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Hello everyone. I am a second year who will write the exam in June 2011. Meanwhile let this be a good thread where everyone share their study progress and recent trend of the exam.
Official 2011 USMLE Step 1 Experiences and Scores Thread
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From some of the behavioral science questions I got on the exam, a question asking you to translate a schizoid teen speaking only in internet slang wouldn't be so far out. I jest but only barely.
Yes,I realize there were probably more savvy ways to go thru uw again. And I considered them, however, for me, it was important to start over with a clean slate. And considering that i think some new items were added to the question bank (items I saw on my exam), this turned out to be a good choice for me. Just basing this on MY expeience only, so take it for what it's worth.
Two more points...I didn't mean to say FA was pointless, just definitely not representative of all the material I was tested on. Additionally, I spent my last week doing UW again, textbook lookups, and skimming RR. For my exam, this turned out to be a VERY good choice.
Two more points...I didn't mean to say FA was pointless, just definitely not representative of all the material I was tested on. Additionally, I spent my last week doing UW again, textbook lookups, and skimming RR. For my exam, this turned out to be a VERY good choice.
personally, what i'm realizing so far in my prep is the following:
- having gone to lectures, listened and made every effort to learn lecture notes covers those 'one-step beyond' details
- FA is not a primary source but rather an outline imo, a good one .. having annotated it from a primary source essentially 'completes it', at least this is what i am realizing
- the best thing i ever did was read robbins basic pathology during path ... i stayed away from RR path since this is a review book .. robbins path is a peer-reviewed source and is 'the' agreed upon book of information for all things pathology .. i have not come across a pathology question that couldn't be answered from robbins path
i notice two types of people in this forum ... one who says "read FA and do UW" and the others who say "FA wasn't enough" .. of course these are individual opinions and are relative to each individual
how about this.. two students from the same school:
person A = attended lectures, learned their notes, read primary sources, used FA along the way .. during dedicated study, used their FA and UW and had primary sources for reference
person B = attended about 50% of lectures, mainly just 'read' the notes, glanced through primary sources, 'casually' read FA along the way .. during dedicated study, used FA and UW and had primary sources for reference
if they both take step, who will think FA was a good choice? person A. i mean this may be a bad example, but ask yourself how many questions do you answer because you remember something from class? from robbins? from lippincotts? most of the time the answer is in FA but the initial learning and connections had to be accomplished in basic science.
just my thoughts for people who still have to take the test (i.e. be confident in your chosen study methods) .. congrats to everyone else who is finished!
- having gone to lectures, listened and made every effort to learn lecture notes covers those 'one-step beyond' details
- FA is not a primary source but rather an outline imo, a good one .. having annotated it from a primary source essentially 'completes it', at least this is what i am realizing
- the best thing i ever did was read robbins basic pathology during path ... i stayed away from RR path since this is a review book .. robbins path is a peer-reviewed source and is 'the' agreed upon book of information for all things pathology .. i have not come across a pathology question that couldn't be answered from robbins path
i notice two types of people in this forum ... one who says "read FA and do UW" and the others who say "FA wasn't enough" .. of course these are individual opinions and are relative to each individual
how about this.. two students from the same school:
person A = attended lectures, learned their notes, read primary sources, used FA along the way .. during dedicated study, used their FA and UW and had primary sources for reference
person B = attended about 50% of lectures, mainly just 'read' the notes, glanced through primary sources, 'casually' read FA along the way .. during dedicated study, used FA and UW and had primary sources for reference
if they both take step, who will think FA was a good choice? person A. i mean this may be a bad example, but ask yourself how many questions do you answer because you remember something from class? from robbins? from lippincotts? most of the time the answer is in FA but the initial learning and connections had to be accomplished in basic science.
just my thoughts for people who still have to take the test (i.e. be confident in your chosen study methods) .. congrats to everyone else who is finished!
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First Aid is going to be the same as always. The problem with many people is that they think memorizing a book is all that it takes to do well. One must learn to use it to integrate and apply information. That is where question banks come in. First Aid is just a launching pad or baseline. If it contained everything we needed then those 2 years of medical school would be a bit excessive.
