~80% is my average with ~65%% of the bank completed. I wish pathoma went over biochem. Thats why it is frustrating. I seem to do fine on uworld but NBMEs peg me as average.
Make sure you use boards and beyond for biochem. definitely worth it. that's a good average so those 87s aren't a fluke and I don't think it's an issue with stamina since you were getting 87s on uworld blocks at the end. not sure what to say other than keep at it and keep doing more practice questions
Nothing like a 67% resulting in 60 new anki cards from the first uworld block of dedicated to kick yourself into high gear.
4-5 of ridiculously dumb errors but thankfully nothing that seemed far out of left field, probably thanks to zanki. Felt like the foundation from zanki let me immediately hone in on the parts of the explanation I didn’t know yet super fast.
Took exactly 3 hours to complete + review which is a pace I’m quite happy with.
Does anyone have suggestions on what my first practice exam should be for a baseline? I’m saving UWSA1,2 and NBME 18,21 for later into dedicated.
Just got 215 on NBME 16. I’m admittedly a little bummed since I wanted to get at least a 220. I only got below borderline performance on 4 subjects overall so I’m taking that as a positive and now I gotta got those areas hard. Im 8 weeks out and I’m hoping that 240 is still a possibility.
Does gardner syndrome no longer include fibromatosis/retroperitoneal fibrosis? My 2017 copy of pathoma has it but FA 2019 and firecracker database dont (but have other stuff such as hypertrophy of retinal pigment epithelium and impacted/supernumerary teeth).
Just got 215 on NBME 16. I’m admittedly a little bummed since I wanted to get at least a 220. I only got below borderline performance on 4 subjects overall so I’m taking that as a positive and now I gotta got those areas hard. Im 8 weeks out and I’m hoping that 240 is still a possibility.
IMO seems like a lot of people in this thread are getting knocked down by 16, myself included. Regardless thats a great baseline and making a 30-40point stride in 8 weeks is absolutely not unheard of and seems decently doable from previous posts. Hit those weaknesses and keep chugging!
I 've done forms 13,15,17,19 so far and keeping 18 for a few days out of the exam. I might have time for another 1-2 until then. Shall I choose 16 + a new one or swap 16 and do two new ones?
Finally broke the 240 barrier on NBME 20, although there were a decent amount of repeats from 16/17. Probably a tad inflated but still felt a lot better seeing that on the screen than the 228 of Monday. The curve on the new NBME's is much nicer so there is that. I think I missed like 38 compared to the 28 I missed on Monday and was 12 points higher.
It appears the new NBME's do have a bit more critical thinking involved, I even had a few questions that felt a bit MCATy by even if you didn't have any clue what they were talking about you could reason through the graph that they gave you and eliminate answers.
Just finished! Honestly feel more anxious now than I did before/during. Gonna be a long 3 weeks...
I feel bad now because, paradoxically, I felt fine throughout. 90% of really high scorers seem like they felt terrible after the test so that's actually worrying me. I felt similarly to how I feel now after NBME 20, which was my worst NBME. I don't think I hit the high range of my scores (I changed a bunch of answers first block, which means probably at least 50% of them wrong), probably somewhere a little below my average, though I'd be totally fine with that.
The test was really not that bad. There were maybe 5 truly WTF questions (things I had never seen before and probably never would have seen no matter how long I studied, similar to the
thiazide diuretics causing galactorrhea
question), not even 1/block. I will say that there were probably an additional 5/block that seemed WTF at first but were actually things you could think through - definitely didn't feel confident on these, but they weren't one line recall where you knew it or not. Probably an additional 5 that I had no idea on but were on things I might have encountered with studying longer (IE, not truly WTF).
In general, questions felt pretty similar to UWorld/Free 120. Definitely less like the NBMEs. There are occasional super long questions, often including lab values - I read 100% of the question on these maybe once. Looking at the final line, the line before, the answer choices, and the labs was almost always enoughr. I finished first run through with about 20 minutes left each block - similar to my UWorld timing. I marked and moved on more liberally in this because I was worried about running out of time, but finished reviewing marked questions with about 5 minutes remaining on most sections.
Though I never really trusted the write-ups on general content (test to test and person to person variation makes these pretty unreliable, to my opinion), I'll give my thoughts anyways:
Biostats was pretty easy, ethics was bimodal, biochem had some toughies - definitely didn't feel like biochem was as de-emphasized as some other people. Ascultations were easy (auscultation was really clear and nice, much better than UWorld sound quality). I felt like I was pretty light on neuroanatomy, which I'm grateful for. A lot of cardio. Not very much pulm. Balanced amount of GI/renal. Basically felt like the whole thing was pretty balanced overall, although certain specific topics showed up more than expected - I had 2 syndrome of apparent mineralocorticoid excess questions, and I don't think I saw any of those in UWorld?
