Pathology Shelf Exam 2011

[DrMetal]

Anyone taken the Pathology Shelf Exam recently? Can you offer some kind words of guidance???

Am planning on studying from Goljan RR, and Robbins, then doing questions from the Goljan QBank (I have Uworld too, but would rather save those for the big dance). Any thoughts on this study technique?

Much thanks. . .

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[DrJD]

I would love to hear what people have to say about this as well!

 

[RySerr21]

Just took it a few weeks ago. Dont even bother w/ Robbins. Goljan essentially wrote the answer key to this exam. No joke. I used Goljan as my sole source throughout the year and tried to review as much as possible for the shelf (we only had 4 days). I used the first 3 days to review as much as possible - i looked over the stuff that I had not studied in a long time and the stuff I had the most trouble with previously. I hoped that the stuff I didn't have time for was going to be fresh enough to do me well for the exam. The last day I did kaplan questions b/c i wanted to save uworld for step studying.

Honestly there were very few questions that were not in Goljan. A lot of stuff I just didnt remeber cuz i didnt have enough time to review but at the least the question and answers sounded similar b/c i read it in Goljan.

There were probably about 10 questions with pictures out of 125 but none of them were necessary to answer the question correctly. One of them I thought you needed to know the picture to get the question but then I read the question again more carefully and you cuold figure it out w/ other clues. This is was clutch b/c i hate looking at path slides and pictures and try to rely on the question if at all possible.

Seriously, the more you know from Goljan, the more questions you will get right. I looked at the general path section of FA to see whta they thought you should know for the tumor markers and stuff, but other than that didnt look at it. Goljan all the way.

 

[panencephalitis]

Just took it a few weeks ago. Thought it was a lot less detail oriented than some of the qbanks tend to be (kaplan). There were a lot of association questions, what rash is associated with a particular GI disorder type things. Know all your tumor markers, characteristic "cells seen in ___" type questions, bone lesions associated with particular cancers, genetic disorders (annoying because they don't just ask for identification of the disorder). I read through Goljan once and thought that was enough to do pretty well. I only got to listen to the audio for about 12 of those chapters but he talks a lot and I had 5 days so had to choose reading over listening, but I don't think that affected my score.

 

[DrMetal]

Great advice guys, thanks!

 

[Day man]

Take mine first week of may...going to go through kaplan qbank/RX and chapter by chapter in goljan, and trying to make my first pass through FA. Hoping GT makes the process at least a little less painful...we shall see though.

 

[RedVelvet1]

Did it really follow this format:

Organ Systems 60%-65%
Hematopoietic & lymphoreticular 10%-5%
Central & peripheral nervous 10%-5%
Cardiovascular 10%-5%
Gastrointestinal 10%-5%
Renal/urinary 10%-5%
Reproductive 10%-5%
Skin & related connective tissue 10%-5%
Respiratory 5%-1%
Endocrine 5%-1%
Musculoskeletal 5%-1%


General Principles 35%-40%
Biology of Tissue Response 15%-10%
Immune Responses 10%-5%
Multisystem Processes 10%-5%
Microbial Biology and Infection 5%-1%
Human Development and Genetics 5%-1%
Cell Biology 5%-1%

 

[RySerr21]

Did it really follow this format:

Organ Systems 60%-65%
Hematopoietic & lymphoreticular 10%-5%
Central & peripheral nervous 10%-5%
Cardiovascular 10%-5%
Gastrointestinal 10%-5%
Renal/urinary 10%-5%
Reproductive 10%-5%
Skin & related connective tissue 10%-5%
Respiratory 5%-1%
Endocrine 5%-1%
Musculoskeletal 5%-1%


General Principles 35%-40%
Biology of Tissue Response 15%-10%
Immune Responses 10%-5%
Multisystem Processes 10%-5%
Microbial Biology and Infection 5%-1%
Human Development and Genetics 5%-1%
Cell Biology 5%-1%

yea pretty much

 

[RedVelvet1]

it was said that the stems are SHORTER than Robbins Qbank, and that 1st Edition Robbins QBook is a better resource since its stems are shorter

I'm sticking with the newest version since I don't know what to do.

Is this true?

 

[RySerr21]

i dont recall them being overly long. I'm a fast test taker tho. I finished with half hour left out of 2 1/2 hours given. I know people that ran out of time tho, so i think it really depends how fast of a test taker you are.

 

[RedVelvet1]

So I've given up on using 5 sources.

My hope now: To do all the USMLE World questions by then.

And hopefully Goljan audio (transcript).

 

[olemissbabydoc]

Anyone taken the Pathology Shelf Exam recently? Can you offer some kind words of guidance???