As far as the type of people, there are more than 2. I rarely went to lecture and instead read the notes and multiple sources on each topic. Oftentimes, I didn't even know how far the class was because I was usually a week or two ahead. I'm yet to run into a concept that is so mind boggling that I need to sit there and have someone explain it to me though. Usually, it is just putting the effort in to jam it into my brain.
As far as the type of people, there are more than 2. I rarely went to lecture and instead read the notes and multiple sources on each topic. Oftentimes, I didn't even know how far the class was because I was usually a week or two ahead. I'm yet to run into a concept that is so mind boggling that I need to sit there and have someone explain it to me though. Usually, it is just putting the effort in to jam it into my brain.
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I disagree. Yes, the boards people are aware of FA because it's ubiquitous, so for the hardest questions, they will ask things that aren't in there; but that was always true. The hardest questions are on low-yield details, and a FA-like, "high-yield" book would never prepare you for some of that stuff.
I had a question that wasn't in FA. It also wasn't in my pharm book. I was able to answer it because I drew an analogy with a drug that *was* in my pharm book and FA. I'm confident of the answer I gave, even though I'd never thought about it before, because I remembered a detail from a book I read in high school. Talk about freakin' random. I'm not going to tell you to read that book so you can get one question right, out of 326, that may or may not turn up on your exam. It might even be an experimental question, who knows?
Now, on one level, that's pulling a detail out of their nether regions to test you on, but it's like they're saying... "We know you know a lot, but can you use what you know in a new situation?"
Anyway, if you knew the right class of drugs in FA, you'd go... huh, those side effects are exactly like what happens in this class of meds, so this is probably the answer they're looking for.
FA isn't going to feed you answers to questions like that, but knowing the details from FA does equip you to answer them. And Uworld is useful in combination because it gives you practice in answering this kind of question, where you don't necessarily know the answer, but have to puzzle it out from what you do know.
So when I say that FA + Uworld were gold for me, that's why I say that. There's more nuance than that, but in the month before the exam, I do think it's the best use of your time. If you have more time than that, the textbook-based method someone posted above might make sense, but when it gets down to "what's the most efficient use of your time?" I have to go with FA and Uworld. Again, YMMV. And IYELMTFH,CYP. (I made that last one up, don't ask.)
You can. I wouldn't recommend it; you're better off just relaxing. But if you're the kind of person who feels like you have to (not judging, believe me, I understand), you can do it.
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I apologize if someone already addressed this, but would someone mind sharing how many two part questions there were? Were they always at the end of blocks, like on the UWSA exams?
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I just have a quick question for the experienced ones here about my method. With all this talk about how FA "isn't enough", its getting me a little nervous. My test is on next Saturday. For the first 4 weeks of studying I read BRS physio and path, and some other books (RR Biochem, HY neuroanatomy, Road map anatomy, HY embryo, HY behavioral, along with microcards and pharmcards), and my main method was to match these sources up with the sections in first aid and write notes in where I thought there were high yield facts missing. Now for the last 2 weeks before the test I have been doing mainly 3 blocks of UWorld a day and then just going over all of FA one more time. On the UWorld blocks I have been getting consistently in the mid 70s/sometimes 80s. Is this a good method?
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You're doing fine. Pick a method that you have confidence in and go with it. Everyone is different.
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Seriously...all of these FA is not enough posts are making me nervous as well! I just picked up goljan RR and thought I should read through that once but I have my test in a little over a week, so I'm not sure this is a great idea...
One more FA pass vs. Goljan?
One more FA pass vs. Goljan?
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FA pass...this first aid is not enough is bull****...of course its not enough because you have to understand the concepts in First aid which you gain from your first two years of class (or Robbins or Golkan i guess). I mean there are always going to be questions that arent in first aid, but if you understand and know all of first aid I dont see why you cant make a 240+. Standardized tests are not direct recall, obvi.
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Kinetoplastid is the CLASS of organism to which the GENUS Trypanosoma belongs... (King Plays Chess On Fat Guy's Stomach... if you recall your high school bio)
If that's the only info they gave you... then I wonder what Intro Bio is doing on the Step 1 exam...
If that's the only info they gave you... then I wonder what Intro Bio is doing on the Step 1 exam...
