Step II Official 2014 Comlex 2 CE Experiences and Scores Thread!
Started by ccc2009
My study plan as I have about 50 days left:
1. Go through step up to step 2 about 3 times
2. Get through Comquest twice
3. Hit Ob/Gyn, Peds, GI, OMM, Endo, Neuro, Med Ethics, Psych, on Combank
4. Green book and some questions in the back of it...
What is your guy's take on the rest of Combank? How important would it to be to go through Cardio, Nephro, Pulm, Infect Disease, Surgery, Derm, Heme/Onc, Rheum? I feel like some of those sections have way too many questions for it not even being high yield on the exam.. please correct me if I'm wrong
1. Go through step up to step 2 about 3 times
2. Get through Comquest twice
3. Hit Ob/Gyn, Peds, GI, OMM, Endo, Neuro, Med Ethics, Psych, on Combank
4. Green book and some questions in the back of it...
What is your guy's take on the rest of Combank? How important would it to be to go through Cardio, Nephro, Pulm, Infect Disease, Surgery, Derm, Heme/Onc, Rheum? I feel like some of those sections have way too many questions for it not even being high yield on the exam.. please correct me if I'm wrong
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Comquest and Combank are both much easier than Uworld. With that said I've finished Uworld and instead of repeating it have moved on to the easier more vague question banks which better mimic the Comlex. During step 1 I did mostly Uworld and got frustrated with how vague I felt Comlex questions were.
Do you feel that uworld questions helped you learn the material/retain info? I hear they have better explanations.
I'm only taking comlex but my friend in residency who also only did comlex said she used uworld for comlex 1 and 3 and did really well. She didn't use uworld for comlex 2 and that was her lowest score.
I was thinking about purchasing uworld as a learning tool, but will adding a 3rd qbank be overwhelming? Decisions, decisions!
For sure, as a pure learning tool UWorld is by far the best question bank. Combank would follow then Comquest. Comquest's biggest weakness is their explanations so if you're looking to thoroughly learn I'd stick with Uworld/Combank, Comquest is nice for better overall questions than Combank.
I'm kind of in shock here guys. Level one I got 551. Uworld this year 69% with 800 to go. Just took COMSAE form D and got a 442. I'm so confused. My world score correlates to an above average Step 2 and comlex is one week from today. Definitely pushing my exam back. Any advice?
From what I've heard, the comsae's are not great at predicting scores. I would definitely trust your uworld % over the comsae unless you think there is some reason your uworld % is inflated (tutor, non random, 2rd/3rd pass etc.).
I did questions on timed tutor mode and usually finish a block with about 20 minutes left, up to 27 minutes on uworld. I will say though, I did not read savarese at all before taking this test. Just now, a recent grad told me that by reading savarese once through, knowing ribs, sacrum and cranial well (and I don't know these subjects AT ALL) I could easily add at least 50 points to my score. So hopefully that will put someone other than myself at ease if they're in the same situation. Buying comquest now and taking the test July 7th. Hopefully this is enough time to dominate the test as I am hoping for an MD community IM residency.
Side note, do I really have to crush Level 2 to get into an MD community IM program? I think the average usmle step 1 score for community IM residencies is around 220 and I managed to pull a 223, don't know about step 2 at all.
Side note, do I really have to crush Level 2 to get into an MD community IM program? I think the average usmle step 1 score for community IM residencies is around 220 and I managed to pull a 223, don't know about step 2 at all.
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I'm not trying to be mean, but you didn't study any OMM and are shocked that you got a 442 on a practice exam?
Like others said, they aren't super predictive of your score anyway but knowing OMM well is at least some of the battle.
If you go back to the comlex experience thread from last year it's pretty clear that OMM will appear throughout the exam. Good luck!
I have to be honest, I find Saverese to be a complete bore. I don't know if it will add 50 points to your score. I just can't do cranial. I found OMM to be hard at times, i think im weird or something lol
But I find doing OMM questions on COMQUEST or combank a lot more useful IMO....i think im just not a book person. lol
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I had around 5 cranial ques on level 1 and about the same number of sacral as well. It's all the luck of the draw.
