So I took the exam recently.
My experience should be taken with a grain of salt, since we take Step 1 after our clinical rotations, hence I had a year of shelves under my belt. Many are gearing up to take Step 2 very shortly after Step 1.
I'd like to reiterate others sentiments that actively studying Step 2 type info is very low yield for Step 1. I did well on all major shelves and was regularly scoring in the 90s in the UW step 2 q bank during the year and very little translated directly to Step 1 studying. Granted the rare "next step" or "what is the diagnosis" questions are lay ups after the clinical experience, but this is not the focus of step 1. Furthermore, more clinical knowledge can almost be detrimental as Step 1 scenarios are often not clinically realistic, with people getting drugs, procedures, and biopsies in vignettes that would never occur in real life, so often I had to suspend disbelief in order to think about what the question was trying to test.
Overall, I had about 6 weeks, I committed about 3 to memorizing FA with Anki.
Before studying
NBME6 = 214
2 weeks out
NBME 12 = 254
1 week out
UWSA1 = 265/800
UW avg, timed random (75% complete) = 85%
On test day, the real deal was less detail oriented than UWorld and FA. There were a few very specific pure knowledge based questions that depended on recall. Nothing seemed overrepresented, it was a mix of physio, path, micro. Only a handful of biochem that were straightforward, very little embryo, a few weird anatomy questions that had to do with identification of bone parts and ligaments you just had to be familiar with but are not emphasized in any test prep books.
Biostats were not tricky. Overall sparse need for physio equations, which I was concerned about going in as I didn't have them all down pat. Im thinking this is form dependent.
Several ethics question and experiment interpretations in each block. For these I found that really eliminating choices by finding the possible flaw in each answer choice is better than attempting to come up with the logical answer in your head, as they seem to be designed to slow you down. Being able to let go and move on is key to finishing blocks with time to spare.
I came out feeling meh, and like many others I know I made some dumb mistakes. I know at least twice I changed my answer from right to wrong and that I got a few gimmes wrong. At this point I can't really imagine doing very well on the exam, as I could imagine other people just crushing it. I don't know whether I was being smart by going with my gut on lots of things and moving through at a brisk pace, or if I was too casual in my approach. I know personally for me overthinking leads to bad outcomes, so its all about finding that middle ground where you dont kneejerk to the buzzword but also don't make things more complicated than they need to be. For this, UWorld timed random is the best practice, and despite the fact that there was a different "feel" on the real deal, it is undoubtably the most important resource and of course I wish I had the time to get through the whole bank.
I will update with my score and hopefully will be able to provide better advice on what I did right/wrong after I see the results. Honestly I am clueless about how I did.
Good luck! Just keep working hard on the highest yield material, look things up you don't know or understand from supplementary resources, and it will be the best thing you can do; the more well rounded you are the better. Much more about breadth than depth, though some depth is necessary, as is the inherent tension in all test prep. Overall I think I was too detail oriented in studying (ie waste too much time memorizing pathways etc rather than doing more s) but again my score will tell me that more than my guessing.