Hey All,
I thought I would give my two cents since I took the exam yesterday. I used FA, did the whole Goljian audio, went through his high yield notes and did UW and I don't think I could have been better prepared for that exam. Goljian is so money and I don't know if it was the combo of that with FA and UW or what but I had definitely seen everything on my exam and felt comfortable with like 90% of it. My test was very heavy on Immuno, which surprised me and the Biochem was very straight forward which also surprised me. I would say FA is good for many things but I don't think it should be anyone's sole resource for this exam. The Physio was interesting, very very similar to UW so that was cool. I also felt like I had a lot of images like more than I expected especially heme wise, but that was okay too. Overall a fair test so we'll see in a few weeks how I actually did.
I thought I would give my two cents since I took the exam yesterday. I used FA, did the whole Goljian audio, went through his high yield notes and did UW and I don't think I could have been better prepared for that exam. Goljian is so money and I don't know if it was the combo of that with FA and UW or what but I had definitely seen everything on my exam and felt comfortable with like 90% of it. My test was very heavy on Immuno, which surprised me and the Biochem was very straight forward which also surprised me. I would say FA is good for many things but I don't think it should be anyone's sole resource for this exam. The Physio was interesting, very very similar to UW so that was cool. I also felt like I had a lot of images like more than I expected especially heme wise, but that was okay too. Overall a fair test so we'll see in a few weeks how I actually did.
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Do the people who have taken it already recommend skipping the tutorial if you have done UWorld to get the extra break time? I feel like if the interface is the same exact one as UWorld why waste time with a tutorial.
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Spend a few moments during the tutorial to make sure your headphone works (on the page that tests it)
You don't want to get to a media clip and the nfind out your headphones do not work.
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Ohhh, so you can like go through the tutorial really quick and get whatever time is left over for break? I was under the impression that you either accept the tutorial and get 15 minutes off break time or forego it and gain that extra time.
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Skip the tutorial and those 15 minute (well 14 and change in reality) get added to your break/lunch time.
Bring a stopwatch with you and put it in your locker. They don't allow you to bring a watch with you and you really need to ration your time carefully during breaks.
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Could you just leave a regular watch in your locker instead??
Stays in the locker.
Yeah, definitely test your headphones.
You will still have some time left over after doing the tutorial (quickly). Just to reiterate, it was NOT like the NBME tutorial. But do check that your headphones work (mine didn't at first and I had to switch).
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Thanks! So I'll have access to it during my breaks and can use it as a stopwatch?
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They make you turn them off and put them in the lockers.
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Ah, so I won't get to use it. That's what I was assuming but thought it was worth checking. Thanks!
Taking it tomorrow!
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Ah, so I won't get to use it. That's what I was assuming but thought it was worth checking. Thanks!
Taking it tomorrow!
GOOD LUCK! Get a good night's sleep!
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This FA is not enough talk is just scaring me too much. I feel demotivated and don't feel like studying :/
I just wanna know if the NBMEs (I did 7, 11, 12) were a good representation and if you all are expecting a score similar to what you got on them?
I just wanna know if the NBMEs (I did 7, 11, 12) were a good representation and if you all are expecting a score similar to what you got on them?
They didn't make me turn off my cell phone. It was on silent. I think you can do whatever you want during breaks. They said I was a "free citizen" during breaks.
Also, you won't really need to time it that closely. I remembered pretty well what 10 minutes felt like from the MCAT. It's a similar experience (except a little longer). I'd say go with the flow is the best.
What if you choose test day to have unbelievable diarrhea? Take the breaks as you need them, judge how much time you have left, and act accordingly. It's not as stressful as you would think it might be.
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I had a lot more random questions than nbmes. Maybe they were the experimentals?
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True
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Took the beast today. I'll refrain from doing a full write-up until my score comes back (if I somehow managed to blow it, then my advice isn't worth much, right?) However, here's my initial impressions...
- Test was fair/balanced. Many qs were easier than your average uworld q. There were nbme repeats (of course) but the real shocker is that my exam seemed to have about double the word-for-word (or close to it) repeat questions from usmleconsult as from uworld. I had no "linked" questions, very few brain slides (all but one of which wasn't hard), and a reasonable number of abdominal/pelvic anatomy qs (most of which I could deal with relatively easily). Aside from biostats, I had perhaps one additional question where I was asked to calculate anything, and maybe 2 qs that involved limb innervation/musculature (and they were obvious).