Either way, very glad I'm done. I plan on doing a much more full write-up when I get my scores back. But for now imma celebrate (aka get drunk by myself while I wait for my fiancee to get out of work). Good luck to everybody still slogging through the trenches, we're all gonna make it!
Does gardner syndrome no longer include fibromatosis/retroperitoneal fibrosis? My 2017 copy of pathoma has it but FA 2019 and firecracker database dont (but have other stuff such as hypertrophy of retinal pigment epithelium and impacted/supernumerary teeth).
Just use the FOREST mnemonic. There's a garden in the forest or some ****.
F = FAP
O = Osteoma
RE = Retinal epithelium hypertrophy
ST = Supernumerary teeth
So... I don’t even know for sure cause no one has ever sat me down and been like “this is what the free120 is”... but from trying to figure it out on my own I think it’s this and bookmarked the link:
Like 1200ish Zanki and a few hundred for sketchy, so like 1500 total too...it's helping a lot for UWORLD though so I think it's worth it. UWORLD is a higher yield use of my time though, I think
Just got 215 on NBME 16. I’m admittedly a little bummed since I wanted to get at least a 220. I only got below borderline performance on 4 subjects overall so I’m taking that as a positive and now I gotta got those areas hard. Im 8 weeks out and I’m hoping that 240 is still a possibility.
Same goal and also hoping for your baseline but have a weirder/unoptimized dedicated schedule. May I ask what resources you used before your dedicated?
Like 1200ish Zanki and a few hundred for sketchy, so like 1500 total too...it's helping a lot for UWORLD though so I think it's worth it. UWORLD is a higher yield use of my time though, I think
Yup I’m about the same. 1k light year, ~200 Uworld and a few hundred sketchy. I’m half way through Uworld and have seen a big jump in my scores. Started at 60% and the last 15 blocks or so have been a ~75% average I see so many straight recall from my light year deck it’s crazy.
Uworld (2 blocks) w review and anki take about 7-8 hours total and it leaves ~4hours for review of topics (BnB videos mainly). I think I’m going to keep this up for the next two weeks and reavulate with ~4weeks left
Yup I’m about the same. 1k light year, ~200 Uworld and a few hundred sketchy. I’m half way through Uworld and have seen a big jump in my scores. Started at 60% and the last 15 blocks or so have been a ~75% average I see so many straight recall from my light year deck it’s crazy.
Uworld (2 blocks) w review and anki take about 7-8 hours total and it leaves ~4hours for review of topics (BnB videos mainly). I think I’m going to keep this up for the next two weeks and reavulate with ~4weeks left
Same goal and also hoping for your baseline but have a weirder/unoptimized dedicated schedule. May I ask what resources you used before your dedicated?
I've mainly done Zanki (but not super diligently as my school schedule didn't really allow for that) and I did a full pass of UWorld. I also used USMLERx and COMBANK sparingly. My dedicated schedule isn't great either, I have a bunch of school responsibilities through most of it. Good luck! I hope you get your goal score!
UW has a lot more straight recall than you would think. They simply disguise it really well. If you read the question, look at the options they give you, and then read the second to last sentence you can already kinda figure out what they want most of the time, at that point it's just skimming the rest of the stem to make sure there isn't a hidden piece of info in there that would change your answer.
I use the light year deck which is based off of BnB videos. It’s really well done in my opinion. I started with zanki for a couple months but then made a 180 and jumped ship to lightyear. Happy I did, I feel it is the superior deck (although both get the job done)
The only cards I make are from uworld, which I sometimes add screen shots from FA if it could use a good visual
I've mainly done Zanki (but not super diligently as my school schedule didn't really allow for that) and I did a full pass of UWorld. I also used USMLERx and COMBANK sparingly. My dedicated schedule isn't great either, I have a bunch of school responsibilities through most of it. Good luck! I hope you get your goal score!
Same here but without the uworld pass. Had to take like one day or two every two weeks because exams and have school responsibilities as well. I hope we all get what we need!
What is the consensus on the UWorld anki decks out there?
Zanki and Pepper both have versions, but I was wondering if these give away answers for a 'false' elevation in your qbank/UWSA score, or if the cards are done well enough to truly teach all the concepts, and thus have a 'true' elevation in your score.
What is the consensus on the UWorld anki decks out there?