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Well I didn't study cranial or sacral for level 1 so I thought they were though. I'm pretty sure I got them wrong.
http://www.nbome.org/docs/TestDayTips.pdf
Examination time – The examination will last approximately nine hours which consists of a brief tutorial, and eight hours total exam time. The eight hours are divided into two four-hour sessions with four sections each. Included in the eight hours are two breaks as described below. You also receive a 40-minute lunch break, which is not included in the eight hours.
Breaks – Rules regarding breaks are as follows:
You have the option of taking two, 10-minute breaks, one after the second section of the examination and the other after the sixth section.
Break time will count against your examination time.
Additional breaks beyond the two allowed will be considered unexcused and will be reported to the NBOME by the TCA.
Following breaks, you will need to go through the biometric identification process and be scanned with the metal detector upon each re-entry into the testing area.
o Lunch – The lunch break will last 40 minutes. Your afternoon examination session will begin after the 40-minute break, regardless of whether you are seated at the work station or not. You may choose to forego all or part of your lunch break, but the unused time will not be added to your examination time.
I think if you skip the tutorial, you don't get the extra time added on like the USMLE. I would use the time during the tutorial to get my mind right, pray, play the Final Countdown or Rocky theme in my head, etc.
On an unrelated note, trying to decide if I should take a COMSAE or just go off my UWorld % and hope for the best. Reading Savarese this time around is killing me very slowly.
Just took it today, the 40 minute break isn't mandatory but you also don't get to add it on anywhere either.
Took this today.
Will post my score when it comes but here are my stats for the future test takers:
COMLEX I- 694
COMATS- 103-122 (average around 112) Used First Aid through my core rotations with UWorld, saved COMQUEST for my dedicated time. Didn't touch FA during my study period, read about half of savarese.
UWorld- 45% done at 76% correct (untimed, tutor)
COMQUEST- 90% done at 77% correct (untimed, tutor)
COMSAE B- 574 (3 weeks before test)
COMSAE C- 752 (2 days before test)
COMLEX 2CE-??
Now to pack for 5 months on the road for auditions!
Will post my score when it comes but here are my stats for the future test takers:
COMLEX I- 694
COMATS- 103-122 (average around 112) Used First Aid through my core rotations with UWorld, saved COMQUEST for my dedicated time. Didn't touch FA during my study period, read about half of savarese.
UWorld- 45% done at 76% correct (untimed, tutor)
COMQUEST- 90% done at 77% correct (untimed, tutor)
COMSAE B- 574 (3 weeks before test)
COMSAE C- 752 (2 days before test)
COMLEX 2CE-??
Now to pack for 5 months on the road for auditions!
Yay for being done?
Any new advice to give? 🙂 Ob/gyn, peds and omm heavy?
I know the test can/will be a crap shoot, but I'm trying to prepare and study a lot, with a month to go, trying to figure out if there is anything new I should really focus on.
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Took mine today, seemed easy compared to USMLE yesterday. But I might be wrong. Straight forward stuff, with lots of OMM, which helped to diagnose. Know the innervations.
I did not know a few names of syndromes that are also called other names in my school and Wikipedia, so I got those wrong.
Lots of OB-GYN, but easy things if you did OK on COMAT, you'll be fine. Finished 1 hour early.
Peds stuff was easy too.
Hoping to get a good score. ;-)
I did not know a few names of syndromes that are also called other names in my school and Wikipedia, so I got those wrong.
Lots of OB-GYN, but easy things if you did OK on COMAT, you'll be fine. Finished 1 hour early.
Peds stuff was easy too.
Hoping to get a good score. ;-)
You know the drill. Its random on what subjects will be emphasized. Mine today I thought was well balanced, just like Level 1 was for me.