- I thought the overall style of the exam qs was actually closer to usmleconsult than uworld. My stems were not long at all; there were a fair few one-liners and very, very few stems went on for longer than your average paragraph. Believe it or not, on many qs they're really not trying to trick you, and a lot of the questions simply struck me as being plain, bland and straightforward. Of course, some were uworld-esque mind-melting brain teasers - but I really thought these accounted for no more than 5-10 qs out of each block. (Some blocks didn't seem to have any.)
- I had no time problems. I was often able to make 2 full passes of the qs before time got called each block.
- FA was adequate for the most part, but you need to back it up with a lot of practice qs for best results. I did 3 full banks (uworld+qbank+usmleconsult), and I would have done more if I'd had time. I also used Gunner Training, which I think is the most underrated boards tool out there. FA was an important component of my study plan, but GT was responsible for my biggest gains. It took me from being a micro, immuno and biochem idiot to having sheer mastery of each. If I'd had enough time to go all the way through GT and master all the material, I have no doubt that this would have been a 260+ performance. As it stands, I think (I hope) I broke 240...but I'm not going to jinx it.
- Don't do the Taus method. I started with this and frankly it wasted a lot of time early on that would have been better spent with GT and question banks. Annotation is incredibly time consuming, and I do not think it helped me absorb the material. Furthermore, a lot of what I annotated did not seem very relevant and/or important later on. The only Taus method books I'd unconditionally recommend are Levinson Immuno, HY Biostats (if you don't have a good biostats background), BRS Physio and maybe CMMRS. (I loved CMMRS when I was reading it, but in all honesty my micro % correct in the qbanks did not start rising until I did GT's micro cards.)
- While I may have just gotten an exam well-suited to my strengths (namely pharm, micro, immuno, behavioral sci, and perhaps path), I'd just like to remind you guys that this damn test is doable. When I got in front of that computer, I was literally shaking like John Glenn presumably was while he was being loaded into Friendship 7. I was utterly scared that I'd find tons and tons of qs on material that I knew nothing about, that I'd be guessing left and right etc. And you know what? I got a test whose blocks were generally easier than the ones I was finishing up on uworld the day before. I scored 75-85% on those uworld blocks, and I might've done even better on these. Yes, there were a number of wtf questions and some where I simply had to guess - but usually it wasn't a complete shot in the dark. And while I've looked up a lot of answers and realised I made (at least) 15-20 boneheaded mistakes, there were many qs where I knew the answer instantly. Do questions, questions and more questions and you will be able to pull off a score you can be proud of.
- Test was fair/balanced. Many qs were easier than your average uworld q. There were nbme repeats (of course) but the real shocker is that my exam seemed to have about double the word-for-word (or close to it) repeat questions from usmleconsult as from uworld. I had no "linked" questions, very few brain slides (all but one of which wasn't hard), and a reasonable number of abdominal/pelvic anatomy qs (most of which I could deal with relatively easily). Aside from biostats, I had perhaps one additional question where I was asked to calculate anything, and maybe 2 qs that involved limb innervation/musculature (and they were obvious).
- I thought the overall style of the exam qs was actually closer to usmleconsult than uworld. My stems were not long at all; there were a fair few one-liners and very, very few stems went on for longer than your average paragraph. Believe it or not, on many qs they're really not trying to trick you, and a lot of the questions simply struck me as being plain, bland and straightforward. Of course, some were uworld-esque mind-melting brain teasers - but I really thought these accounted for no more than 5-10 qs out of each block. (Some blocks didn't seem to have any.)
- I had no time problems. I was often able to make 2 full passes of the qs before time got called each block.
- FA was adequate for the most part, but you need to back it up with a lot of practice qs for best results. I did 3 full banks (uworld+qbank+usmleconsult), and I would have done more if I'd had time. I also used Gunner Training, which I think is the most underrated boards tool out there. FA was an important component of my study plan, but GT was responsible for my biggest gains. It took me from being a micro, immuno and biochem idiot to having sheer mastery of each. If I'd had enough time to go all the way through GT and master all the material, I have no doubt that this would have been a 260+ performance. As it stands, I think (I hope) I broke 240...but I'm not going to jinx it.