Am planning on studying from Goljan RR, and Robbins, then doing questions from the Goljan QBank (I have Uworld too, but would rather save those for the big dance). Any thoughts on this study technique?

Much thanks. . .

Took it this morning. Goljan was money, and I did the comprehensive review in BRS. We have a really strong path department here, but overall, I didn't find this shelf to be nearly as bad as some (read: micro).

 

[RadOncRocks]

Took it this morning. Goljan was money, and I did the comprehensive review in BRS. We have a really strong path department here, but overall, I didn't find this shelf to be nearly as bad as some (read: micro).

Thats funny, I took micro today and thought it was WAY easier than Path. Haha

 

[DrMetal]

Took it this morning. Goljan was money, and I did the comprehensive review in BRS. We have a really strong path department here, but overall, I didn't find this shelf to be nearly as bad as some (read: micro).

Thanks for the input, good idea about BRS.

Just outta curiosity, what do you guys think is the best way to study Goljan RR? Its 600 pages, if you could know all of it, of course that'd be ideal. Do you think its all high yield? Is time better spent focusing on, say, the blue boxes, or the blue margin notes??

 

[Day man]

Thanks for the input, good idea about BRS.

Just outta curiosity, what do you guys think is the best way to study Goljan RR? Its 600 pages, if you could know all of it, of course that'd be ideal. Do you think its all high yield? Is time better spent focusing on, say, the blue boxes, or the blue margin notes??

I'm (taking a break now) from reading margin notes/things I've written in...then I'll go through Rx and finish up questions for each section (which was hard for general path since there's NO questions there...). Probably going to re-read the neoplasia, environmental, and some of those basic chapters to make sure I remember everything. Test in 5 days...these finals seem so irrelevant it's not even funny.

 

[RySerr21]

Thanks for the input, good idea about BRS.

Just outta curiosity, what do you guys think is the best way to study Goljan RR? Its 600 pages, if you could know all of it, of course that'd be ideal. Do you think its all high yield? Is time better spent focusing on, say, the blue boxes, or the blue margin notes??

yes, its high yield. He could change the titlte to "answer key to the pathology shelf exam."

i was crunched for tim on this exam, so i just read the chapters i felt i needed the most work on. If you can read it all, do it. If not, read however much you can.

 

[Mace1370]

Here is what I don't follow about people's advice to read Goljan for the path shelf.

It's ~600 pages of highly dense material. If you read it once, for the very first time, how much would you really remember? I would guess very little. I assume it is only worth using if you have been using it throughout the year and have already studied it fairly thoroughly.

 

[Day man]

Here is what I don't follow about people's advice to read Goljan for the path shelf.

It's ~600 pages of highly dense material. If you read it once, for the very first time, how much would you really remember? I would guess very little. I assume it is only worth using if you have been using it throughout the year and have already studied it fairly thoroughly.

yea there's no point to try to cram the 600p into ~5-7days prior to the path shelf. i would just do questions at that point...if you used it throughout the year (along with the audio), going through the margin notes he/I wrote jogs the memory. or at least i hope so?

 

[ParabolaMDPHd]

Just took this exam earlier this week.

I used Rapid Review and had to cram in alot of the info not covered in my lectures in four days. However all in all, I still stand behind Rapid Review. The shelf was rough but I felt i did fine with using rapid review.

This may be emphasized by some of your professors but to reiterate, if you're used to memorizing buzz words or key words for path, you're going to have to take a different root for this exam and Step 1 as well. The exam requires the ability to tie 3-4 small details together to find the correct answer. For example, something like On a mission trip, you see a young African boy with a rapidly enlarging mass on his jaw, what translocation would you expect to see upon biopsy? So the question requires you to take clinical info, diagnose the disease and know the pathological characteristics of the disease or vice versa. Simply put, you gotta know everything

 

[Day man]

So are the questions any different from qbanks or the Robbins book?

Just took this exam earlier this week.

I used Rapid Review and had to cram in alot of the info not covered in my lectures in four days. However all in all, I still stand behind Rapid Review. The shelf was rough but I felt i did fine with using rapid review.

This may be emphasized by some of your professors but to reiterate, if you're used to memorizing buzz words or key words for path, you're going to have to take a different root for this exam and Step 1 as well. The exam requires the ability to tie 3-4 small details together to find the correct answer. For example, something like On a mission trip, you see a young African boy with a rapidly enlarging mass on his jaw, what translocation would you expect to see upon biopsy? So the question requires you to take clinical info, diagnose the disease and know the pathological characteristics of the disease or vice versa. Simply put, you gotta know everything

 

[ParabolaMDPHd]

So are the questions any different from qbanks or the Robbins book?

