have a huge amount like some people have been reporting. I felt like my exam was pretty well balanced.
Anyways... I am SO FREAKIN' HAPPY TO BE DONE!!!!!!!! This month has been hell. I had a big stressor in the middle of my study peroid that through me off by 2.5 days. Ended up having to reschedule, then felt like I was ready to take it earlier...... then realized I probably was not. I don't know, this whole experience had my emotions all messed up. So glad it is done.
Thanks for all the support guys/gals. This board has been amazing. So much good information flowing here and positive energy. I just want to say thanks especially to those folks that I was PM'ing this past week, it was really tough for me, thanks for the support.
Goodluck to those of you who are up next. You guys will rock it!
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Oh yeah. And timing wasn't an issue. Like I said, it felt just like UWORLD. I always finished with at least a good 5 minutes, sometimes more, to review. Also question stems seemed the same as you see in the UWSA exams.
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Checking in guys. Finished up the test today.
It was tough. But definitely doable. I'd say it was like NBME 6/7 with some WTF UWORLD only 15% got this correct type of questions.
I saw plenty of repeats, or psuedo-repeats. Saw a biostats question that was exactly the same as one I saw in UWORLD (only got it right because of that). Also noticed some repeating themes, like being asked multiple times about Diptheria in the first few blocks. Also being asked about acute intermittant porphoria, not once, but 2 times in a row in one of the later blocks. I also saw an X-ray that was exactly the same as an X-ray image in NBME 6... question was the same, but answer choices were differnt (ie. NBME 6 asked which nerve was lesioned, Step 1 asked what muscular action is inhibited due to the injury).
There were PLENTY of easy questions. I was actually pretty shocked at how easy some were. Some straight up used buzzwords, and that sort of tripped me up because I wasn't expecting some of them to be that easy. I would sometimes mark super easy ones to come back and make sure I didn't miss something, lol.
Also plenty of difficult questions. Seemed like my hardest block was block 6. Absolutely brutal. But whatever. Block 3 was tough too. The rest were alright. I felt like I was doing UWORLD the whole time so overall it was a good experience.
In terms of content, I think if you know RR/FA/UWORLD, you will be solid. I don't think you really need anything else. Anatomy on my test was fine, I didn't have a huge amount like some people have been reporting. I felt like my exam was pretty well balanced.
Anyways... I am SO FREAKIN' HAPPY TO BE DONE!!!!!!!! This month has been hell. I had a big stressor in the middle of my study peroid that through me off by 2.5 days. Ended up having to reschedule, then felt like I was ready to take it earlier...... then realized I probably was not. I don't know, this whole experience had my emotions all messed up. So glad it is done.
Thanks for all the support guys/gals. This board has been amazing. So much good information flowing here and positive energy. I just want to say thanks especially to those folks that I was PM'ing this past week, it was really tough for me, thanks for the support.
Goodluck to those of you who are up next. You guys will rock it!
That's awesome. Congrats to you and Milkman for completing the test.
Good Luck on your scores.
Thanks
Checking in guys. Finished up the test today.
It was tough. But definitely doable. I'd say it was like NBME 6/7 with some WTF UWORLD only 15% got this correct type of questions.
I saw plenty of repeats, or psuedo-repeats. Saw a biostats question that was exactly the same as one I saw in UWORLD (only got it right because of that). Also noticed some repeating themes, like being asked multiple times about Diptheria in the first few blocks. Also being asked about acute intermittant porphoria, not once, but 2 times in a row in one of the later blocks. I also saw an X-ray that was exactly the same as an X-ray image in NBME 6... question was the same, but answer choices were differnt (ie. NBME 6 asked which nerve was lesioned, Step 1 asked what muscular action is inhibited due to the injury).
There were PLENTY of easy questions. I was actually pretty shocked at how easy some were. Some straight up used buzzwords, and that sort of tripped me up because I wasn't expecting some of them to be that easy. I would sometimes mark super easy ones to come back and make sure I didn't miss something, lol.
Also plenty of difficult questions. Seemed like my hardest block was block 6. Absolutely brutal. But whatever. Block 3 was tough too. The rest were alright. I felt like I was doing UWORLD the whole time so overall it was a good experience.
In terms of content, I think if you know RR/FA/UWORLD, you will be solid. I don't think you really need anything else. Anatomy on my test was fine, I didn't have a huge amount like some people have been reporting. I felt like my exam was pretty well balanced.