- Don't do the Taus method. I started with this and frankly it wasted a lot of time early on that would have been better spent with GT and question banks. Annotation is incredibly time consuming, and I do not think it helped me absorb the material. Furthermore, a lot of what I annotated did not seem very relevant and/or important later on. The only Taus method books I'd unconditionally recommend are Levinson Immuno, HY Biostats (if you don't have a good biostats background), BRS Physio and maybe CMMRS. (I loved CMMRS when I was reading it, but in all honesty my micro % correct in the qbanks did not start rising until I did GT's micro cards.)
- While I may have just gotten an exam well-suited to my strengths (namely pharm, micro, immuno, behavioral sci, and perhaps path), I'd just like to remind you guys that this damn test is doable. When I got in front of that computer, I was literally shaking like John Glenn presumably was while he was being loaded into Friendship 7. I was utterly scared that I'd find tons and tons of qs on material that I knew nothing about, that I'd be guessing left and right etc. And you know what? I got a test whose blocks were generally easier than the ones I was finishing up on uworld the day before. I scored 75-85% on those uworld blocks, and I might've done even better on these. Yes, there were a number of wtf questions and some where I simply had to guess - but usually it wasn't a complete shot in the dark. And while I've looked up a lot of answers and realised I made (at least) 15-20 boneheaded mistakes, there were many qs where I knew the answer instantly. Do questions, questions and more questions and you will be able to pull off a score you can be proud of.
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Yeah, actually, I have to think there's something to what you wrote. At least I think/hope it's true. Since I went with FA ;-)
Nope, they had both noise-canceling headphones and regular ones at my test center. I didn't see any earplugs, though, but I don't like earplugs anyway.
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Taking the exam on Monday. It's been incredibly hard to study these last few days! I need to finish up my second go at UWorld and my second pass of FA today and I just can't seem to get started. I've read so many posts on here where people say the same thing, and I used to think, "How can they feel that way? This exam is SO important!" Well, here I am, BURNT out. haha. I guess I feel like there's just not a lot more that I can learn at this point.
Oh well, Good luck to everyone! This thread has been very helpful during my studying and I felt like I needed to stop being a creepy lurker and start contibuting a bit. 😛
Oh well, Good luck to everyone! This thread has been very helpful during my studying and I felt like I needed to stop being a creepy lurker and start contibuting a bit. 😛
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Take tomorrow off!!! The worst thing you can do is go into this beast burnt out. Close the book tonight, sleep in tomorrow and do something you find fun!
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Thanks for the writeup man. I love the can do attitude.
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I got a lot out of this board in deciding how to go about my board prep and hopefully this will be useful to some of the MS1s and MSOs out there. I don't really have much advice for my fellow ms2s nearing the test, but i've got my fingers crossed for you
First things First: figure out what your goals are. for a lot of people, going all out to max out their step1 score makes little sense. If you know that you want to do family practice or something that you don't need that really high score, celebrate rejoice and work hard on doing things you think will make you a great doctor. STEP 1 is not the be all end all, but for some people, myself included getting as high a score as is possible is important and this is what I did and it worked for me. I put in an incredible amount of work over the last year and it was worth it for me based on my goals (pretty set on one very competitive field) and strong desire to be in one of a few difficult to match locations for family reasons. I wanted to put myself in a position where I felt confident that I could break 260 on any test that I got and made a year long study plan accordingly. It is not for the faint of heart, but I'm pretty sure that any US medical student will break 250 if they do what I did and the good test takers among us will be over 260 with this type of study plan. Final advice, don't follow anyone study plan exactly, but figure out what you need to use (first aid and uworld) and then tailor the specifics towards what you need.