No, not really. UW is very similar to the path shelf

 

[RySerr21]

So are the questions any different from qbanks or the Robbins book?

robbins is way harder than any question you'll see. If you just understand how diseases present clincally, you will know most of the answers. There were quite a few buzz words. Not necessarily the most common things, but things that if you knew the disease well, you would know right away what they were talking about. Goljan has everything. The qbanks and Goljan are everything you need.

 

[Mace1370]

robbins is way harder than any question you'll see. If you just understand how diseases present clincally, you will know most of the answers. There were quite a few buzz words. Not necessarily the most common things, but things that if you knew the disease well, you would know right away what they were talking about. Goljan has everything. The qbanks and Goljan are everything you need.

Robbins Qs are probably way more detailed (haven't taken the shelf yet, just assuming) but I don't think the shelf or step path questions will be the same style as Robbins, either. Robbins questions give you a ton of hints. They practically list every fact about the disease in the question. I doubt shelf qs or step qs will be so generous.

 

[DrMetal]

No, not really. UW is very similar to the path shelf

UW has 2 divisions, 'Pathology' and 'Pathophysiology'. Many books make this distinction too.

The pathophys questions, of course, focus more on the phsyiology induced by the pathology, so the question will be about a heart murmur, pressure profiles, etc etc. I find them to be hard. Were there many pathophys type questions on the shelf, or more strict traditional path?

 

[RySerr21]

UW has 2 divisions, 'Pathology' and 'Pathophysiology'. Many books make this distinction too.

The pathophys questions, of course, focus more on the phsyiology induced by the pathology, so the question will be about a heart murmur, pressure profiles, etc etc. I find them to be hard. Were there many pathophys type questions on the shelf, or more strict traditional path?

ya those uworld pathophys cardio questions were ridiculous. Very good questions though. To answer your question, no there werent any like that. Its pretty much just straight path.

 

[Day man]

UW has 2 divisions, 'Pathology' and 'Pathophysiology'. Many books make this distinction too.

The pathophys questions, of course, focus more on the phsyiology induced by the pathology, so the question will be about a heart murmur, pressure profiles, etc etc. I find them to be hard. Were there many pathophys type questions on the shelf, or more strict traditional path?

i'll let you know how it is tomorrow. i did all the rx questions for each section and was able to review most of rapid review. feel pretty good about everything...minus neuro. i loathe that damn subject.

 

[RadOncRocks]

UW has 2 divisions, 'Pathology' and 'Pathophysiology'. Many books make this distinction too.

The pathophys questions, of course, focus more on the phsyiology induced by the pathology, so the question will be about a heart murmur, pressure profiles, etc etc. I find them to be hard. Were there many pathophys type questions on the shelf, or more strict traditional path?

DON"T do "pathophys" questions in prep for this. It is all Path!

 

[justaregularmed]

I really appreciate how Review of Pathology builds on itself and really attacks common diseases in each organ system over and over again while giving lip service to the zebras. I'm a fan.

The big thing that people dislike as stated above is the questions are all one off's. They either give you the symptoms and the diagnosis or ask a question about the diagnosis without giving it, so you really have to know your stuff. But like I said it builds on itself pretty heavily so this becomes easier with every organ system.

 

[RadOncRocks]

Can anyone else confirm? I was planning on doing all the Qbank questions for path + pathophys, so this should cut down my questions by 1/3

nvm, looks like ryserr said the same thing...

I promise! There weren't any of the questions where you have to pick from a bunch of arrows etc. I wish I had just focused on the path only questions, but alas that is life.

 

[Day man]

overall, not too terrible. 1st shelf i've ever taken, so can't really gauge it compared to others. out of the 125?, i probably marked ~20-25 (i mark anything i'm not 100% on) i wasn't sure of. after looking some stuff up, educated guess seemed to be right but there are definitely a few questions i'm still not sure of, and kind of thought were way to vague.

one pointer i will say, is make sure you know your basic path/immuno cold. i don't know if everyone has the same exam, but mine was chock full of this stuff and i can assume this is the way the new step1 will be. long disease course blah blah...cell type or cytokine question. after reading this thread, i actually expected it to be much easier, but in retrospect it was about what i expected. fwiw, i only used goljan and RX, i was scoring ~82% on the path/pathophys blocks. best of luck to everyone who still has to take it.

 

[justaregularmed]

With every passing day I dislike RR more and more. The tables almost make me homicidal sometimes.

 

[Mace1370]

With every passing day I dislike RR more and more. The tables almost make me homicidal sometimes.

I feel your pain

I've been taking small, 20 question UWorld path blocks in between RR chapters. 60% is definitely my average. Worst part is that there are definitely one or two questions that I should be getting out of the ones I get wrong. Sigh.