Anyways... I am SO FREAKIN' HAPPY TO BE DONE!!!!!!!! This month has been hell. I had a big stressor in the middle of my study peroid that through me off by 2.5 days. Ended up having to reschedule, then felt like I was ready to take it earlier...... then realized I probably was not. I don't know, this whole experience had my emotions all messed up. So glad it is done.
Thanks for all the support guys/gals. This board has been amazing. So much good information flowing here and positive energy. I just want to say thanks especially to those folks that I was PM'ing this past week, it was really tough for me, thanks for the support.
Goodluck to those of you who are up next. You guys will rock it!
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I liked USMLE road map for neuro.
To those who have taken the test, how are the blocks and times set now? (I went and took the practice 150 at the Prometric site on Saturday and the test format seemed to be very different than what I was used to on UWorld or the other NBME exams. My total break time for the entire exam was available at start of the exam and it looked like it included time that carried over from reading the tutorial.)
How does the time with the tutorial work?
Can you use the time in the tutorial to write crammed things on your marker board?
If you skip the tutorial, does that apply to your break time?
Can I take a 20 minute break after the first block? Or do you have to save up your breaks and let them accumulate to take more than a 10 minute break?
And one other thing, I know I will have a really hard time sleeping the night before. What did you guys do the night (or nights) before the test?
Thanks!
How does the time with the tutorial work?
Can you use the time in the tutorial to write crammed things on your marker board?
If you skip the tutorial, does that apply to your break time?
Can I take a 20 minute break after the first block? Or do you have to save up your breaks and let them accumulate to take more than a 10 minute break?
And one other thing, I know I will have a really hard time sleeping the night before. What did you guys do the night (or nights) before the test?
Thanks!
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The format of the free 150 is exactly the same as the breaktime of the real thing. If you skip the tutorial, end sections early, it will add to your break time.
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Would looking over the Neuro images in HY Neuro be sufficient, if you have tried it?
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Vaca...I was also wondering if we are allowed to write some stuff (like formulas, mnemonics, ect) on our whiteboard during tutorial time and breaks.
Can someone please answer this one? Thx.
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yup. I could've sat at the station for as long as I wanted to prior to even starting the tutorial (and hence the clock) writing down whatever I wanted. You can take as long a break as you want, as long as you don't use up the total break time. Finishing a block early applies any leftover time to your break time allowance.
Just wanted to let everyone know: at my center, the proctor stood there and made sure I started the exam (ie I couldn't just sit there writing everything down for as long as I wanted before the clock started). I think he was standing there to make sure I didn't have any problems getting anything started, not trying to be a bully and not let me write (which I didn't do anyways, p.s.). But just don't count on having unlimited note writing time at the beginning!
Just a heads up.. my friend took the exam and did not do the tutorial since she wanted the extra 15 for break time and it turns out her head phones didnt work when she got to a media q! So it might be good to do at least ck the headphones during the tutorial
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Took the exam yesterday. Lots of path, no single subject seemed to be overrepresented. Micro actually seemed to be a little underrepresented. I think I only had a total of 4-5 micro questions that were directly testing knowledge of specific bugs which was surprising considering the emphasis that gets placed on micro. First aid was enough to answer all the micro questions I had. There were also only a few biochem questions and they were all pretty straight forward as well. Several pharm questions but if you knew mechanisms/major side effects, they were fairly simple. Had my fair share of challenging questions that I probably wouldn't have been able to figure out had I studied for another 6 weeks. Biostats questions were simple, first aid was all you needed to answer these. I had maybe 6 neuro questions that included brain images and I'm fairly certain I missed most of them. First aid actually helped very little with the neuro questions. Quite a few cardio questions, two with heart sounds. Overall, the exam was roughly what I expected. Like I said, I thought there would be a few more micro questions but other than that, no real surprises. Oh, and there were a few questions I had that were testing the exact same concept which was strange. For example, I think I had 2 questions testing lead poisoning and 2 questions testing coarctation. I believe there was one other concept that was tested more than once but I can't remember it right now.
Resources used: First aid, BRS physio, USMLEworld. I felt that these resources alone were adequate. I mentioned that first aid wasn't enough for the neuro images but in hindsight, I don't think I would have changed the way I studied just for neuro. I could have spent a week just studying brain slices and considering I only had a small handful of those questions, I think that (at least for me) my time was more efficiently spent focusing on the more high yield subjects. I had several questions that were almost identical to questions I had on UW. If I could change anything about the way I studied, I would have spent more time doing UW questions.
