I saw that there was a similar thread for 2011 that had plenty of useful info so I figured its best to start one for 2012.
I honestly hope we don't have to deal with that crap. As much as we obviously need (and should) know that stuff because we're all aspiring to be competent doctors, I would still hope they'd just give us some peace of mind and leave it for 2CK, not Step1.
DoctwoB, what is your take on Anatomy for Step 1. Was FA + UWorld sufficient? Should I supplement with BRS?
Jason E and DoctwoB,
Any thoughts on CT scans, or weird brain cross sections for neuro. It seems like most of the neuro questions are asked via CT, MRI, Cross sectional images or via drugs. Any particular advice regarding those?
I have checked out couple of med school links that were posted here on SDN but it seems way too many scans. Perhaps just focus on the ones in U world?
they didnt ask anything too fancy, IMO, if there was an image on the test, it wasnt anything picky. i think kaplan neuroanatomy did a great job
and i also think the test was pretty balanced. i know people post about how their test had a ton of anatomy or biochem or whatever, but it seemed even to me. just like the nbme's
Uworld questions are more difficult in that they require more 2-3 step reasoning, and the depth of knowledge tested is greater. NBMEs are very similar to the real thing. At least for me, NBMEs usually felt easier than world, and difficult NBME questions were not usually 2-3 step but rather they had bizarre answer choices or tested obscure material. Step 1 seemed like a well written NBME. It felt fair, not easy, but fair. Uworld is masterpiece and some of my questions seemed like they had been taken directly from world. Overall, both were crucial to my study plan, and I highly recommend repeating missed and marked questions from world and taking multiple NBMEs plus the free 150.
Behavioral: Fairly easy. Some things that you had to narrow down to two and kinda pick one but maybe that was just me. One REALLY annoying question on abortions which did NOT have a correct answer. You basically had to take a stand on the issue. Ridiculous.
there was also a question on pharmacokinetics that had no correct answer which shocked me. i can guarantee every answer choice was wrong. i was pretty sure i knew what answer they were looking for, but it wasn't scientifically correct! anyone know if there is a way to contact them about a particular question?
I find posts like this entertaining for some reason. It's kind of like if one of our friends gets ketchup on his white suit, we laugh, but in actuality we're all scared s***less of this happening to us as well.
Good advice. Thanks.
Considering the NBMEs played a significant role in your prep, would you recommend buying them in untimed-mode (in order to review actual questions later on) or timed-mode? Same with UWorld; I noticed you did timed-mode for that. Would you recommend that over tutor-mode?
Thanks again,
Try out a screenshot program. Or try poking around some of the IMG websites for offline copies.Good advice. Thanks.
Considering the NBMEs played a significant role in your prep, would you recommend buying them in untimed-mode (in order to review actual questions later on) or timed-mode? Same with UWorld; I noticed you did timed-mode for that. Would you recommend that over tutor-mode?
Thanks again,
I'm sure those were probably experimental questions. Or at least I hope so.
If any questions were experimental, I would think they'd be more based on question-style rather than actual content.
My guess would be that the "experimental" ones are those where they incorporate either a novel method of asking the question (e.g. video, multi-location heart sounds, etc.) or 2CK material (to see how much we've learned clinically, earlier than expected, perhaps in an effort to conflate future testing material somehow).
This is indeed BS. I wonder if there is any way to dispute an answer. Probably not though.just to chime in, ive looked up some of the questions i got and some of them did not have a clear answer. total BS
Question: Is there a urine or a drug test before the test? Or just finger prints like the MCAT. Thanks!
they actually do a punch biopsy on the site using generalized anesthesia and then a follow up with a confirmatory bone marrow biopsy using crack cocaine as an anesthetic. After which they do a hair based drug test (which will definitely be positive from all the crack cocaine).
Yeah, but why would any of that make the questions "experimental?"
There are obviously going to be minutiae questions in genetics, biochemistry or whatever subject, but that merely makes them curve-defining, not experimental.
Unless any of us were actual test-writers, I'm not sure we could post definitively as to what the exp. ones actually are.