Things used during the year:
Gunnertraining: Awesome, awesome, awesome. This was a huge part of my success on this exam. It hammers an incredible amount of stuff into your brain and made me a rockstar all year in classes and small groups and payed off big time for board studying. First aid is great, but I would not really have been able to memorize it, but gunnertraining has most of first aid plus a lot of the best tidbits of goljan and other good stuff. If you are finishing up first year and have a goal of a very hight step1 score I would start it now, bank all of the first year stuff over the summer, bank the rest along with classes, but double up at the end of the year so that you have gt fully banked by at least 1 month before your dedicated study period-that way you will be able to keep doing your gt questions, but it will be down to a more manageable 100 or so qs a day.
Kaplan Qbank: Did this along with classes. Did all questions on tutor mode, would do a question read the explanation, flip to the page in first aid, read the appropriate section and annotate if necessary.
First Aid: In addition to the annotations from qbank, i made sure to read the appropriate sections from first aid at least once (usually 2x) along with classes second year. Not to memorize but to get very familiar with all the content.
Goljan audio: This is still great though it has a few errors (but not really more than most up to date written texts). Had a 25 minute commute to school and listened to goljan almost everyday=about 1 lecture a day. I would listen to what we were studying in school and just repeat it until my exam, this meant that i listened to each lecture around 3x at least during the year.
RR path: Also good and a good combo with the audio. I would generally read through each chapter 2 times along with classes. Also it has all the pictures referred to in the audio and has a synergistic learning response when combined.
Robins Q book and webpath: Did these along with classes, maybe a little over the top, but I found it helpful in really nailing down path.
BRS Physio: I would read the appropriate chapters and do the questions at the beginning of each block at school. It is great to be really solid on your physio because it makes a lot of things make sense and the more that you understand pathology and pathophysiology (vs memorize) the better. Plus physio is high yield in general and this is a great book.
Brenner pharmcards and Katzung and trevors examination and board review: My schools curriculum is a little weak in pharm. I don't really know if these books are the best, but they worked for me. Would do the appriate drugs/chapters along with class.
CMMRS: book is gold, read it twice during our ID (micro +micro pharm block)
HY neuroanatomy: read before neurology block, a little overdetailed but very good.
Lily for cardiology: great book, but way beyond what you need for boards
BRS behavioral-read this twice plus all the questions twice during our psych block (final was the BS shelf). Big fan of this book.
Class syllabi and lectures: I read the syllabi and went to or watched all of my class lectures until the end of february. I think that you need to learn things for the first time somewhere and this was good for me, but YMMV. The 20 points above 250 IMO are made up largely of somewhat random stuff and you'll find some of it in your classes. My school is P/F though, so I would go to class, read the syllabus once and did the rest of my studying including the 3-4 days before the test solely w/board level materials
Few months before step1 (while still in class)
UWORLD: the best resource of all, an amazing learning tool-use it that way. I did my first pass of uworld + marked and incorrects during my last two months of classes. All on tutor mode with the same method I used for kaplan qbank (see above). Though I was doing tutor mode, I tried to do the questions quickly (but took my time with the answers) though occasionally i would take 2-3 minutes for a question. remember uworld is a learning tool, not a prognosticator first and foremost, use NBMEs for that.
Rx: did about 1000 questions from it (including all behavioral science) but didn't have time to do more. IMO for qbanks UWORLD >>>kaplan>rx, but kaplan and rx aren't that far apart in quality, what really turned me off to rx was that there were at least 3 or 4 completely incorrect answers which didn't happen in the other qbanks (i.e. in world or qbank there might be an error here or there, but the right answer to the question is still the right answer, whereas the rx questions that were incorrect the actual answer choice was wrong)
Read RR biochem: I liked this book alot, and along w other resources I thought was good, though not super high yield.
Last 23 days (after classes)-beast mode
Would read through the appropriate section in BRS physiology (but not do the questions), then read the section in first aid and do all of the kaplan qbank questions for that subject on tutor mode(some subjects had 2-3 days according to their length in first aid and my gut feeling on strengths and weaknesses), doing the easy questions, then medium then hard (would intersperse reading with questions because I could not read first aid for extended stretches). I would also do 100 UWORLD questions on random tutor mode and my gt questions for the day last once I was thoughouly burnt for the day (would actually do the last 50qs in bed). I only used RR as a reference during this period and referred to other books/wikipedia as necessary. I also listened to goljan while walking to and from the library and got through most of it again.
along the way i did some practice exams
Last 5 days I was done w kaplan qbank and finished UWorld plus incorrects and read through first aid one more time (didn't get fully back through it). I did UWSA 2 one block a day for the first 4 days (i.e. not the day before the test) to get myself back to being used to doing random questions i'd never seen in 46q blocks and then read the answers.