I just want to add as sort of a disclaimer that the content on step 1 is variable. If you haven't noticed from reading the experiences posted by others, you could have an exam that emphasizes things that were not emphasized on mine. I hope nobody is using these experiences to guide their studies in any way, shape, or form. Doing well on step 1 requires a knowledge of each subject that is broad and deep so don't ignore micro because I only had a few micro questions and likewise, don't spend days studying anatomy because you read someone had 40 anatomy questions.
Resources used: First aid, BRS physio, USMLEworld. I felt that these resources alone were adequate. I mentioned that first aid wasn't enough for the neuro images but in hindsight, I don't think I would have changed the way I studied just for neuro. I could have spent a week just studying brain slices and considering I only had a small handful of those questions, I think that (at least for me) my time was more efficiently spent focusing on the more high yield subjects. I had several questions that were almost identical to questions I had on UW. If I could change anything about the way I studied, I would have spent more time doing UW questions.
I just want to add as sort of a disclaimer that the content on step 1 is variable. If you haven't noticed from reading the experiences posted by others, you could have an exam that emphasizes things that were not emphasized on mine. I hope nobody is using these experiences to guide their studies in any way, shape, or form. Doing well on step 1 requires a knowledge of each subject that is broad and deep so don't ignore micro because I only had a few micro questions and likewise, don't spend days studying anatomy because you read someone had 40 anatomy questions.
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Okay, let's write this up the proper way now that I'm not completely exhausted.
Study materials:
RR Path
UW
FA
BRS phys
BRS gross (chapter summaries only!)
In truth, my studying started 2 months ago with the subject NBMEs which serve as finals for us. I did all the M2-related UW questions plus all the biochem questions by subject during those 2 weeks. After that, I started doing a Taus pass by organ system with the gross BRS chapter summaries thrown in where appropriate. I did a block or two of UW questions between each source so that I'd get some active learning going on. That took about 3 weeks of ass busting to get through, and then I took UWSA1 to see how I was doing. After that, I read through FA from cover to cover and got through half of Goljan's margin notes before deciding I was burnt out on reading. I started doing USMLERx questions, but after so much experience with UW, those were just insufferable. I had to quit after about 8 blocks or so. That all took a little more than a week, and NBME7 was next on the chopping block. Next, A full run through of UW in random blocks followed by a FA review of some subjects I'd noted along the way, UWSA2, and another FA run through those same subjects. I took the day before the test off completely and rotted my brain with soccer and CoD: Modern Warfare 2.
Practice tests (helps with the timeline considerably, if that's something you're curious about):
CBSE: 193 (mid-March or so)
Free 150: 82%/243 (early May)
UWSA1: 230 (5/30)
NBME 7: 249 (6/8)
UWSA2: 247 (6/18)
UW percentage: 68 overall after 3 passes, 85-ish on the last pass
In general, the test was exactly what I expected. There were quite a few easy questions, several that I could easily narrow down to 2 answers, a few more that you could get correct if you knew enough about the answer choices but didn't necessarily know the answer after reading the stem, and maybe 2-3 per block that I was just totally clueless on. The worst of those was one that had a solid 9-10 lines of text describing a baby with botulism in painful detail. The whole time, I was thinking, "Okay, it's botulism - just have to read through this to make sure I don't miss some weird twist in the question." At the end, it tells you the baby has botulism. To avoid giving anything away, I'll just say that it ends up being a very specific molecular biology question. there were also a few questions that were just plain written terribly. One of them was a two-sentence question regarding antigen presentation (I think...) that I literally spent a good 10 minutes staring at. It pissed me off that I couldn't figure out WTF they were trying to ask because chances were that I knew the answer. I'm hoping those were experimentals that they'll take back to the drawing board.
In terms of difficulty, NBME7 is a great example. I'd say the real thing is a bit harder than that by virtue of the crazy left field questions, but for the most part, it's close enough. The stems are no longer than anything in UW or NBME7, so don't worry a bout that at all. I still had plenty of 1-3 sentence questions. In fact, I'd say most of them are short paragraphs or less. There were very few of the 8+ line monsters some people have been crying about, and most of those were so full of info that you'd have to be comatose to get the question wrong unless they decided to be douchebags and ask you, say, a molecular bio question about the condition at hand. *ahem* There were at least 2 questions taken directly from NBME7 and several taken almost verbatim from UW. Still more were UW questions with slightly different wording. The format of the test is exactly like UW.
In case it wasn't clear from those last couple sentences, UW was very clearly the most important study tool I used. Nothing even came close to being as useful, in my opinion. FA and Goljan are still excellent and indispensable, but UW is the star of the show. BRS phys was definitely nice to have, and given that the gross BRS chapter summaries took next to no time to read, it was also helpful. I'd recommend all of those. I definitely liked the source/questions alternation I used throughout my studying. That really helped me a lot.