I think that about 50% of the non-OMM questions could be found in FA, 15-20% more with UWorld and Comquest, but a good 30% is just what you could remember from your first three years of schooling and stuff that nobody will know, well almost nobody.
My advice with a month out is to hammer whatever question bank you have and take notes. I have 40 pages of handwritten notes that I took from comquest that I went over everynight, not all of them every night but whatever I could muster. Read ALL the explanations, most of my notes are from the wrong answers.
Work hard now and enjoy your life after, its a great feeling to be done with both the Level 2's!!!!
Best of luck.
I am sure it would be if you can memorize the secrets without reading something else too. I had secrets for a year and did not read more than a chapter or two of it. Do not forget to review statistics section in Secrets and the GREEN Book one day before test.
8-10 weeks is what I read last night on their website
http://www.nbome.org/score-release.asp
Looks like 6-8 weeks for those of us who took it recently. Apparently they are adjusting the minimum passing score
Looks like 6-8 weeks for those of us who took it recently. Apparently they are adjusting the minimum passing score
No word but if I had to guess they will just adjust the % correct and keep the score itself at passing of 400. It's not quite like the USMLE where the average score changes with each test release. The COMLEX seems to be pretty consistent on keeping their average of 500
Well, I thought there was no worse feeling than walking out of COMLEX I...Wrong. I definitely feel like I failed. Forget trying to break 600, I'm praying for a 400 now. Took USMLE earlier this week and felt 10X better walking out of the exam. OPP questions were bizarre. There were diseases I had never heard of and I've done UWorld 1.5X, Secrets, MTB2/3. Hope to God I pass. Took a COMSAE earlier and scored in the 500s, thought I was set. Now let's begin the 8 week waiting period where I am doomed to try and make myself like certain specialties because my board scores were terrible. Halfway through my exam, some guy started hyperventilating. FML.
Did you use Comquest at all? Just curious how the comquest questions are correlating ... ty
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For those that took the real COMLEX 2, did you feel COMQUEST or COMBANK, one or the other was superior? I have been using COMQUEST and finished it. But I was thinking about getting COMBANK for my last week as I heard some people say that they saw exact questions on their COMLEX level 1 last year and thats why they are re-using it.
Any input? thanks ya'll and congrats on finishing! 🙂
Any input? thanks ya'll and congrats on finishing! 🙂
Have you used uworld at all?
I would urge you to do combank, I felt comquest was too easy for the real test. The best thing about comquest is the OMM questions, I thought those were on par with my CE. I did combank twice, took me about a week to do it the first time since there are about 1800 questions. I also did comquest in less than a week but I dont' think I gained much from doing all the questions (around 70% avg). This was after I did uworld and tooks notes from uworld over the year.
I was getting around 70% on combank the first time thru and I passed CE comfortably. Do yourself a favor and focus on OB, I wish I had done more off that. There were literally 10 OBGYN questions per section, it was annoying.
good luck!
Thanks for the response. Yeah, I did finish about 90% of Uworld throughout the year and got a measly 50%. Our shelf exams were NBME so I haven't done much OMM at all.
Did you not find the OMM questions on COMBANK useful? I have found COMBANK to be pretty useful for some of the nitty gritty detail questions. I've currently finished half of it in like 2 weeks. I like how they take things out from different review books.
Congrats on finsihing btw, did you read the saverse or just do the omm questions to prepare for omm?
I KNOW that this question has been asking 1,000 times so forgive me to posting it again but.....I've been doing some of the 2011 DIT Step 2 lectures and they are taking way too long and just adding some random material to Step Up. I'm deciding to stop the lectures and just read Step Up and read the MTB book and start using COMBANK. taking my exam July 31st.
Thoughts? I'd really appreciate it! DIT for Step 1 was helpful and helped with my score so I guess I am just nervous about not doing them for Step 2
Thoughts? I'd really appreciate it! DIT for Step 1 was helpful and helped with my score so I guess I am just nervous about not doing them for Step 2
