COMLEX Official 2019 Comlex 1 Experiences and Scores Thread

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ASGD1983

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It's that time of the year. Anyone took new Comsae recently? Hopefully it's more predicitve than old ones that were all over the place - like +/- 100 points.
Also, interesting to hear if this years comlex is indeed changed? If anyone took it recently - please share your experience. Especially if you can compare it to previous year one.
 
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EspressoDrip42 said:
One other question... How was the biochemistry? On our schools comsae last month there was barely any biochem on that thing. And the other comsaes I've taken had close to zero true biochem questions. It seems like it's just heavy micro pharm, with path and then a lot of biostats/epi and weird legal questions
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Biochem was either very straight forward or totally obscure. Not really HY. Micro was definitely more HY than anything so I would review sketchy or go over flowcharts of tests and differentiators. Phys, Anatomy, OMM, and Pharm I felt were very reasonable and pretty straight forward. If you have time do a once over of Pathoma on 2x speed just to be familiar with the pictures and understanding of processes. I missed 2-3 points that I definitely would have gotten had I did another quick review of Pathoma. Hope that helps.
 
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EspressoDrip42 said:
One other question... How was the biochemistry? On our schools comsae last month there was barely any biochem on that thing. And the other comsaes I've taken had close to zero true biochem questions. It seems like it's just heavy micro pharm, with path and then a lot of biostats/epi and weird legal questions
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For Biostats as long as you’ve reviewed you should be solid, and I mean honestly at this point how are you going to review ethics this close to game time. Both of those sections were pretty self explanatory so I wouldn’t worry too much about it.
 
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phagocytosis41 said:
I stand by what I said. I think Biochem was HY for me. @ EspressoDrip42: By the way, ethics and medical law were also present, HY. Def study that
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Each exam is going to be different. I think if you've looked over FA Biochem and completed UWorld then you should be good. Ethics, Biostats, Medical Law were all present but for me was likely a smaller percentage than phagocytosis41. Micro is HY on everyone's exam, as is pathology from what I've gathered from people who have taken it. According to the Blueprint your most likely highest percentages are going to come from OMM, MSK, and Neuro. Each of these 3 sections I would say I felt pretty confident on with the occasional WTH is that type of question. You can probably expect ~40 OMM questions, 52 MSK, and 40 Neuro based on the minimal percentages given on the blueprint, whereas Interpersonal and Communication Skills, Professionalism, and Practice Based Learning and Improvement will combined account for roughly 44 questions. No real breakdown was given for Biostats but I would assume that it should fall in one of those components.
 
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phagocytosis41 said:
Micro, Pharm, and the most randomest OPP and Path stuff. They were Very very picky on the Pharm, literally to the third order level. No joke. I would brush up on pharm. Micro was very HY but pretty straight forward. Also def. look over path and phys.
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Would you say sketchy is sufficient for the micro in the exam? Or would I need to use additional resources (I have Clinical Micro Made Ridiculously Simple as one of my book references for micro)
 
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Is the COMSAE 101 supposed to be predictive, or underpredictive? I scored <380 and am struggling here, but I have a little under 6 weeks before I have to take it. Only care to pass and move on.
 
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Arcanine said:
Is the COMSAE 101 supposed to be predictive, or underpredictive? I scored <380 and am struggling here, but I have a little under 6 weeks before I have to take it. Only care to pass and move on.
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Consensus so far on sdn and reddit is that new comsaes (101, 102 ... etc) are if anything - underpredictive. However, since we don't have a first wave of comlex scores out yet to compare comsaes to comlex - it is advised to exercise caution. I think new comase is underpedicting by at least 50-70 points. Highest old vs new comsae difference seen was 150 points - when same person took old comsae and then new comsae within couple weeks if I'm not mistaken (old comsaes were removed from website in April). 150 points might be a stretch and n=1, but 50-70 is what I think it really is - based on national average comsae score drop this year (compared to previous year). It dropped by about 50-70 points. Also, imho new comsaes are not necessarily harder, it might be that NBOME just decided to score them using harsher curve (easiest approach). Also, comlex is twice as long (400 questions) so keep that in mind too, fatigue is real and it's a marathon. Impossible to maintain concentration, focus, clear mind and speed.

P.S. I personally think this test is unfair to all of us, it became a reading speed test and stamina test more then anything. You have to basically guess on answer while still reading question to make it in time. Or hope that you will see a keyword and save time avoiding reading everything on question. I would rather have 280 questions like in step 1 or even 200 is enough imho. Just make questions such that we can have time to read and reason through, to apply logic, to have time to calculate, weigh in on answers etc. Unfortunately as it is now - we are mainly just speed reading often skipping half of question and data to just quickly guess most likely choice and hope that luck is on our side. This kind of test is degrading.
 