The gritty details of the test by subject:
Anatomy: My favorite. Like I said above, it definitely sounds like there was more on this new version than there has been historically, but there still wasn't a lot. I'd say I had around 20-25 on the whole test. Most of them were pretty easy even for someone like me who really couldn't give less of a **** about the subject, but some were hard. Realistically, the BRS, FA, and UW are more than sufficient for the anatomy. If you can't get the question from those plus what you recall from class, you weren't going to get it anyway.
Embryo: Maybe 4-5 questions on the whole exam, all of them super easy except one CT scan. CT's look like a jumbled mass of crap to me anyway, but when you're asking me to pick out some GI malformation, there's no chance in hell. Seriously, you don't even need FA for this. If you have the big stuff down (genitals, heart, neural tube), you'll be fine.
Cell bio: Probably 10-ish questions, all told. I recall them being above-average in difficulty, but cell is another subject I really just do not care about and never did. It's one (and probably the only) area that really isn't adequately covered in any of the main sources, in my opinion. You'll need something else if you're trying to scrap for the 3-4 extra questions knowing cell inside and out will get you.
Phys: BRS is money. I didn't have very many straight phys questions, but the ones I did have were pretty much just common sense if you have a bit of background. Heart phys was big for me.
Biochem: 3-4/block or so. Most were straightforward enzyme or cofactor questions. UW is a hell of a lot harder than the real thing, for the most part, but the question style is pretty much the same.
Histo: I don't think I had any unless you want to count path slides, in which case there were a few. Fewer than 10 on the exam, and most were pretty obvious.
Neuro: I was going to report that I had next to no neuro on my exam, but now that I think about it, there was quite a lot. There were maybe 3 neuroanatomy questions which I could tell were pretty easy (Here's a brainstem. Which one is the facial nerve?) but I just missed. Like I said, if you want to get those, you need a neuro atlas. The rest was mostly vision and seizure stuff. Know your neuro micro well, for sure. Cranial nerve lesions are a big deal, too, as you might have guessed. For everything that isn't neuroanatomy, the usual offenders are just fine.
Micro: FA plus UW is golden. Seriously, if you know those two sources decently, you will murder the micro on Step 1. At least on mine, most of the micro was buzzword-related, so all those cheesy groupings FA has are gold. In general, know unique symptoms and other distinguishing factors.
Pharm: Second messengers! I had a lot of ACE inhibitor questions, too. It's all pretty easy, for the most part, but make sure you know your recombinant antibodies.
Path: Not nearly as much as I'd anticipated. I'd say it accounted for maybe 30-35% of the questions. That's obviously still a lot, but it isn't the >50% SDN led me to believe would be on there. Goljan is priceless. FA is meh. UW is great for solidifying Goljan and giving some extra details.
BS/Ethics: Man, I had some hard questions. There's also a lot of this stuff. I didn't think there's be anywhere near as much as there was. I probably had 5 questions per block, and most of them lacked the obvious feel-good answer choice. I was not pleased. I'd counted on these being a source of easy points, but it was anything but that. I honestly don't think there's any way to prepare for this stuff. Just go in knowing the basics of patient interaction (which FA covers just fine) with the mentality that choosing the carebear answer is almost always the best way to go, and hope for the best.
Biostats: Awesome! 3-4 per block, and I loved every minute of it. These questions are EASY with a capital high school cheerleader. Some may disagree, but man, med (read: middle) school math on a test of this magnitude is like the USMLE question writers coming out of the Prometric office and offering you sexual favors during your exam. Seriously, these are points just handed to you on a silver platter. The biostats portion of FA is quite literally the highest yield thing you can possibly study. All of it WILL be on the test. Of the dozen-ish people who took the test with me yesterday, every single one of them had a question over each of the main biostats concepts (sensitivity/specificity, normal distributions, study design, risk, etc.). Know this cold.
The moral of this story is that you could do a lot worse than memorizing UW to the question. Again, it was far and away the most useful study tool I had, and there were numerous question ripped from it. I'm incredibly glad I saw all of it 3 times. A fourth pass certainly would not have hurt at all.
I think that's about it. If I left anything out, let me know. Good luck to everyone taking the beast soon!
Study materials:
RR Path
UW
FA
BRS phys
BRS gross (chapter summaries only!)
