One month to go: some reassurance would be nice, this is a long read sorry :/

[PokerDoc]

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First of all, you guys have all been amazing, most people I know shy away from SDN because it hurts their confidence but I've found you guys to have been nothing but helpful constructively and confidence wise.

ANyways,
I am not looking for a confidence boost but was just looking for any criticism or critique or +/- suggestions for the plan I have set up for myself.


-As of 11pm last night, I have read all my books once, completed USMLERx (about 2 weeks ago for that), have done 125 USMLEWorld questions (57%).

here is my plan of action, would love some feedback:

1) Today: Question block full 48 on Uworld, highlighting and taking notes on tutor mode, going to read that 'high yield tables' section in the back of FA, its the only thing I haven't read yet. I also plan on going through and really looking at all the FA HY images all in a row and seeing if I can guess the pathology before reading the description (i'm finding that these images are incredible and keep popping up in Qbank questions). Then I want to reread Micro in FA with all my brand new annotations since that is def the toughest for me, especially the treatments. Then to end the night, I plan on going back to review the 48 question block I'm about to do right now and annotate my notes into FA (I like to do it hours later to see what I actually remembered and what I am still glossing over even after reading the explanation).


2) Tomorrow: First full length assessment test: I am going to use USMLEWORLD Form 2. I have doctors apt at 830 AM.. so I am going to wake up at 7 eat breakfast and get that taken care of, then go to the schools library. Do 2 of the blocks, eat lunch, then do the last 2 blocks.
-GYM BREAK
-Then probably spending the rest of the day going over the full length and seeing where I went well and where I went poorly

3) Friday I plan on focusing again on some more micro and particularly this time on treatments, and side-effects adverse reactions of drugs. again, this is a weak point for me, I will also fill the rest of the day up with random high yield topics that I did poorly on in the assessment.

4) Saturday: I got softball game, gonna enjoy that, then probably do 2 48q blocks and that will consume most of my day. I will then probably scale back a bit because....

5) Sunday: Doctors in training course starts: so from the 6-20th I will be doing that. I imagine the 5 hrs a day with the course will be taxing, plus I havent about half of his bi-weekly email questions so I will be doing those too in the afternoons.. During this time I envision waking up in the morning and reviewing the previous nights question block which will take 1:30hr or so... then doing the DIT segment for that day, then doing a question block or two depending how I am feeling, and then whatever remaining time I have will be subject specific. However I think on day 8 or 9 I will do USMLEWORLD assessment #1.

6) The 21st might have to be a day off
7) 22nd: USMLE Full Length #6
8) 23rd-27th Pounding out UWorld questions like crazy, goljan audio w/ transcripts as more toned down high yield studying so I don't go nuts, and shoring up weak areas
9) 28th: USMLE World Full length #7

10) Cross my fingers and do whatever I can, mainly practice questions.




feedback? thanks so much in advance

 

[desijigga]

Looks like an intense plan, but if you stick to it I assume you will be good for the USMLE. Only suggestion might be to take atleast one NBME before the real deal, I have no idea how UW assessment exams are but if they are anything like UW then they should be good.

 

[PokerDoc]

Looks like an intense plan, but if you stick to it I assume you will be good for the USMLE. Only suggestion might be to take atleast one NBME before the real deal, I have no idea how UW assessment exams are but if they are anything like UW then they should be good.

well as you can see i have NBME forms 6 and 7 built in there.. so i'll be taking two actual ones

 

[aashkab]

more world of warcraft needs to be built in. along with bicep curls.

 

[2001bmw330xi]

well as you can see i have NBME forms 6 and 7 built in there.. so i'll be taking two actual ones

in the original post, you wrote "USMLE World", and "USMLE" 6 and 7, not NBME 😛

 

[PokerDoc]

in the original post, you wrote "USMLE World", and "USMLE" 6 and 7, not NBME 😛

oops, well i meant nbme 6 and 7

 

[Domenech]

Have you made some adjustments for the FIFA World Cup?

 

[PokerDoc]

Have you made some adjustments for the FIFA World Cup?