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TheTeacher said:
anyone here anything about comsae 104? how is it? @AnatomyGrey12 you mentioned you've taken a few right?
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104 is the one I haven't taken unfortunately so can't comment.
ASGD1983 said:
P.S. I personally think this test is unfair to all of us, it became a reading speed test and stamina test more then anything. You have to basically guess on answer while still reading question to make it in time. Or hope that you will see a keyword and save time avoiding reading everything on question. I would rather have 280 questions like in step 1 or even 200 is enough imho. Just make questions such that we can have time to read and reason through, to apply logic, to have time to calculate, weigh in on answers etc. Unfortunately as it is now - we are mainly just speed reading often skipping half of question and data to just quickly guess most likely choice and hope that luck is on our side. This kind of test is degrading.
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This. It is SO irritating that we get less time per question for COMLEX when the stems are as long as they are. Especially with a crappy delivery system that glitches when you try and scroll. The NBOME is a joke. If any other business were run this inefficiently they would have been closed down a very long time ago.
 
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Does anyone know if COMLEX has questions that automatically get thrown out, like "trial" questions? Like how it is on Step? If so any estimate on how many?
 
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EspressoDrip42 said:
Does anyone know if COMLEX has questions that automatically get thrown out, like "trial" questions? Like how it is on Step? If so any estimate on how many?
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I don’t think so according to their site:

“With the exception of pretest questions, which do not contribute to the scores candidates receive, each test question contributes equally to the candidate’s score. The total reported score is a model-based standard score that takes into account the response to each question and the psychometric properties of the examination.”
 
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AnatomyGrey12 said:
Glad I'm not the only one who has no idea what that means.
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I imagine they have a sensor in the mouse to measure our CRI. With the way my sphenoid is flapping its wings under stress there is bound to be a veritable air current in the prometric test center.
 
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sunshinefl said:
Hoping more experienced people chime in. Our school bought us 102 and 104 to take on our own, and 105 for proctored qualifying exam. I planned on taking one a couple days before the proctored exam to see if I’m ready (we can pick from 5 proctored dates), and one between my Step and my comlex.
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When is your 105?
 
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Sthpawslugger said:
When is your 105?
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Our school’s first administration was yesterday 5/29. I didn’t take it but some of the class did. I’m planning on taking the 2nd one 6/4.

I only know one persons specific score and they got a 466 (so passed the 450 requirement) who scored over 500 on 102 and 104 they gave us for practice. Everyone’s consensus was that it was extremely hard and with poor questions.
 
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sunshinefl said:
Our school’s first administration was yesterday 5/29. I didn’t take it but some of the class did. I’m planning on taking the 2nd one 6/4.

I only know one persons specific score and they got a 466 (so passed the 450 requirement) who scored over 500 on 102 and 104 they gave us for practice. Everyone’s consensus was that it was extremely hard and with poor questions.
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sending you PM.
 
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So does anyone know when is first batch of scores released for new comlex? According to NBOME new Level 1 started from May 1st and first scores released will be in July 1st (they need extended time for first batch). So I guess 1 month left till we have some first new comsae vs new comlex correlation stats. I might be wrong.
 
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Took it today. My exam crashed twice and they had to restart the computer. Super frustrating.

It was easier than my schools COMSAE, a lot less vague. Easier than step. A lot of first order questions. OMM was hard. I’m bad at cranial lol. Ethics questions were hard. Look over policy/insurance stuff.
 
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cjcarter said:
Took it today. My exam crashed twice and they had to restart the computer. Super frustrating.

It was easier than my schools COMSAE, a lot less vague. Easier than step. A lot of first order questions. OMM was hard. I’m bad at cranial lol. Ethics questions were hard. Look over policy/insurance stuff.
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which COMSAE did you take?
 
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phagocytosis41 said:
Micro, Pharm, and the most randomest OPP and Path stuff. They were Very very picky on the Pharm, literally to the third order level. No joke. I would brush up on pharm. Micro was very HY but pretty straight forward. Also def. look over path and phys.
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Would knowing the details in FA pharm be enough to reason through or what would you suggest?
 
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Arcanine said:
Is the COMSAE 101 supposed to be predictive, or underpredictive? I scored <380 and am struggling here, but I have a little under 6 weeks before I have to take it. Only care to pass and move on.
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I took it and did poorly on it and it freaked me out to the core. I talked to several people in my class and after lurking on forums, it seems scores dropped by 70-100 pts for that one form. I'm not sure about the other forms. Anyone else take the other 2 and have comments?
 
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COMLEX is next week and planning on doing some sort of practice test tomorrow. Should I do a COMSAE + 200 COMQUEST/UWorld questions to simulate the exam? Or should I just take a UWorld test? Any thoughts would be appreciated!
 
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All I can say about COMQUEST is it's a joke IMO. The questions seem too easy. I'm just using them for OMM and ethics. I'd say do a COMSAE and a COMBANK or UW.
 