Zanki and Pepper both have versions, but I was wondering if these give away answers for a 'false' elevation in your qbank/UWSA score, or if the cards are done well enough to truly teach all the concepts, and thus have a 'true' elevation in your score.
Alright somebody give me some tips here. Haven’t started dedicated yet, will have about 5 weeks (awesome!) but have been working like mad for the past little while. Taking the exam 6/17.
A little over 2/3 of the way through uworld at 58% (using it as learning tool, plan to go through it again). Trending up, last practice exam was UWSA1 at 215 a couple weeks ago. I hadn’t finished looking through renal, repro, derm, or neuro yet so there’s definitely room to improve there. Also fought off some exam fatigue by the third and fourth block. Scheduled to take an NBME on Thursday.
Finished reading and annotating BRS path and phys, along with taking their little practice exams in the books. So I’m completely through the pathophys things now
Been through FA 1x annotating along with B&B. Working through sketchy pharm for the second time currently. Already done sketchy micro.
Trying for 230-240. 240 I would be stoked. Most of my uworld questions I’m at the point where I narrow it down to 2 and it’s about a 60/40 split that I get the right answer out of those two.
Thinking of going through uworld again, doing timed random, as well as thoroughly reading FA and maybe watching some sketchy alongside or redoing some BRS pathophys things.
Any tips/what do you think of that plan? I know I’m not superhuman like a lot of you guys and if you have any extra brainpower you’d wanna lend me it’d be much appreciated, but I’m currently having that classic internal struggle. Trying to figure out how to do this as been a little tough since Anki is not my friend haha sorry for the wall of text but I appreciate any ideas. Thanks
NBME 24 - 194. 7.5 weeks out. Little bummed. Did awful in Neuro section in particular. Should I be worried? UFAPS + BB. Averaging about 100 UWORLD questions a day. Cramfighter being used as well.
Alright somebody give me some tips here. Haven’t started dedicated yet, will have about 5 weeks (awesome!) but have been working like mad for the past little while. Taking the exam 6/17.
A little over 2/3 of the way through uworld at 58% (using it as learning tool, plan to go through it again). Trending up, last practice exam was UWSA1 at 215 a couple weeks ago. I hadn’t finished looking through renal, repro, derm, or neuro yet so there’s definitely room to improve there. Also fought off some exam fatigue by the third and fourth block. Scheduled to take an NBME on Thursday.
Finished reading and annotating BRS path and phys, along with taking their little practice exams in the books. So I’m completely through the pathophys things now
Been through FA 1x annotating along with B&B. Working through sketchy pharm for the second time currently. Already done sketchy micro.
Trying for 230-240. 240 I would be stoked. Most of my uworld questions I’m at the point where I narrow it down to 2 and it’s about a 60/40 split that I get the right answer out of those two.
Thinking of going through uworld again, doing timed random, as well as thoroughly reading FA and maybe watching some sketchy alongside or redoing some BRS pathophys things.
Any tips/what do you think of that plan? I know I’m not superhuman like a lot of you guys and if you have any extra brainpower you’d wanna lend me it’d be much appreciated, but I’m currently having that classic internal struggle. Trying to figure out how to do this as been a little tough since Anki is not my friend haha sorry for the wall of text but I appreciate any ideas. Thanks
Boards and Beyond for basic science/phys/biostats, Sketchy micro/pharm, Pathoma for path. Go over your weaknesses in FA every few days. Hammer UW like mad. Take as many practice tests as you can afford. That's pretty much what i'm doing except I'm doing anki for some of this stuff instead of watching the vids.
Boards and Beyond for basic science/phys/biostats, Sketchy micro/pharm, Pathoma for path. Go over your weaknesses in FA every few days. Hammer UW like mad. Take as many practice tests as you can afford. That's pretty much what i'm doing except I'm doing anki for some of this stuff instead of watching the vids.