Wasn't able to take the last day off, but stopped studying at 7pm, ate dinner and watched one of my favorite movies in bed and was able to get a good nights sleep the night before (try as hard as you can to do this)
Good luck everybody. for the younguns-set your goals intelligently and do what you need to do to get there. Hard work over a long period of time pays off on this test.
numbers (all qbanks done on untimed tutor mode with annotation into first aid on first pass)
Gunnertraining: 98% banked (didn't bank some of the stuff they added during the last 3 weeks) and about 76% mastered with a peak of 80% mastered
Kaplan qbank along with classes: 81%
1st pass uworld (in the last two months of school): 84.5%
Usmlerx (did about 1000qs)
on't remember exactly but around 93%
Behavioral Shelf about 2months before step1-910
Second Pass qbank: around 90%
second pass UW: 97% (though I was recognizing a fair amount of the answers)
NBME 5 4/1: 690: 264 (old scale)
UWSA1 4/13: 265
NBME 12 4/23: 680:264 (missed 9)
NBME 11 5/1: 710: 271 (missed 6)
UWSA 2 (taken as 4 separate blocks):265 (max for uwsas)
STEP1: 5/16: 270
First things First: figure out what your goals are. for a lot of people, going all out to max out their step1 score makes little sense. If you know that you want to do family practice or something that you don't need that really high score, celebrate rejoice and work hard on doing things you think will make you a great doctor. STEP 1 is not the be all end all, but for some people, myself included getting as high a score as is possible is important and this is what I did and it worked for me. I put in an incredible amount of work over the last year and it was worth it for me based on my goals (pretty set on one very competitive field) and strong desire to be in one of a few difficult to match locations for family reasons. I wanted to put myself in a position where I felt confident that I could break 260 on any test that I got and made a year long study plan accordingly. It is not for the faint of heart, but I'm pretty sure that any US medical student will break 250 if they do what I did and the good test takers among us will be over 260 with this type of study plan. Final advice, don't follow anyone study plan exactly, but figure out what you need to use (first aid and uworld) and then tailor the specifics towards what you need.
Things used during the year:
Gunnertraining: Awesome, awesome, awesome. This was a huge part of my success on this exam. It hammers an incredible amount of stuff into your brain and made me a rockstar all year in classes and small groups and payed off big time for board studying. First aid is great, but I would not really have been able to memorize it, but gunnertraining has most of first aid plus a lot of the best tidbits of goljan and other good stuff. If you are finishing up first year and have a goal of a very hight step1 score I would start it now, bank all of the first year stuff over the summer, bank the rest along with classes, but double up at the end of the year so that you have gt fully banked by at least 1 month before your dedicated study period-that way you will be able to keep doing your gt questions, but it will be down to a more manageable 100 or so qs a day.
Kaplan Qbank: Did this along with classes. Did all questions on tutor mode, would do a question read the explanation, flip to the page in first aid, read the appropriate section and annotate if necessary.
First Aid: In addition to the annotations from qbank, i made sure to read the appropriate sections from first aid at least once (usually 2x) along with classes second year. Not to memorize but to get very familiar with all the content.
Goljan audio: This is still great though it has a few errors (but not really more than most up to date written texts). Had a 25 minute commute to school and listened to goljan almost everyday=about 1 lecture a day. I would listen to what we were studying in school and just repeat it until my exam, this meant that i listened to each lecture around 3x at least during the year.
RR path: Also good and a good combo with the audio. I would generally read through each chapter 2 times along with classes. Also it has all the pictures referred to in the audio and has a synergistic learning response when combined.
Robins Q book and webpath: Did these along with classes, maybe a little over the top, but I found it helpful in really nailing down path.
BRS Physio: I would read the appropriate chapters and do the questions at the beginning of each block at school. It is great to be really solid on your physio because it makes a lot of things make sense and the more that you understand pathology and pathophysiology (vs memorize) the better. Plus physio is high yield in general and this is a great book.
