USMLE Official 2018 Step 1 Experiences and Scores Thread

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sovereign0 said:
IMO, Zanki is too low yield for dedicated. The fact that you did it beforehand should've given you a good enough foundation to jump into QBanks and NBMEs. You will end up spending time reviewing things you already know when you should be focusing on things you don't. I personally have made Anki cards for my weak points as established by UWorld and have kept reviewing those cards throughout.
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Have you felt that the material that you're making from UWorld into Anki is showing up in the NBMEs and practice exams? I'm worried I'm going to make very random cards of material that isn't significant. Right now I make cards only for what the question is asking and not much on the other material.
 
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Krabbeman said:
See, I keep hearing this... wth. aren't they old questions? Now idk what to do again for the next 2 weeks.

People who've taken the exam. would you suggest I do the NBMEs or Uworld a second pass? anybody. somebody. help
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I would strongly recommend doing UW again. There were multiple questions on the exam that I got correct purely because I did ~40% of the second pass. At least for me, the first time I went through UW, I missed quite a few details and forgot some answers because they just seemed "low yield". The second time, when I got far fewer questions wrong I actually focused on those and a few of those topics actually came up on the exam.
I suppose I was pretty lucky there because I actually did less than half of the second pass thinking the time would be better spent reading FA. In retrospect, that was probably a mistake.
 
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Nephronlearner said:
I would strongly recommend doing UW again. There were multiple questions on the exam that I got correct purely because I did ~40% of the second pass. At least for me, the first time I went through UW, I missed quite a few details and forgot some answers because they just seemed "low yield". The second time, when I got far fewer questions wrong I actually focused on those and a few of those topics actually came up on the exam.
I suppose I was pretty lucky there because I actually did less than half of the second pass thinking the time would be better spent reading FA. In retrospect, that was probably a mistake.
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theres that and also that there's freakin no answers for the nbmes which is annoying as poop
 
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pbrocks15 said:
Have you felt that the material that you're making from UWorld into Anki is showing up in the NBMEs and practice exams? I'm worried I'm going to make very random cards of material that isn't significant. Right now I make cards only for what the question is asking and not much on the other material.
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I've been making cards based off the explanations, focusing on the topic of the question but also stuff in the explanations that I didn't know. Most of the topics UW made a question about are worth knowing, even the questions about more obscure nuggets. Making cards off the explanations can be tricky because sometimes there are vague/nonspecific relationships that I don't see the value in knowing.

My Anki deck has definitely helped me in NBMEs. Sometimes the discrete facts I picked up from UW show up, but more often it's something that I was weak in that UW helped me round out. I did well in my school's curriculum but the emphasis on what was important/worth knowing for class didn't always correlate with what boards think is important. Combining UW's perspective from class perspective + FA/P/S/BB perspective really helped me round out my knowledge base.
 
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Taking my exam on Tuesday, and I'm not entirely sure what to expect.... I've taken four practice exams:

Uworld 1: 262 (4/7)
NBME 19: 236 (4/9)
NBME 18: 248 (4/18)
Uworld 2: 266 (4/21)

Seems to be a pretty large discrepancy between NBME and Uworld exam results. If anyone has already taken the exam and gotten your scores, based on your experience which of these are more predictive and where should I potentially expect to fall on test day?
 
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knp0014 said:
Taking my exam on Tuesday, and I'm not entirely sure what to expect.... I've taken four practice exams:

Uworld 1: 262 (4/7)
NBME 19: 236 (4/9)
NBME 18: 248 (4/18)
Uworld 2: 266 (4/21)

Seems to be a pretty large discrepancy between NBME and Uworld exam results. If anyone has already taken the exam and gotten your scores, based on your experience which of these are more predictive and where should I potentially expect to fall on test day?
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I haven't taken it, but it seems like UW2 is by far the closest predictor for most people
 
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Krabbeman said:
I haven't taken it, but it seems like UW2 is by far the closest predictor for most people
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Get mine back this wk, but it seems 18 & UWSA2 were the closest, followed by UWSA1, 19, 17, 16, 15 then 13 (pre-dedicated).

edit: I'll try to post more info later after I get my breakdown back
 
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sovereign0 said:
I've been making cards based off the explanations, focusing on the topic of the question but also stuff in the explanations that I didn't know. Most of the topics UW made a question about are worth knowing, even the questions about more obscure nuggets. Making cards off the explanations can be tricky because sometimes there are vague/nonspecific relationships that I don't see the value in knowing.