yeah I've felt like I've made a lot of progress working through uworld, definitely learning the questioning styles works well. Those explanations are money. Doing about 80ish questions a day so should be finished with 1 pass of uworld by the time dedicated starts. Do you think reading through FA even just to try to remember charts and things will be worthwhile? I'm hesitant to rewatch a lot of B&B because at this point I'm not sure how much passive learning will be good for me and the paranoia is kicking in
yeah I've felt like I've made a lot of progress working through uworld, definitely learning the questioning styles works well. Those explanations are money. Doing about 80ish questions a day so should be finished with 1 pass of uworld by the time dedicated starts. Do you think reading through FA even just to try to remember charts and things will be worthwhile? I'm hesitant to rewatch a lot of B&B because at this point I'm not sure how much passive learning will be good for me and the paranoia is kicking in
Alright thanks I appreciate it. I bought all the NBMEs except the new ones that just came out, gonna take them weekly. Also still have UWSA2 to work through but I was gonna save that for last. Man I just wanna hit 230ish minimum so I can not get the DO bias when it comes to some of the more stingy neuro places
Alright thanks I appreciate it. I bought all the NBMEs except the new ones that just came out, gonna take them weekly. Also still have UWSA2 to work through but I was gonna save that for last. Man I just wanna hit 230ish minimum so I can not get the DO bias when it comes to some of the more stingy neuro places
NBME 24 - 194. 7.5 weeks out. Little bummed. Did awful in Neuro section in particular. Should I be worried? UFAPS + BB. Averaging about 100 UWORLD questions a day. Cramfighter being used as well.
I mean I doubt that many people who get 250s on the real test are getting 270s on UWSA1. You should be happy with your score, just don't get complacent and keep grinding!
I mean I doubt that many people who get 250s on the real test are getting 270s on UWSA1. You should be happy with your score, just don't get complacent and keep grinding!
Oh I'm very happy with my score, was just making a comment that id be even happier if i could take that score at face value lol. I definitely am feeling the burn out lately and have caught myself several times thinking "why dont i just move it up and take whatever score i can get", just want this whole thing to be over with. But you're right gotta keep my head down and keep grinding to do as well as I can, so I don't look back and say "could have done better if i worked a little harder". Just tough to keep the motivation going haha
Oh I'm very happy with my score, was just making a comment that id be even happier if i could take that score at face value lol. I definitely am feeling the burn out lately and have caught myself several times thinking "why dont i just move it up and take whatever score i can get", just want this whole thing to be over with. But you're right gotta keep my head down and keep grinding to do as well as I can, so I don't look back and say "could have done better if i worked a little harder". Just tough to keep the motivation going haha
What % correct was that? Do the Uworld assessments feel the same as typical Uworld questions (I.e your percent correct was similar to your most recent uworld averages)?
What % correct was that? Do the Uworld assessments feel the same as typical Uworld questions (I.e your percent correct was similar to your most recent uworld averages)?
My 247 was a 75% I think. Which is right in line with my UW average of 74. The questions had a decent mix of traditional UW type questions and NBME style 2 liner types. One thing that is the same across all of these practice tests is that a handful of questions can be HUGE for your score, I had one section at a 65% and it cost me at least 5 points on my overall score. My close friend had an 80% overall and that was a 258, so the 8 questions were an 11 point swing. The NBME's can be even more drastic.
What % correct was that? Do the Uworld assessments feel the same as typical Uworld questions (I.e your percent correct was similar to your most recent uworld averages)?
It's a little less than 84% correct which is on par with my UW % which is sitting at around 83% for 20% done rn. I'd say the questions are extremely similar, there was maybe 2-3 one sentence questions thrown in though that were straight know this fact, but that was the only non-UW like thing i noticed. Also one block had like 4 stats questions bunched up right at the end which was fun. But timing for me and average length of the stem overall very similar.
What % correct was that? Do the Uworld assessments feel the same as typical Uworld questions (I.e your percent correct was similar to your most recent uworld averages)?
84% was a 264 for me and my uworld ended up being just under 80%. Super similar question style to me. But way different than the new NBMEs IMO. I feel like I guess much, much better on UWorld questions. I’ll take UW2 this week though and see if that changes haha
What is the consensus on memorizing structure of every virus?
Rx loves these questions (enveloped linear dsDNA, etc). I'm finding it impossible to keep them all straight, and wonder if it's a big waste of mental space to even try.
What is the consensus on memorizing structure of every virus?
Rx loves these questions (enveloped linear dsDNA, etc). I'm finding it impossible to keep them all straight, and wonder if it's a big waste of mental space to even try.
What's the best resource for behavioral sciences? Is there a good video series or book available?
I've gone through the boards and beyond content but I feel like it's too basic to get all the UWorld questions right
What's the best resource for behavioral sciences? Is there a good video series or book available?
I've gone through the boards and beyond content but I feel like it's too basic to get all the UWorld questions right
BnB was pretty solid for it in my opinion. I think the trick is to try and scale everything down. It seems to me, after doing some NBMEs and UWSA along with regular UW, that any q asking about what's the diagnosis will revolve around the timeline. So know that cold. Know for schizo its 6 months, MDD is 2+ weeks, and Manic is over a week and hypomanic is over 4 days, etc etc. That alone I think can help you cross out multiple wrong answers.