In truth, my studying started 2 months ago with the subject NBMEs which serve as finals for us. I did all the M2-related UW questions plus all the biochem questions by subject during those 2 weeks. After that, I started doing a Taus pass by organ system with the gross BRS chapter summaries thrown in where appropriate. I did a block or two of UW questions between each source so that I'd get some active learning going on. That took about 3 weeks of ass busting to get through, and then I took UWSA1 to see how I was doing. After that, I read through FA from cover to cover and got through half of Goljan's margin notes before deciding I was burnt out on reading. I started doing USMLERx questions, but after so much experience with UW, those were just insufferable. I had to quit after about 8 blocks or so. That all took a little more than a week, and NBME7 was next on the chopping block. Next, A full run through of UW in random blocks followed by a FA review of some subjects I'd noted along the way, UWSA2, and another FA run through those same subjects. I took the day before the test off completely and rotted my brain with soccer and CoD: Modern Warfare 2.
Practice tests (helps with the timeline considerably, if that's something you're curious about):
CBSE: 193 (mid-March or so)
Free 150: 82%/243 (early May)
UWSA1: 230 (5/30)
NBME 7: 249 (6/8)
UWSA2: 247 (6/18)
UW percentage: 68 overall after 3 passes, 85-ish on the last pass
In general, the test was exactly what I expected. There were quite a few easy questions, several that I could easily narrow down to 2 answers, a few more that you could get correct if you knew enough about the answer choices but didn't necessarily know the answer after reading the stem, and maybe 2-3 per block that I was just totally clueless on. The worst of those was one that had a solid 9-10 lines of text describing a baby with botulism in painful detail. The whole time, I was thinking, "Okay, it's botulism - just have to read through this to make sure I don't miss some weird twist in the question." At the end, it tells you the baby has botulism. To avoid giving anything away, I'll just say that it ends up being a very specific molecular biology question. there were also a few questions that were just plain written terribly. One of them was a two-sentence question regarding antigen presentation (I think...) that I literally spent a good 10 minutes staring at. It pissed me off that I couldn't figure out WTF they were trying to ask because chances were that I knew the answer. I'm hoping those were experimentals that they'll take back to the drawing board.
In terms of difficulty, NBME7 is a great example. I'd say the real thing is a bit harder than that by virtue of the crazy left field questions, but for the most part, it's close enough. The stems are no longer than anything in UW or NBME7, so don't worry a bout that at all. I still had plenty of 1-3 sentence questions. In fact, I'd say most of them are short paragraphs or less. There were very few of the 8+ line monsters some people have been crying about, and most of those were so full of info that you'd have to be comatose to get the question wrong unless they decided to be douchebags and ask you, say, a molecular bio question about the condition at hand. *ahem* There were at least 2 questions taken directly from NBME7 and several taken almost verbatim from UW. Still more were UW questions with slightly different wording. The format of the test is exactly like UW.
In case it wasn't clear from those last couple sentences, UW was very clearly the most important study tool I used. Nothing even came close to being as useful, in my opinion. FA and Goljan are still excellent and indispensable, but UW is the star of the show. BRS phys was definitely nice to have, and given that the gross BRS chapter summaries took next to no time to read, it was also helpful. I'd recommend all of those. I definitely liked the source/questions alternation I used throughout my studying. That really helped me a lot.
The gritty details of the test by subject:
Anatomy: My favorite. Like I said above, it definitely sounds like there was more on this new version than there has been historically, but there still wasn't a lot. I'd say I had around 20-25 on the whole test. Most of them were pretty easy even for someone like me who really couldn't give less of a **** about the subject, but some were hard. Realistically, the BRS, FA, and UW are more than sufficient for the anatomy. If you can't get the question from those plus what you recall from class, you weren't going to get it anyway.
Embryo: Maybe 4-5 questions on the whole exam, all of them super easy except one CT scan. CT's look like a jumbled mass of crap to me anyway, but when you're asking me to pick out some GI malformation, there's no chance in hell. Seriously, you don't even need FA for this. If you have the big stuff down (genitals, heart, neural tube), you'll be fine.
Cell bio: Probably 10-ish questions, all told. I recall them being above-average in difficulty, but cell is another subject I really just do not care about and never did. It's one (and probably the only) area that really isn't adequately covered in any of the main sources, in my opinion. You'll need something else if you're trying to scrap for the 3-4 extra questions knowing cell inside and out will get you.
Phys: BRS is money. I didn't have very many straight phys questions, but the ones I did have were pretty much just common sense if you have a bit of background. Heart phys was big for me.