Brenner pharmcards and Katzung and trevors examination and board review: My schools curriculum is a little weak in pharm. I don't really know if these books are the best, but they worked for me. Would do the appriate drugs/chapters along with class.
CMMRS: book is gold, read it twice during our ID (micro +micro pharm block)
HY neuroanatomy: read before neurology block, a little overdetailed but very good.
Lily for cardiology: great book, but way beyond what you need for boards
BRS behavioral-read this twice plus all the questions twice during our psych block (final was the BS shelf). Big fan of this book.
Class syllabi and lectures: I read the syllabi and went to or watched all of my class lectures until the end of february. I think that you need to learn things for the first time somewhere and this was good for me, but YMMV. The 20 points above 250 IMO are made up largely of somewhat random stuff and you'll find some of it in your classes. My school is P/F though, so I would go to class, read the syllabus once and did the rest of my studying including the 3-4 days before the test solely w/board level materials
Few months before step1 (while still in class)
UWORLD: the best resource of all, an amazing learning tool-use it that way. I did my first pass of uworld + marked and incorrects during my last two months of classes. All on tutor mode with the same method I used for kaplan qbank (see above). Though I was doing tutor mode, I tried to do the questions quickly (but took my time with the answers) though occasionally i would take 2-3 minutes for a question. remember uworld is a learning tool, not a prognosticator first and foremost, use NBMEs for that.
Rx: did about 1000 questions from it (including all behavioral science) but didn't have time to do more. IMO for qbanks UWORLD >>>kaplan>rx, but kaplan and rx aren't that far apart in quality, what really turned me off to rx was that there were at least 3 or 4 completely incorrect answers which didn't happen in the other qbanks (i.e. in world or qbank there might be an error here or there, but the right answer to the question is still the right answer, whereas the rx questions that were incorrect the actual answer choice was wrong)
Read RR biochem: I liked this book alot, and along w other resources I thought was good, though not super high yield.
Last 23 days (after classes)-beast mode
Would read through the appropriate section in BRS physiology (but not do the questions), then read the section in first aid and do all of the kaplan qbank questions for that subject on tutor mode(some subjects had 2-3 days according to their length in first aid and my gut feeling on strengths and weaknesses), doing the easy questions, then medium then hard (would intersperse reading with questions because I could not read first aid for extended stretches). I would also do 100 UWORLD questions on random tutor mode and my gt questions for the day last once I was thoughouly burnt for the day (would actually do the last 50qs in bed). I only used RR as a reference during this period and referred to other books/wikipedia as necessary. I also listened to goljan while walking to and from the library and got through most of it again.
along the way i did some practice exams
Last 5 days I was done w kaplan qbank and finished UWorld plus incorrects and read through first aid one more time (didn't get fully back through it). I did UWSA 2 one block a day for the first 4 days (i.e. not the day before the test) to get myself back to being used to doing random questions i'd never seen in 46q blocks and then read the answers.
Wasn't able to take the last day off, but stopped studying at 7pm, ate dinner and watched one of my favorite movies in bed and was able to get a good nights sleep the night before (try as hard as you can to do this)
Good luck everybody. for the younguns-set your goals intelligently and do what you need to do to get there. Hard work over a long period of time pays off on this test.
numbers (all qbanks done on untimed tutor mode with annotation into first aid on first pass)
Gunnertraining: 98% banked (didn't bank some of the stuff they added during the last 3 weeks) and about 76% mastered with a peak of 80% mastered
Kaplan qbank along with classes: 81%
1st pass uworld (in the last two months of school): 84.5%
Usmlerx (did about 1000qs)
on't remember exactly but around 93% Behavioral Shelf about 2months before step1-910
Second Pass qbank: around 90%
second pass UW: 97% (though I was recognizing a fair amount of the answers)
NBME 5 4/1: 690: 264 (old scale)
UWSA1 4/13: 265
NBME 12 4/23: 680:264 (missed 9)
NBME 11 5/1: 710: 271 (missed 6)
UWSA 2 (taken as 4 separate blocks):265 (max for uwsas)
STEP1: 5/16: 270