On my exam, the difficult questions were the extremely obscure questions that AndyRSC is talking about. Stuff that is pure trivia. Like obscure autoantibodies and their targets, very specific genes or gene products, stuff like that. The answer choices were all absurdly specific, making it impossible to reason through a good guess if you didn't know the answer.
I can't see how these questions would be "curve-defining", because let's be honest -- we all use fairly similar core materials with a finite set of content. The obscure questions on my exam were light-years away from that content. I looked up one, and had a hard time finding any information on it outside of pubmed (and this is a specific protein we're talking about).
Those questions are experimental, or the test-writers were writing completely unreasonable questions.
Bear in mind, these questions were in the extreme minority on my exam (3-4 tops thinking off the top of my head).
Yeah, so I took the exam yesterday. It was hard as hell. I had talked to a few friends before the test and they had warned me that on their tests certain blocks were super hard and others were easier. My first 3 blocks were ridiculously hard. Ridiculous. I would say 25% of the questions were things you could have learned from First Aid. I kid you not - 25%. So many experiments and random facts and molecular bio and 3 step reasoning questions. Literally like 5-10 actual 1-2 step reasoning questions on each of those blocks of out 46. Not stuff you could have studied for, no way a ton more studying on my part would have helped more than a little bit on those sections. I am hoping this was all experimental (haha maybe that is just me being delusional). I have no idea what resource you could use to prepare to these types of questions.
The last 4 blocks were much more what I had expected in terms of content. Lots of 1-2 step reasoning questions, although still lots of questions you had to think hard about and definitely still a lot of stuff not in FA. I had a 5 or 6 very hard anatomy questions, 1 that I knew for sure because it had been in first aid. The other questions were so obscure that if I would have put in another day studying anatomy hard I think I would have known the answer to 1 or 2 maybe.
I had timing issues throughout the whole exam because a lot of the questions stems were very long, as others have mentioned. I also had a Ton of graphs, and definitely not things you could have picked up from first aid. If you are weak at reading graphs you better brush up before this exam cause they love them.
I had 1 questions straight out of UWorld. I didn't read back over my q bank because I ran out of time and I do regret that.
They are very good at presenting things in ways that are not obvious, that they know you haven't seen before, really seeing if you can make educated guesses based on what you know. I don't know what the best way is to prepare for those types of questions. My test was Very heavy in biochem (a bunch of these were in first aid and I just missed them because I hate/suck at biochem). I know that everyone's test is different, I studied so many things that didn't show up, I definitely felt like I couldn't show how how much I know.
I also think I understand better now why people fail if they are just going off of memorizing FA - a lot of what they are doing is really trying to tease out your actually understanding of things. Goljan audio was helpful for this. Or they would pick these tiny details that only a super gunner would know - I don't know what would be helpful for learning these little obscure facts, like others have said I guess starting studying in first year and just going for volume of information.
My advice to people who have a decent amount of time left would be to really focus on the q banks, and make sure you understand the 'why'. And to those taking it soon, just be prepared for them to ask you a million things you don't know and don't panic because lots of people have had similar experiences.
Thank f*ing good this is over, I'll post when I get my score. Cheers!
What resources did u use? and can you post your practice exam scores?
Thanks!
I used FA mainly, I watched all the DIT videos and listed to about 2/3 of the Goljan videos. I made it through 60% of UWorld qbank throughout the school year (only doing organ systems stuff as we did it in school) and then reset it and made it through 60% again, trying to hit up most of the questions I hadn't done over the school year. I had aimed to do all of Uworld (and Kaplan haha) but I ran out of time. DIT was pretty good to drag my ass through first aid the first time through but I found a lot of it pretty frustrating because he would literally just read FA out loud (and fast!) and that is not helpful at all imho, it would take me 6 hours to get through one 1.5 hour lecture sometimes because I would stop and try to actually review the subject. I had 5 weeks off to study which was definitely not enough time, I really wish I would have started really studying earlier. Starting out I was decently strong in 2nd year systems subjects (we had NBME exams for almost all of our classes this year and my percent corrects ranged from 80-94 with most being upper 80s on those exams) but very weak in Micro/Biochem/Heme/Immuno/Pharm/Embyo, (all the first year stuff - I wasn't a science major and I felt a pretty steep learning curve starting first year) - those are big guns not to know going in, I think that hurt me for sure. About 2 months before my 5 weeks off I started trying to go over the subjects I was super weak in but I didn't get that far with all my normal school stuff to think about. I only did 2 practice tests because I felt so short for time (technically 3 if you count the school sponsored CBSE I took back in February before I had started studying - on that one I got the equivalent of 190, just passed).
