Second year/ Step I books

[Futuredoc1364]

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Hi everyone and congrats to all who recently got their step I scores. I am beginning my second year in a few weeks.

One person in my med school who recently took step I made me this offer about USMLE step I books which seems to be great, but I thought I could ask for your feedback about it.

4 USMLE Kaplan books and First Aid 2007 for $160.

How good are the Kaplan books for the boards? Also is it a big deal if I use first aid 2007 instead of the new version which will come out next year?

I remember during MCAT time I had much more time to study and it was less material and I still didn't get to go through all the practice questions and books, etc. I understand for step I, there are only about 4 weeks to study and a TON of material. Hence, why so many people on this forum and in my med school talk about high yield stuff.

This is funny, there are some of my classmates that are studying for step I during this summer. I am not because I remember during MCAT I studied a bit before my prep class started but I didnt really learn a lot. The irony was that I was beating myself up during my actual class time that I didnt have enough fun before the hard-core studying was necessary.

I will do some search here myself also, but I really appreciate your feedback. Also what other recommendations do you have about good books for step I?

One more thing. 😳 I know I have so successfully managed to take this thread in all kinds of directions. During my first-year I realized that I don't really benefit from reading the required or recommended books that much. The lectures all came with powerpoint files and when I didn't understand something I would just burrow the book from the library and read it.

My friend said that the Lilly cardiology book is a must-have. For those of you who like myself do not rely on outside texts that much, do you have any recommendations for the books that I ABSOLUTELY, DEFINITELY need for second year.

Thanks!😍

 

[E92]

hi, my roommates and i both scored 245+ using roughly the same material. first off, neither of us attended any lectures so keep that in mind (our school's lectures are of little/no use in terms of teachign boards material) so i would study at home using boards books while everyone else was wasting time learning about new research that some of our faculty were doing in their respective fields

i bought those 4 kaplan books and used them to study for the classes and tests. the 2 organs systems books were pretty much falling apart from usage, while the other 2 books were touched only in the 5 weeks preceding step1. those 4, along with: brs physio, brs behavioral, brs pathology, goljan pathology, hiyield biochem, FA 2008, and kaplan qbank, usmlerx, usmleworld were what i used basically to teach myself all of 2nd year. that lilly cardio book was good to pass our school tests, but you definitely do NOT need it for step1. waaaaay too detailed.

i did kaplan qbanks during the actual school year to help learn, and usmlerx during the month before step1. i started usmleworld but honestly i felt that those questions were pretty ridiculous. it would go into levels of detail that i couldnt find anywhere

books you ABSOUTELY NEED: brs physio, rr path and/or brs path, FA2008
and definitely buy the newest edition of FA you can. its waht 35 bucks, they add new content every year and there were 50+ official, known errors in 2008 which hopefully will be fixed