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ASGD1983 said:
Thank you for sharing! Would you say comlex question stem length was similar to UW?
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I would say it was more similar to UW than COMBANK. COMBAK had like paragraph stems. I had a couple longer stems, but a lot of it was extraneous info that you didn’t need. For the most part they were normal length. Sometimes stems just seem longer than they actually are bc they give you the vitals and labs in tables that take up a lot of space.
 
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cjcarter said:
I would say it was more similar to UW than COMBANK. COMBAK had like paragraph stems. I had a couple longer stems, but a lot of it was extraneous info that you didn’t need. For the most part they were normal length. Sometimes stems just seem longer than they actually are bc they give you the vitals and labs in tables that take up a lot of space.
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Would you say the question style was similar to comquest or combank?
 
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bravenugget21 said:
Would you say the question style was similar to comquest or combank?
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I didn’t do comquest but I’d say like 75% of the questions on my exam were similar to COMBANK. Maybe I got lucky with my form but I didn’t think it was as vague or terrible (for the most part) as people on here are saying.
 
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cjcarter said:
I didn’t do comquest but I’d say like 75% of the questions on my exam were similar to COMBANK. Maybe I got lucky with my form but I didn’t think it was as vague or terrible (for the most part) as people on here are saying.
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How about the pharm and micro? Was it enough to know the stuff in FA or were they trickier and require you to really know the minute details?
 
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bravenugget21 said:
How about the pharm and micro? Was it enough to know the stuff in FA or were they trickier and require you to really know the minute details?
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I did have a couple tricky micro and pharm questions. One of the micro ones I’m still not sure what the answer was. But sketchy covered mostly everything. I wouldn’t worry about these tricky questions. There wasn’t a lot on my exam and so just take your best guess and move on is my advice!
 
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MCAT - June 2016 - 501

1st semester GPA - 2.53
2nd semester GPA - 2.56
3rd semester GPA - 2.84
4th semester GPA - 2.90

COMSAE Form E - 1/25/19 - 481
COMSAE Form D - 6/03/19 - 486
COMSAE 105 - 6/04/19 - 402
-------- COMLEX 1 - 7/2/19 - 458

COMATs 2019-2020
Surgery - 100
OMM - 91
Family Med 1 - 96
Family Med 2 - 99
Emergency Med - 103
OBGYN - 102
Internal 1 - 99
Internal 2 - 100
Pediatrics - 96
Psychiatry - 96

Step 2/Level 2 Scores.
NBME 6 - 215 - 6 weeks out
NBME 7 - 185 - 4.5 weeks out
UWSA 1 - 238 - 2 weeks out
UWSA 2 - 240 - 1 week out


I'll come back and update as my scores come in.
 
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Do we have to know EKG and crazy ethics stuff on the comlex? Also is Uworld enough to pass?

Anyone found it really hard? I feel like this is hard.
 
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tdap201827 said:
Would you say doing Uworld helped the most? Anything you would have done different? Btw they make a new exam for everyday right?
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I haven’t taken COMLEX yet, sorry. I should have been more clear. I was referring to the COMSAE I took. But honestly boards and beyond has been my primary content source, and then I supplement that by practice questions on UWorld.
 
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tdap201827 said:
Would you say doing Uworld helped the most? Anything you would have done different? Btw they make a new exam for everyday right?
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IMHO UW gets you through most of scenarios and concepts that may be asked so it's best qbank (a learning qbank). However, you need to have baseline knowledge before UW to get most out of it. And for that baseline knowledge you can use lots of other resources be it B&B, FA, etc or any combo of resources what most of us end up doing anyway.
 
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Taking COMSAE 105 in a couple days...need to get a certain score so my school lets me take boards. is it unreasonable that I'm nervous as hell? I'm comfortably passing NBMEs with like 220s and have looked over OMM but suddenly feel like I know nothing
 
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Chibucks15 said:
Taking COMSAE 105 in a couple days...need to get a certain score so my school lets me take boards. is it unreasonable that I'm nervous as hell? I'm comfortably passing NBMEs with like 220s and have looked over OMM but suddenly feel like I know nothing
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Im like bottom 15% of my class, had hardly done 20 percent of UWORLD, hadnt studied that hard yet, and got a passing score on the 105 two weeks ago. My score might be a fluke, but youll be fine
 
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USAFMDO said:
Im like bottom 15% of my class, had hardly done 20 percent of UWORLD, hadnt studied that hard yet, and got a passing score on the 105 two weeks ago. My score might be a fluke, but youll be fine
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Appreciate the confidence boost. The neuroticism has mostly faded from my pre-med years but damn if it doesn't show its face during dedicated
 
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Chibucks15 said:
Taking COMSAE 105 in a couple days...need to get a certain score so my school lets me take boards. is it unreasonable that I'm nervous as hell? I'm comfortably passing NBMEs with like 220s and have looked over OMM but suddenly feel like I know nothing
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You'll be good. I bet you break 500 with how much prep you've done (this is like top quartile judging from the stats on our class COMSAEs). Look over your MSK anatomy again, I feel like every COMSAE has tons of MSK anatomy.
 
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