On UWorld Self Assessment 1 I got 236 - that was about 3 weeks pre-test
NBME form 11 I got a 238 - 2 weeks pre-test
I had wanted to do another form but yeah, ran out of time (notice the theme!).
Thanks for the response, a lot of people feel the way you did after the exam, i'm sure you did fine...a few more questions lol...did u use rapid review, brs, or any other books besides First Aid?
And did you use any other videos, like pathoma, usmlerx, kaplan hy?
What were you averaging on the uworld toward your test day?
I did watch some Kaplan videos - parts of Micro/Biochem/Immuno- maybe 25% of Biochem/Micro and 60% Immuno, but that's it. No other resources.
You're making me feel bad... lols.
On UW my average now says 67% correct but I skipped/omitted a bunch of questions (I would start blocks and not finish them - not sure if that is factored in) and also was trying to move fast at the end and so I would read the question click randomly and then read the answer so that probably brought the average down. Sometimes I would do really well on blocks, sometimes I would do bad, usually if I did a big block of pharm I was still only averaging like 50% at the end but on others I would get in the 90s. I also didn't go back over almost any of the subjects that I am actually good at, I'm sure the average would have been higher if I went back over the organ systems.
I also Hate studying, I'm super ADD - like Super - I can't sit for more than 5 minutes without being horribly board and feeling extremely distracted so this whole process was a bit of a struggle.
lol didn't mean to make you feel bad, was just wondering because i'm pretty much using First Aid and uworld only, haven't really watched any videos or used any other sources
No worries, I was just kidding I think if you can understand what's in FA without extra sources it's enough, I just needed a little boost on certain subjects because I had holes in my understanding. I'm just not a gunner, never will be, although I admire people who can study all the time without a gun to their head
it sounds like you'll do fine. I'd imagine you did similar to your practice tests and your last NBME is good.
As for feeling you had a holes in your understanding on certain things...it seems like that may have been the case due to your study plan? It seems like you used many different resources but didn't complete any of them. If you do that, of course you'll have random holes in your knowledge. Everyone tells me to pick a few good resources and finish them to completion or else you'll have holes like you're saying.
But what do I know? I'm starting my 5-week hardcore studying tomorrow! I'm sure you did great!
Yeah, so I took the exam yesterday. It was hard as hell...I also think I understand better now why people fail if they are just going off of memorizing FA - a lot of what they are doing is really trying to tease out your actually understanding of things...My advice to people who have a decent amount of time left would be to really focus on the q banks, and make sure you understand the 'why'.
Everybody talks about annotating UW into FA. I was wondering when you annotate, did you write down everything that was not included in FA? Just what you did not know? Or did you just write down the key concepts/key teaching points? I'm not sure what is too much as far as annotating from UW. Do people just throw tons of additional pages into their FA? Thanks for your help. Congrats on the amazing score.
Does 2090 count as thousands and thousands?You need to do thousands and thousands of practice questions.
Doing questions is huge.
Annotate into FA: 1) anything you don't understand entirely (which means all of us should be annotating A LOT) or 2) any detail you pick up in a question that you know is not in FA (because you should absolutely do a cover-to-cover pass of it before even starting questions, so you should be aware of what is unique to the QBank vs already in FA), no matter how minuscule.
I find the "minuscule" info contains a lot of the "whys?" The annotations and answer explanations, following each question, are as important as each question itself.
As holyhekshler has pointed out, knowing FA is just not enough. After you've done lots of questions, you realize that most things, conceptually, ultimately converge back onto FA, but the core concepts and details aren't in the book. You need to do thousands and thousands of practice questions.