My Anki deck has definitely helped me in NBMEs. Sometimes the discrete facts I picked up from UW show up, but more often it's something that I was weak in that UW helped me round out. I did well in my school's curriculum but the emphasis on what was important/worth knowing for class didn't always correlate with what boards think is important. Combining UW's perspective from class perspective + FA/P/S/BB perspective really helped me round out my knowledge base.
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That's comforting to hear. I get a little worried sometimes that I spend too much time on UWorld, but I think I'm going to start making a few more cards. How do you squeeze BnB in?
 
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pbrocks15 said:
Did you start Zanki during dedicated? I feel like most people who do/did zanki during dedicated had already matured most of the cards anyways. I've done pretty much the entire deck (minus micro and biochem and some other things ~ a few thousand cards) but I never keep up with a deck after my exam ends.

My thought process here is to see if it is worth doing the path and physio decks during dedicated. Pharm and Micro I'm doing sketchy for.
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I had done maybe 2-3 sections of it (some path stuff for the last few blocks) but that was about it. But I had done other notecards for all of pre-clinical. So since you've already been doing Zanki, I think you're in a good spot!
 
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Okazaki Frag Grenade said:
I had done maybe 2-3 sections of it (some path stuff for the last few blocks) but that was about it. But I had done other notecards for all of pre-clinical. So since you've already been doing Zanki, I think you're in a good spot!
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I guess my issue is that I stop doing it after the system is completed so I don't feel like I was doing it properly. That's why I was considering doing the pathology decks again, but I'm straying away from that right now, it might take too much time.


Foramenlacerum said:
My exam was Nothing like the NBMEs. So I recommend UW because I did all three question banks and my exam was most similar to UW. If UW was written by Satan
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That's good to know! I feel like everyone has a different experience but this makes me more comfortable as I love doing UWorld and although I wish I learned more from it during the year, I'm going to definitely work through it during dedicated. My issue is that I take about 4-5 hours to do and review a block, which is so time consuming I worry it would take my whole day away from other resources.
 
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pbrocks15 said:
I guess my issue is that I stop doing it after the system is completed so I don't feel like I was doing it properly. That's why I was considering doing the pathology decks again, but I'm straying away from that right now, it might take too much time.




That's good to know! I feel like everyone has a different experience but this makes me more comfortable as I love doing UWorld and although I wish I learned more from it during the year, I'm going to definitely work through it during dedicated. My issue is that I take about 4-5 hours to do and review a block, which is so time consuming I worry it would take my whole day away from other resources.
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If I could do it over again I would use only first aid and Uworld. The questions I know I got wrong are either things that were in FA that I missed or I wasn’t going to get them right anyway because I can’t know everything
 
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Exam coming up this week. My goal is 250+, but I'd be ecstatic to break 260.

Post-MS1 CBSE - 187 (had only covered foundations and Cardio/Resp/Renal systems)
Post-MS2 CBSE - 207

Vacation, then started dedicated (~5.5 weeks).

NBME 16 - 225 (6 weeks out - post-content review, hadn't started UW)
NBME 17 - 219 (5 weeks out - barely started UW)
UWSA 1 - 251 (4 weeks out)
NBME 19 - 230 (3 weeks out)
NBME 18 - 242 (2 weeks out)
Practice Session/F120 - 88% (1 week out, taken at prometric)
UWSA 2 - 254 (<1 week out)

First and only UW pass - 76% (started ~66%, last few blocks averaging 85%)

Any advice for the last few days to try and close the gap to a 260? I'm planning on reviewing Free 120 (briefly) and UWSA2. Will continue reviewing my UWorld Anki. Thinking about doing a combo of reviewing the first couple Pathoma chapters, skimming FA, and hitting topics I performed poorly on in UWSA2. Could also do NBMEs (probably offline, so as to not freak myself out).
 
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Foramenlacerum said:
If I could do it over again I would use only first aid and Uworld. The questions I know I got wrong are either things that were in FA that I missed or I wasn’t going to get them right anyway because I can’t know everything
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Good to know. Thanks for all the input and help.

Edit: do you think going through some kaplan questions quickly would be useful? I have the qbank but haven't used much of it at all.
 
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quick questions (and sorry might be a dumb one)

but my lowest section on my NBMEs seem to be evidence based medicine.. do you all know what types of questions/resources to read to improve that ?


Thanks!
 
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pbrocks15 said:
Good to know. Thanks for all the input and help.