Biochem: 3-4/block or so. Most were straightforward enzyme or cofactor questions. UW is a hell of a lot harder than the real thing, for the most part, but the question style is pretty much the same.
Histo: I don't think I had any unless you want to count path slides, in which case there were a few. Fewer than 10 on the exam, and most were pretty obvious.
Neuro: I was going to report that I had next to no neuro on my exam, but now that I think about it, there was quite a lot. There were maybe 3 neuroanatomy questions which I could tell were pretty easy (Here's a brainstem. Which one is the facial nerve?) but I just missed. Like I said, if you want to get those, you need a neuro atlas. The rest was mostly vision and seizure stuff. Know your neuro micro well, for sure. Cranial nerve lesions are a big deal, too, as you might have guessed. For everything that isn't neuroanatomy, the usual offenders are just fine.
Micro: FA plus UW is golden. Seriously, if you know those two sources decently, you will murder the micro on Step 1. At least on mine, most of the micro was buzzword-related, so all those cheesy groupings FA has are gold. In general, know unique symptoms and other distinguishing factors.
Pharm: Second messengers! I had a lot of ACE inhibitor questions, too. It's all pretty easy, for the most part, but make sure you know your recombinant antibodies.
Path: Not nearly as much as I'd anticipated. I'd say it accounted for maybe 30-35% of the questions. That's obviously still a lot, but it isn't the >50% SDN led me to believe would be on there. Goljan is priceless. FA is meh. UW is great for solidifying Goljan and giving some extra details.
BS/Ethics: Man, I had some hard questions. There's also a lot of this stuff. I didn't think there's be anywhere near as much as there was. I probably had 5 questions per block, and most of them lacked the obvious feel-good answer choice. I was not pleased. I'd counted on these being a source of easy points, but it was anything but that. I honestly don't think there's any way to prepare for this stuff. Just go in knowing the basics of patient interaction (which FA covers just fine) with the mentality that choosing the carebear answer is almost always the best way to go, and hope for the best.
Biostats: Awesome! 3-4 per block, and I loved every minute of it. These questions are EASY with a capital high school cheerleader. Some may disagree, but man, med (read: middle) school math on a test of this magnitude is like the USMLE question writers coming out of the Prometric office and offering you sexual favors during your exam. Seriously, these are points just handed to you on a silver platter. The biostats portion of FA is quite literally the highest yield thing you can possibly study. All of it WILL be on the test. Of the dozen-ish people who took the test with me yesterday, every single one of them had a question over each of the main biostats concepts (sensitivity/specificity, normal distributions, study design, risk, etc.). Know this cold.
The moral of this story is that you could do a lot worse than memorizing UW to the question. Again, it was far and away the most useful study tool I had, and there were numerous question ripped from it. I'm incredibly glad I saw all of it 3 times. A fourth pass certainly would not have hurt at all.
I think that's about it. If I left anything out, let me know. Good luck to everyone taking the beast soon!
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Study materials: FA, BRS Path & Phys, 1 run of Goljan audio, UWorld, Kaplan Qbank (75% complete, 78% average), MMRS (skimmed it, but still took me a while), HY Embryology, SKIMMED half of BRS anatomy
First pass through UWorld - 79% (artificially high because I used it to study for school examinations, too)
Second pass through UWord (91% complete) - 90%
School's Mandatory Diagnostic Thingy (I filled in last 30 with random answers because I knew I didn't know anything) - 191
NBME 6 (3 weeks out) = 255
NBME 1 (4 days later) = 244)
Free 150 (2 weeks out) = 91% (medfriends 262)
NBME 7 (3 days later) = 249
I didn't study on Friday, and read first aid on Saturday/Sunday. Got 8 hours of sleep for my test Monday.
It was harder than anything I could have imagined. I only had about 20 "gimme" questions per block. Embryology + anatomy were my weak points and it will show. Behavioral science I found much tougher than in UWorld (as milkman alluded to), and while I had some easy biostatistics questions, I also had a few very difficult ones involving terms not in FA or UWorld.
I had many questions (~20) on topics that I've never seen before (afraid to give specifics, sorry). I don't think moving my test back would have helped...I don't want to scare anybody but I had one question on environmental pollution (I probably guessed this one right, but I can see people getting this wrong if they don't happen to catch a certain episode of discovery channel late at night or something). Of the ones I remember, I probably got about 50% of these right (I googled the ones I remembered after the exam).
I already missed 17 (that I know of) that were in first aid (which I read 2.5 times) and should have gotten. So I'm guessing I probably missed anywhere from 50-80 questions on this test.