Does 2090 count as thousands and thousands?
Took step last Thursday. My prep consisted of FA, World (twice), kaplan qbank (75% complete) Kaplan videos for biochem, behavioral science, molecular bio, immuno, and some pharm (cardio, neuro, psych, and muscarinic/adrenergic), pathoma and Goljan audio. Over Christmas break, I listened to all of pathoma and all of Goljan audio then had about 7 weeks to study after classes ended.
Finished World at 73% the first time
USWA 1 (7 wks out): 216
NMBE 11 (6 wks out): 228
NMBE 7 (5 wks out): 228
NMBE 6 (4 wks out): 238
NMBE 12 (3 wks out): 238
NMBE 12 (2 wks out): 252
USWA 2 (1 wk out): 263
The actual test -- it seemed pretty straightforward. I feel like 60-70% was really, really easy, roughly 20% made me work but I felt "good" about them, and then 10% were 50-50s for me. I think World tests pharm and micro significantly different from actual step. I do think FA was really good for micro and the kaplan qbank seemed more in tune with the way they wanted to conceptually test micro. I thought the kaplan videos were really solid for pharm and taught you how you would be tested on step 1. I felt like there was an emphasis on things like antibiotics (esp HIV), cardio drugs...very straightforward like patient presents with blah blah blah what should you give them or some adverse reaction after they had begun treatment. Overall, I'd just say have a plan, trust your plan, and try to keep as calm as possible. I think Goljan's HY (like 36 pgs) stole me 10 or so question on really random stuff I didn't know. I thought I was wasting my time the day before the test but it ended up paying off. Best of luck everyone. It is a tough process and am very thankful to be finished with it.
So, I took Step 1 today and I really don't know how to feel. I studied like mad and at some point felt really good about myself but then recently started realizing that despite how much I know, there were still stupid things I didn't know or I'd forget.
Anyway- my test seemed easy- TOO easy, so I'm worried I will get screwed on the curve. And when I say "easy" I don't mean I knew all the answers- I mean that there were certainly questions that I should have gotten but didn't because I'd forgotten some detail I should have known.
Overall, there was nothing surprising or totally out of left field- maybe one or two random anatomy questions that didn't phase me at all because I wouldn't have known it unless I'd spent a month just studying Netter's. Biochem was mostly integrated and not too difficult. Lots of genetics, a fair amount of neuro-related pharm that I should have learned better.
I felt like I breezed through a lot of it, but also feel like those were questions everyone would have breezed through and that I missed things I should have known that other people definitely probably knew, so that makes me feel kind of crappy.
Sooooo, yeah. Not sure what to think. Guess no one gets a perfect score but I was hoping to do really well, and while I don't feel like I didn't badly- I don't feel like a rockstar right now either.
Duke, this is exactly how I feel right now. Took it today (well technically, yesterday, I guess, since its 4 am and Im still awake obsessing about it...haha).
Left it feeling pretty good, like "hey that seemed pretty damn easy compared to what I expected and compared to some UW Qs" etc, but then thinking back I remembered saying to myself during the test - damn I definitely KNEW this at one point and SHOULD know it, and OTHER people probably know it, but Im guessing here... and knowing that I got some of those easy ones wrong and worrying about the "easy curve" (if that is indeed an actual phenomenon) is killing me. You would think coming out of an exam feeling like it wasnt super hard would be a good thing!!... haha. Ugh.
Really interested to know how things turn out when one "feels it was too easy, and yet also knows they got things wrong," as I am in the same boat.
So even if you choose not to post your results, would love to hear what happens via PM if you are comfortable sharing. Would relieve some anxiety hopefully! And happy to return the favor of course.
Don't you think it's best to let those who have taken the test give advice?
i've done 13000 questions and I agree with Jack. Where the 260 rain makers at? Let me know the dets
Overall, I'd just say have a plan, trust your plan, and try to keep as calm as possible. I think Goljan's HY (like 36 pgs) stole me 10 or so question on really random stuff I didn't know. I thought I was wasting my time the day before the test but it ended up paying off.