Edit: do you think going through some kaplan questions quickly would be useful? I have the qbank but haven't used much of it at all.
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Depends, are you weak in some areas? I used it for micro during our class and got a killer grade on the shelf and that’s all the studying I did. I had essentially zero micro questions on my exam though and the one I had that I can remember was total BS. If you have thoroughly gone through UW and feel like you have time then it can’t hurt!
 
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Foramenlacerum said:
Depends, are you weak in some areas? I used it for micro during our class and got a killer grade on the shelf and that’s all the studying I did. I had essentially zero micro questions on my exam though and the one I had that I can remember was total BS. If you have thoroughly gone through UW and feel like you have time then it can’t hurt!
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I think I have random gaps in a few areas. I think its more times that I'm not the best test taker and I'll know the material but then I get to the questions and I'm like "WHAT ARE THEY ASKING?" and then I click it and i'm like "-___- wait I know this!!!"

That's my main goal I guess when deciding whether to use it or not. What do you think about using it for that?

ON A SIDE NOTE: you didn't have much micro?!?! I'm banking on micro and pharm being a good part of my studying, I thought micro and pharm are pretty high yield? Perhaps Im misinformed?
 
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pbrocks15 said:
I think I have random gaps in a few areas. I think its more times that I'm not the best test taker and I'll know the material but then I get to the questions and I'm like "WHAT ARE THEY ASKING?" and then I click it and i'm like "-___- wait I know this!!!"

That's my main goal I guess when deciding whether to use it or not. What do you think about using it for that?

ON A SIDE NOTE: you didn't have much micro?!?! I'm banking on micro and pharm being a good part of my studying, I thought micro and pharm are pretty high yield? Perhaps Im misinformed?
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Not sure if it helps but I had plenty of Micro on my exam and I thought UW was definitely enough if you go through it very thoroughly.
As far as pharm is concerned, I don't remember a single pharm question that couldn't be answered from UW explanations.
 
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pbrocks15 said:
I think I have random gaps in a few areas. I think its more times that I'm not the best test taker and I'll know the material but then I get to the questions and I'm like "WHAT ARE THEY ASKING?" and then I click it and i'm like "-___- wait I know this!!!"

That's my main goal I guess when deciding whether to use it or not. What do you think about using it for that?

ON A SIDE NOTE: you didn't have much micro?!?! I'm banking on micro and pharm being a good part of my studying, I thought micro and pharm are pretty high yield? Perhaps Im misinformed?
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Maybe I did and I just don’t remember because I was trying to fight back the tears of failure. Or maybe I only remember the one because it was the only micro question I missed. Who knows. The whole test was like the drunk night in college where you wake up and have no idea how you got there. I’ve never done that but I imagine this is what it would feel like.
 
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orangetea said:
quick questions (and sorry might be a dumb one)

but my lowest section on my NBMEs seem to be evidence based medicine.. do you all know what types of questions/resources to read to improve that ?


Thanks!
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Within evidenced based medicine it breaks it down by subject ... most of them were clinical pathology for me. Hope that helps


Sent from my iPhone using SDN mobile
 
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Is it normal to feel like you're doing a lot of educated guessing on NBME's?? Or do all of you smart people REALLY know that you're gonna get as many right as you actually do. I mark wayyyy more questions than I miss. Am I getting lucky or what? Should I be nervous?? Send help..😱

PS NBME 15, 16 & 17 have been 238, 252 & 259 respectively.. 2 and a half more weeks of dedicated
 
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medgal1025201 said:
Is it normal to feel like you're doing a lot of educated guessing on NBME's?? Or do all of you smart people REALLY know that you're gonna get as many right as you actually do. I mark wayyyy more questions than I miss. Am I getting lucky or what? Should I be nervous?? Send help..😱

PS NBME 15, 16 & 17 have been 238, 252 & 259 respectively.. 2 and a half more weeks of dedicated
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That is perfectly normal, I think! I got 255 on 17 and 261 on 18 and neither time did I feel particularly confident I was getting a high score. I would usually mark like 10 questions per block. Both times I was pleasantly surprised I only got 12 wrong (on each). I think you are doing great. If it was just one of the forms, then it could be luck but not with multiple forms. Just make sure you do 18 and 19 as questions on them were by far the most representative of the questions on the real exam, or at least that's how it seemed to me.
 
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Nephronlearner said:
Not sure if it helps but I had plenty of Micro on my exam and I thought UW was definitely enough if you go through it very thoroughly.
As far as pharm is concerned, I don't remember a single pharm question that couldn't be answered from UW explanations.
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That's good to know! Did you do Sketchy at all? I was just looking at some UWorld Pharm and sketchy was covering all the points I was looking at so that made me feel good. It just takes me a while bc I'm just starting sketchy anki now since I forgot everything.