- 2 on thoracic anatomy
- 1 on headache
- 3 on neuroanatomy/labeling nerves
- 2 on extracellular matrix
- 5 on organ systems pathology
- 2 on biostats
Sigh, I think I probably got around a <220 - which would be a huge disappointment given my practice test scores. I'll post more about my preparation after I get my scores back, if they warrant posting at all.
Now gonna go chill @ the beach and let the waves drown my sorrows.
First pass through UWorld - 79% (artificially high because I used it to study for school examinations, too)
Second pass through UWord (91% complete) - 90%
School's Mandatory Diagnostic Thingy (I filled in last 30 with random answers because I knew I didn't know anything) - 191
NBME 6 (3 weeks out) = 255
NBME 1 (4 days later) = 244)
Free 150 (2 weeks out) = 91% (medfriends 262)
NBME 7 (3 days later) = 249
I didn't study on Friday, and read first aid on Saturday/Sunday. Got 8 hours of sleep for my test Monday.
It was harder than anything I could have imagined. I only had about 20 "gimme" questions per block. Embryology + anatomy were my weak points and it will show. Behavioral science I found much tougher than in UWorld (as milkman alluded to), and while I had some easy biostatistics questions, I also had a few very difficult ones involving terms not in FA or UWorld.
I had many questions (~20) on topics that I've never seen before (afraid to give specifics, sorry). I don't think moving my test back would have helped...I don't want to scare anybody but I had one question on environmental pollution (I probably guessed this one right, but I can see people getting this wrong if they don't happen to catch a certain episode of discovery channel late at night or something). Of the ones I remember, I probably got about 50% of these right (I googled the ones I remembered after the exam).
I already missed 17 (that I know of) that were in first aid (which I read 2.5 times) and should have gotten. So I'm guessing I probably missed anywhere from 50-80 questions on this test.
- 2 on thoracic anatomy
- 1 on headache
- 3 on neuroanatomy/labeling nerves
- 2 on extracellular matrix
- 5 on organ systems pathology
- 2 on biostats
Sigh, I think I probably got around a <220 - which would be a huge disappointment given my practice test scores. I'll post more about my preparation after I get my scores back, if they warrant posting at all.
Now gonna go chill @ the beach and let the waves drown my sorrows.
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I'm sure you got around the same as on your practice test. Can't imagine how you go from 17->50 wrong.
When you (and other people) say you read FA 2.5 times, do you mean after all your studying was done? Or you just mean you read it 2.5 times throughout your studies?
When you (and other people) say you read FA 2.5 times, do you mean after all your studying was done? Or you just mean you read it 2.5 times throughout your studies?
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I read it once while going through kaplan qbank, then I read it again while reading brs path/phys, then i tried to run through the first part again before the test.
so 2.5 times total - some of the more diligent people do 4-5 times but i think they start earlier than I did or even during the courses.
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Beyond glad to be done!
I thought it was very comparable to NBME 7. No embryo for me (yay!). Some pretty involved bio-stat questions, not a lot of path or micro. Had a couple of MRIs. Lots of questions with charts and arrows (as in if this were to happen, blah will increase and blah-blah will decrease answer options). 2 sound questions. I felt like there were quite a few endocrine and renal questions.
Oh, and a lot of questions like "what would be the best opening statement?" or "what would be the best response in this situation?"
I was happy with the 46-question format, b/c I actually had time to go back and look over questions I marked.
Was too nervous and hyped up to take long breaks, so ended up finishing up by 3 pm.
I guess we'll see how it went.
I thought it was very comparable to NBME 7. No embryo for me (yay!). Some pretty involved bio-stat questions, not a lot of path or micro. Had a couple of MRIs. Lots of questions with charts and arrows (as in if this were to happen, blah will increase and blah-blah will decrease answer options). 2 sound questions. I felt like there were quite a few endocrine and renal questions.
Oh, and a lot of questions like "what would be the best opening statement?" or "what would be the best response in this situation?"
I was happy with the 46-question format, b/c I actually had time to go back and look over questions I marked.
Was too nervous and hyped up to take long breaks, so ended up finishing up by 3 pm.
I guess we'll see how it went.
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I'd have to imagine 80% correct would be about a 240 or so. If you figure that approximately 65% (NMBE says 60-70% is passing, so just looking at the middle) is a 188, I can't imagine the standard deviation for the test to be more than 5-6% (about 16 questions) at most. I'm solely basing this on what seems sensible to me.
I mean if you got an 80% and the standard deviation was 5% you got 48 more questions right than a barely passing student (using my completely made up standard deviation). That seems pretty significant.