 

[justaregularmed]

The test literally had everything on it (hint hint). It certainly had some zingers but overall it was not overly difficult. The biggest issue I would say is running out of time if you were not prepared (not that you couldn't answer the questions with all the time in the world). I was honestly surprised by how straightforward the questions were as a whole.

Won't comment on content because I'm anal retentive like that sorry.

 

[RySerr21]

With every passing day I dislike RR more and more. The tables almost make me homicidal sometimes.

learn to love it. its literally the answer key.

 

[Quinone]

learn to love it. its literally the answer key.

Yep...Goljan is MONEY. Took the path shelf today, and I think at least 80% of the questions were straight out of RR. The audio files are also useful.

 

[RedVelvet1]

For all those who think Goljan RR is too dense:

I thought so too! I took the shelf today. Here is what I would advise:

Do all the world questions. If you feel rushed for time, atleast read the answer and skim the explanations (what I did towards the end).

Do the Robbins questions from the main chapters (I didn't have time to do all this myself).

Read First Aid along with the world questions. Going over First Aid 3 times is ideal.

For any chapters you don't understand, do Goljan audio/transcript.

* I felt bad about not going thru Goljan, especially since many 3rd years advised me too. But everytime I opened it, it was way too dense for me and frustrated me!

Expect to not know the answers to all of them! Schools curve your shelf so no need to freak out

 

[justdoit31]

I have this shelf and the path one on Friday (school takes our highest of the two towards our grade so I'm putting my money on path)

I'm planning on using FA and then UW as I have time (I have done 75% of UW while going through the semester so some subjects don't have any unused questions left).

Will post my experience after I get done.

 

[fahimaz7]

I can't believe that you guys take these things so seriously. Our grades aren't influenced once single bit by the shelf exams, so we just show up and take the thing. We average about the national average on it (as a class), so....

Plus, I can't imagine doing 2000 questions for a stupid shelf exam (Uworld Path x3? Seriously?)

 

[Quinone]

I can't believe that you guys take these things so seriously. Our grades aren't influenced once single bit by the shelf exams

Well, that's nice for you, but not all schools are like that. Our behavioral shelf, for example, is worth 60% of our final grade. So it's not wrong for people to take them seriously/prepare intensively.

 

[fahimaz7]

Well, that's nice for you, but not all schools are like that. Our behavioral shelf, for example, is worth 60% of our final grade. So it's not wrong for people to take them seriously/prepare intensively.

Nothing wrong at all... Just sucks to have to put that much effort into something like a shelf exam.

 

[Day man]

Well, that's nice for you, but not all schools are like that. Our behavioral shelf, for example, is worth 60% of our final grade. So it's not wrong for people to take them seriously/prepare intensively.

what was up with that BSP exam...could there be anymore subjective questions? good lord

and yea, bsp is 40%, path is 33%. not really a bad thing...studying for this = studying for step 1

 

[justdoit31]

and yea, bsp is 40%, path is 33%. not really a bad thing...studying for this = studying for step 1

and I don't even have to pass the shelf to pass the class- I have a huge cushion so it isn't that bad just good motivation to focus on studying more.

 

[fahimaz7]

For the guys who get graded on these things, are you in a pass/fail system?

 

[Mace1370]

For the guys who get graded on these things, are you in a pass/fail system?

We are graded on the shelves and are on a letter system (A through F).

 

[Day man]

we're pass fail...and those are the only shelves we take.

 

[justdoit31]

For the guys who get graded on these things, are you in a pass/fail system?

H (>92), HP (87-92), P (75-87), MP (70-75), Fail.

Our class doesn't have to pass the shelfs but the class under us now has to get over a 70 to pass the individual blocks. We use a mix of actual shelfs and customized shelfs as finals for each block except our clinical skills course. Almost all of them have been curved to some degree- Physiology was the major exception.

 

[justaregularmed]

I think my final parting shot for this thread will summarize what I've seen. Absolutely everything is tested (some stuff that was emphatically denied to be on it earlier in this thread showed up on my exam).

The question stems are not overly long nor is the exam overly difficult but if you are not well prepared you will struggle to finish as you only have slightly over 1 minute per question.

Just prepare completely by any historically reliable resource and you'll be fine, if you are a slow test taker you may want to do some questions to work on pace.

 

[fahimaz7]

We took the Pharm, Path, Micro, and Immunology shelf exams. The pharm and Path ones were interesting (at least fun to take), while the MI exam was abouta s boring as it could possibly be.

 

[Mace1370]

I did 3 blocks of UWorld path on timed, random today with an overall average of 70% on the three blocks. Where does that put me in regards to the path shelf?

 

[olemissbabydoc]

We have to pass the NBME in each class to pass the class.