Foramenlacerum said:
Maybe I did and I just don’t remember because I was trying to fight back the tears of failure. Or maybe I only remember the one because it was the only micro question I missed. Who knows. The whole test was like the drunk night in college where you wake up and have no idea how you got there. I’ve never done that but I imagine this is what it would feel like.
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HAHA I totally understand! Thanks for the help though. I guess you can always do your best and trust the process.
 
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pbrocks15 said:
That's good to know! Did you do Sketchy at all? I was just looking at some UWorld Pharm and sketchy was covering all the points I was looking at so that made me feel good. It just takes me a while bc I'm just starting sketchy anki now since I forgot everything.



HAHA I totally understand! Thanks for the help though. I guess you can always do your best and trust the process.
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I did not use Sketchy at all. I tried but after a while I found it a bit annoying and started forgetting what was in which image! I occasionally used some reference books (or even just googled) stuff when I wanted further explanation but that was really it. UW plus referencing FA really seemed to cover most of the material very, very well. The only things I found those resources lacking in were images (gram stains, autopsy specimens, etc).
At least on the test I got, the questions that couldn't be answered from those resources were mostly either bizarre ones that would require PhD-level knowledge or just extremely particular details that go beyond even the level of regular review books (eg, BRS, RR,...). I am pretty sure those questions made up less than 20% of the test.
In fact, I found myself missing multiple questions (at least 4 that I can remember) that I should never have missed as they were UW material so whatever score I end up getting, it could have been higher had I: learned UW better and/or got more sleep/focused better on the test day.
 
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I need some opinions. I'm wondering when I should take my next practice NBME. I have two more weeks of class and then dedicated starts. I'm out of town this weekend and we have a final exam the Monday after next weekend so that probably won't work, but I was thinking of taking one on the first day of dedicated. Or is that pointless and should i wait until my first week of dedicated is over?
 
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Can anyone comment on if they encountered concepts/questions that weren't on any of the NBME's or in Uworld? For example, I find myself glossing over all the EKG stuff because I have yet to have a pure EKG question in Uworld or any of the NBME's. Likewise, when reviewing FirstAid or other material, If I come across something I haven't seen tested, I gloss over it. Not sure if this is smart to help narrow things down or a pitfall that can backfire
 
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Mikeyyd34 said:
Can anyone comment on if they encountered concepts/questions that weren't on any of the NBME's or in Uworld? For example, I find myself glossing over all the EKG stuff because I have yet to have a pure EKG question in Uworld or any of the NBME's. Likewise, when reviewing FirstAid or other material, If I come across something I haven't seen tested, I gloss over it. Not sure if this is smart to help narrow things down or a pitfall that can backfire
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Just took it yesterday. Definitely had some non NBME/UWorld questions. There was actually one question where they gave an EKG that I only knew from learning it in class. Also, some questions were about the material in UWorld, but the answers were worded in a way that I did not expect, which made me feel like I was guessing despite knowing the material. Overall, not as bad as I expected based on some of the posts here.
 
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Mikeyyd34 said:
Can anyone comment on if they encountered concepts/questions that weren't on any of the NBME's or in Uworld? For example, I find myself glossing over all the EKG stuff because I have yet to have a pure EKG question in Uworld or any of the NBME's. Likewise, when reviewing FirstAid or other material, If I come across something I haven't seen tested, I gloss over it. Not sure if this is smart to help narrow things down or a pitfall that can backfire
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Like 50% of my exam. At least 10 questions I can specifically remember were not in Uworld, FA, any of the NBMEs, Pathoma, Kaplan Q bank or USMLERx. 3 anatomy questions for sure. I focused on really knowing the stuff that showed up over and over. That was a mistake as it seemed to be less than 50% of my exam. I had multiple questions that were one liners in FA as well. I.e not big topics. The idea isn’t to know everything. You can’t. But I wish I would have been more superficial. I know I don’t have my score yet, but the thing is that I felt and still feel pretty crappy about my exam. And I was very aware of what a train wreck it was while it was occurring. So even if my score is in the toilet (which I suspect it will be) I am basing my suggestions on what could have made it better. I think it’s far more effective to learn from people who feel like it was not the best experience because it’s easier to pin point what went wrong than it is to really nail down what helped.
 