This is all baseless speculation, but I have to believe that the standard deviation of this test is not that large as most students taking the test are capable of getting the basic questions correct and differences in scores will mostly come from the moderate to hard difficulty questions which as most have said on here only comprise about 30-40% of the test.
Edit: The test remains a mystery to me. As I just re-read my post and my math and statistics make absolutely no sense. hahahaha
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Saw this on another forum, have no idea where its from or how valid/current it is:
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Saw this on another forum, have no idea where its from or how valid/current it is:
Isn't that for one of the NMBE's?
In my opinion the actual test was slightly more challenging that NMBE 7, I believe some of that may be due to crap experimental questions being mixed in.
Also since the NMBE tests are available to the question bank creators they are capable of using those questions to make questions for their bank, which may create an artificially high NMBE percent correct because students have exposure to concepts in the NMBE exams prior to taking them
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Our dean told us that passing is approximately 58-60% correct, so an 80% being in the 240 range sounds about right to me. That chart is pretty outdated, I'm sure. Keep in mind that the Free 150 which is regarded as way, way too easy (and certainly is, in my opinion) used to be fairly representative.
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I took the test June 10th and didn't feel too good about it. I know thats normal but does anyone know what a reasonable range of scoring would be based on NBME's? I am just wondering if I really did have a bad day how far could I drop?
I took 2 NBME's:
5/16 NBME7: 244
5/30 NBME6: 249
Last 7 blocks of 48 UW questions unused, timed (over the last 3-4 days) : 78%
I took 2 NBME's:
5/16 NBME7: 244
5/30 NBME6: 249
Last 7 blocks of 48 UW questions unused, timed (over the last 3-4 days) : 78%
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Runnerdoc,
How did you feel after you finished your NBME tests? I took two of them and thought I could've done great or just ok... basically I didn't know what to think. Then I ended up getting a 232 on the the first and a 236 on the second. I felt pretty much the sam now that I'm done with my test. That said, I'm hoping that those scores along with my kaplan percentage (which correlated to a similar score) will be fairly predictive of my actual test score since I felt about the same on the actual test.
For all those out there that still haven't taken it I am just now really reading this discussion board and didn't do nearly as much as most of the people posting on here.(regret?) I read though golgan once and FA almost two times and read Micro made ridiculously simple partways through and I my tests/percentage predidtions were between 230 and 240. I know it frustrating to miss off the wall questions about neuroanatomy and containment protocols for infectious diseases but I really think that focusing on high yeild stuff, especially at the end, is the way to go. I never even opened my BRS Phys and I was confident on most of those on test day.
I also want to say that I'd be really reluctant to move my test back if I were you. the people I know that have done it really didn't feel like it was worth it and would've gotten the same score had they taken it it earlier. That said, I think there are instances were it would be warranted. Just don't do it if you're freaking out, because everyone does a little bit. Make sure that you actually think that you can improve your score and aren't just pushing back the inevitable to make you feel better right now.
Good luck everyone! It feels so great to be lost in periods of time that I have absolutely nothing to do!!! Hope that you will all enjoy it as much as I am.
How did you feel after you finished your NBME tests? I took two of them and thought I could've done great or just ok... basically I didn't know what to think. Then I ended up getting a 232 on the the first and a 236 on the second. I felt pretty much the sam now that I'm done with my test. That said, I'm hoping that those scores along with my kaplan percentage (which correlated to a similar score) will be fairly predictive of my actual test score since I felt about the same on the actual test.
For all those out there that still haven't taken it I am just now really reading this discussion board and didn't do nearly as much as most of the people posting on here.(regret?) I read though golgan once and FA almost two times and read Micro made ridiculously simple partways through and I my tests/percentage predidtions were between 230 and 240. I know it frustrating to miss off the wall questions about neuroanatomy and containment protocols for infectious diseases but I really think that focusing on high yeild stuff, especially at the end, is the way to go. I never even opened my BRS Phys and I was confident on most of those on test day.
I also want to say that I'd be really reluctant to move my test back if I were you. the people I know that have done it really didn't feel like it was worth it and would've gotten the same score had they taken it it earlier. That said, I think there are instances were it would be warranted. Just don't do it if you're freaking out, because everyone does a little bit. Make sure that you actually think that you can improve your score and aren't just pushing back the inevitable to make you feel better right now.
Good luck everyone! It feels so great to be lost in periods of time that I have absolutely nothing to do!!! Hope that you will all enjoy it as much as I am.