Resisting watching the Yankees every night is MUCH more of a problem for me.. i time dinner to be during the games, and then end up sitting there for too long and all the sudden its 10pm lol

 

[HTxFrog]

I'm always in favor of going over RR again if you have time. If you have a month you'll easily get through world, and DIT will get you through fa x1 probably pretty in depth from what I hear. If you don't want to just use a plan like Taus for the last two weeks you should figure out how to cram as much as possible in that time period. If you study world, FA, and RR (as time allows) for a month straight you should be golden. Sounds like you've got a good plan lined up. Good luck!

 

[PokerDoc]

So I took the UWorld Self-Assessment #2 today... my 3 dig score ended up being a 201 which obviously is nothing to overreact about since my exam date is still 4 weeks away, I haven't looked over what I got wrong, I'll do that tonite I need a big ass break right now but what do you guys think about these observations:


1) I ran out of time on every single block.. I've never had this happen before when I did timed blocks on USMLERx or our school's NBME exams. Is this a UW thing, or should I be working on timing strategies for the NBME practice as well (now I'm wondering if I should do an NBME practice earlier to see how the timing works). I generally had 2-4 questions left when I hit the 1:30 remaining mark

2) of the 4 blocks, my % breakdown were 60%, 60%, 39%, 54%. So basically one block wrecked me and the others weren't so bad even though they all felt horrible while I was taking them. I'll have to analyze more in depth what I got wrong (a quick glance at the bar graphs showed that I didn't really have any glaring weakness except pharmacology and in that third block I got 9 pharms wrong out of 12).


So what do you guys think.. a 201 on UW form 2 with 4 weeks to go.. 230 still possible?

 

[hartbot]

Sure, thats a lot of time. FYI, going over 200 questions takes a lot of time. For me, thats the benefit of having 2 weeks for the test.

And can can anybody tell me if UWSA 1 is equally difficult as UWSA 2?

 

[kryptik]

i havent taken the uwsa yet, will be taking them soon, as far as timing, you should really try not to dwell on questions you cant come up with the answer within a minute, pick an answer and flag the question, if you have extra time at the end you come back to flagged questions.
230 should be attainable with 4 weeks left

 

[Waysensei]

I concur.

more world of warcraft needs to be built in. along with bicep curls.

 

[aashkab]

hahaha waysensei, pokerdoc is my friend in RL. lol, so i always tease him.

don't sweat it poker doc. you haven't started UWORLD or DIT yet. that's why i'm holding off on my practice test still because we really weren't even exposed to everything in FA throughout the year. just bust it hard and active learning till test date. gluck buddy.

 

[PokerDoc]

I found it interesting that the one real horrible block was the one I did right after lunch (i intentionally started my test so that there would be a lunch break after block 2)... I'll have to see if on the next go around my worst block is after lunch.. if that keeps happening, I may stock up on power bars and power my way through the exam without stopping lol

 

[HTxFrog]

I think that block was just harder on UWSA2 if I'm remembering right. I took it about a week ago and I remember one of my blocks was 20% lower than the others and I think it was block 3

 

[PokerDoc]

I think that block was just harder on UWSA2 if I'm remembering right. I took it about a week ago and I remember one of my blocks was 20% lower than the others and I think it was block 3

I started going over my exam.. and its def taking forever, and im basically picking out 10-15 per block that I marked ot look at again in a week/annotate in FA.

But im even more encouraged right now because the last 4 answers in all 4 of my blocks were all wrong.. its obviously my lack of practice with time management negatively affected my score significantly. So I think theres even more hope for me to really bring this up.

I think what I might start doing is 2 blocks of UW a day, one timed, one tutor. Just to work on timing, and I will immediately review the timed block after I punch a wall or something.

 

[hartbot]

Haha chill dude. UW is a puzzle and it doesnt take long to decipher what the question is actually asking for. Once you start doing more questions the answers will pop out at you

 

[PokerDoc]

Haha chill dude. UW is a puzzle and it doesnt take long to decipher what the question is actually asking for. Once you start doing more questions the answers will pop out at you

sorry, apparently my sarcastic attempt at humor isnt as easily deciphered on a message board as in real life