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Also, if it makes anyone feel any better, I am the living embodiment of Murphy’s law. I’m the person that would be scoring 270s on NBMEs (I wasn’t) and would manage to score a 210 on the real deal. Or like when they say you need 85% to pass, I would get 84.999999% and they wouldn’t round up. So to those people who score consistently 230s on NBMEs and end up with a 265 on the real deal, I envy you. The universe loves you. Those experimental questions.... I probably got every single one of them right. And the ones I missed were probably ones 100% of people got correct. I have learned to embrace my misfortune. I feel like it is part of my inherently annoying yet somewhat endearing charm. I’m like a train wreck, you just can’t help but stare and wonder/kinda feel bad for me. Although I will say that when luck does come my way I am so tremendously grateful because it just doesn’t happen that often lol
 
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Nephronlearner said:
That is perfectly normal, I think! I got 255 on 17 and 261 on 18 and neither time did I feel particularly confident I was getting a high score. I would usually mark like 10 questions per block. Both times I was pleasantly surprised I only got 12 wrong (on each). I think you are doing great. If it was just one of the forms, then it could be luck but not with multiple forms. Just make sure you do 18 and 19 as questions on them were by far the most representative of the questions on the real exam, or at least that's how it seemed to me.
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Thank you so much! That’s pretty much exactly how I feel.. I was potentially planning on skipping 19 as to not totally crush my confidence, but you think it’s worth it to do it anyways?
 
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Love this thread- m1 here so I'm mainly just an observer. Good luck to everyone and thanks to all that are sharing.

Question for m2's/newly m3's- any tips on how you managed to get through q-banks during 2nd year before dedicated? Did you do q-bank at night / weekends (on the system that you were on or a system previously covered)?
 
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I have a question (not sure if anyone knows the answer). I decided not to make anki cards on wrongs but to just redo my wrongs to simulate repetition similar to anki. Anyone know if redoing wrongs (and getting them correct) alters the percent correct? or does it only account for the first-time answers? (would hope it only counts the first to get an accurate representation of my performance)
 
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blueeyedprincess said:
Just took it yesterday. Definitely had some non NBME/UWorld questions. There was actually one question where they gave an EKG that I only knew from learning it in class. Also, some questions were about the material in UWorld, but the answers were worded in a way that I did not expect, which made me feel like I was guessing despite knowing the material. Overall, not as bad as I expected based on some of the posts here.
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Foramenlacerum said:
Like 50% of my exam. At least 10 questions I can specifically remember were not in Uworld, FA, any of the NBMEs, Pathoma, Kaplan Q bank or USMLERx. 3 anatomy questions for sure. I focused on really knowing the stuff that showed up over and over. That was a mistake as it seemed to be less than 50% of my exam. I had multiple questions that were one liners in FA as well. I.e not big topics. The idea isn’t to know everything. You can’t. But I wish I would have been more superficial. I know I don’t have my score yet, but the thing is that I felt and still feel pretty crappy about my exam. And I was very aware of what a train wreck it was while it was occurring. So even if my score is in the toilet (which I suspect it will be) I am basing my suggestions on what could have made it better. I think it’s far more effective to learn from people who feel like it was not the best experience because it’s easier to pin point what went wrong than it is to really nail down what helped.
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So any suggestions then on how to possibly prepare for this type of stuff? I'm in a pretty solid point knowledge base wise and unfortunately, I can't move up my exam date. A change in pace in terms of different material would actually be nice at this point.
 
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Are the NBMEs easier than UWorld? I'm quite curious how people will get something like 85% on an NBME which translates to something like a 230, whereas you're at the median if you're hitting 63% on UW.
 
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Nephronlearner said:
I did not use Sketchy at all. I tried but after a while I found it a bit annoying and started forgetting what was in which image! I occasionally used some reference books (or even just googled) stuff when I wanted further explanation but that was really it. UW plus referencing FA really seemed to cover most of the material very, very well. The only things I found those resources lacking in were images (gram stains, autopsy specimens, etc).
At least on the test I got, the questions that couldn't be answered from those resources were mostly either bizarre ones that would require PhD-level knowledge or just extremely particular details that go beyond even the level of regular review books (eg, BRS, RR,...). I am pretty sure those questions made up less than 20% of the test.
In fact, I found myself missing multiple questions (at least 4 that I can remember) that I should never have missed as they were UW material so whatever score I end up getting, it could have been higher had I: learned UW better and/or got more sleep/focused better on the test day.
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I appreciate the input! I think I really have to learn the value of UWorld more. I think before I was just doing it and skimming the answer explanations. I mean I would read them but I wasn't digesting them bc my school is a little rigorous and has a lot going on all the time. Now that I'm aware I'm most definitely going to head into dedicated really spending the time to understand UW better instead of just swifting through it to make sure I get through it all quickly.
 
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NecFasc92 said:
Honestly I think a 196 on 19 is not too shabby this far out. Mind if I ask what your % is on uworld? Can PM me if you want.
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I was looking at the percent and it seems pretty rough that a 77% turned into a 196 lol.

Currently about 500Qs in and I'm at 68-70% but I've been doing by organ systems (with some topics like general principles and I&I added in which are the things bringing me down usually)

Thanks for replying!
 
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pbrocks15 said:
I appreciate the input! I think I really have to learn the value of UWorld more. I think before I was just doing it and skimming the answer explanations. I mean I would read them but I wasn't digesting them bc my school is a little rigorous and has a lot going on all the time. Now that I'm aware I'm most definitely going to head into dedicated really spending the time to understand UW better instead of just swifting through it to make sure I get through it all quickly.
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I definitely think UW is the best resource. I found FA incredibly difficult to read, probably in part because I have already graduated from med school so a big time gap (6 years for some of the courses) makes it difficult. However, the more clinical the question - the easier it is for me. That is why I spent a LOT of time trying to memorise details from FA at the expense of UW thinking "I need to know these things".
Then on the test day, I realised that a lot of the things that were only briefly mentioned in FA, and that UW turned into questions with decent explanations - ended up being important. So unless my exam was really a "one of a kind" thing, I would definitely rate UW explanations as the better of the two resources and even the "this cannot possibly be important" stuff in UW can actually be very relevant.
 
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Mikeyyd34 said:
So any suggestions then on how to possibly prepare for this type of stuff? I'm in a pretty solid point knowledge base wise and unfortunately, I can't move up my exam date. A change in pace in terms of different material would actually be nice at this point.
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I don't think you can. I would just keep trucking and really focus on UW an FA. If you are weak on basics or foundations work on that. Then you might be able to figure out the questions that you didn't necessarily study. I just got unlucky. For example, I was asked 4 questions on 2 topics that never came up in any of the Qbanks. So it wasn't like one question on a topic that wasn't high yield, there were multiple on the same topic. So just don't worry about it. Know what you know really well and just take a hit on the random questions you can prepare for or hope you get lucky.
 
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sharkbyte said:
Ah, I see. If you had to estimate, what % of each NBME is composed of those vague questions? It's not important haha, but was just curious.
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Not too many honestly, but you get stuck on them so you spend a disproportionate amount of time on them. Maybe like 10%?
 
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Well, ladies and gentlemen, I think this wild journey is just about coming to an end for me. In less than 48 hours, I will be done with Step 1. Tonight I will review some high-yield points that I tend to forget, and tomorrow will be mostly relaxation and mental preparation before the big day.

Clearly, I'm not going to be the guy to go in there and get a 250 or 260. I've never been that guy, and that's never been the goal. But I do think I've done everything in my power. I have reviewed thousands upon thousands of Anki cards every single day since September. I've done over 7000 practice questions since January. I pushed my dedicated all the way to the very end and gave up a pre-M3 vacation to squeeze out as much time as possible. I've done this while concurrently working on school material and research and maintaining my own life. I don't philosophically agree with the idea of a single test determining what career you're allowed to go into, but I have poured my entire soul into this and I truly don't have any regrets in terms of preparation. If this doesn't go as planned, it will not be because I didn't work hard enough.

Godspeed, everyone. It's been a pleasure to go from stressing out with a lot of you about getting accepted to medical school to stressing out about Step 1, and I look forward to stressing out about our specialty choices and match lists together in the near future.
 
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Foramenlacerum said:
I don't think you can. I would just keep trucking and really focus on UW an FA. If you are weak on basics or foundations work on that. Then you might be able to figure out the questions that you didn't necessarily study. I just got unlucky. For example, I was asked 4 questions on 2 topics that never came up in any of the Qbanks. So it wasn't like one question on a topic that wasn't high yield, there were multiple on the same topic. So just don't worry about it. Know what you know really well and just take a hit on the random questions you can prepare for or hope you get lucky.
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I appreciate that. I guess thats my biggest fear. Doing super solid on all these NBME's and UWorld, feeling confident, and then getting blind sided and possibly screwed hard by getting tested on infrequent concepts that aren't in my wheel house, but someone else's.
 
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