Some questions for those who’ve taken Step 1

[Peach Newport]

a few random, unrelated questions.

1) Lets day you took a reasonably intelligent person who had never set foot in a med school. You give him a copy of first aid, an infinite amount of time, and you have him take step 1 open-book with no time limit. How does he do?

2) what’s the best way to review first year material? I’ve heart that FA is very insufficient for biochem, and physiology.

3) How does step 1 deal with very recent changes in medical knowledge? For instance, the cutoff for hypertension was recently changed to 130/90 I believe.

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[psychMDhopefully]

a few random, unrelated questions.

1) Lets day you took a reasonably intelligent person who had never set foot in a med school. You give him a copy of first aid, an infinite amount of time, and you have him take step 1 open-book with no time limit. How does he do?

.

As someone who has failed step 1 twice, med students have very biased unrealistic views on a lot of stuff. The first being you can take any guy off the street give him FA and time to study and he can pass Step 1, I had a decent MCAT, never failed a single class in the first 2 years, and I just can’t get past this test. There is just way too much ****ing stuff to remember. Med students act as if its normal to be able to memorize everything in an 800 page book and a 2500 question bank, no that **** is not normal. No matter how many times I go over this **** I just can’t retain it and that’s probably genetic. A lot of med students don’t have problems with step 1 and assume because they didn’t they anybody could do it. Thats like saying anybody could be a running back in the NFL if they are willing to work hard enough.

 

[Newyawk]

a few random, unrelated questions.

1) Lets day you took a reasonably intelligent person who had never set foot in a med school. You give him a copy of first aid, an infinite amount of time, and you have him take step 1 open-book with no time limit. How does he do?

2) what’s the best way to review first year material? I’ve heart that FA is very insufficient for biochem, and physiology.

3) How does step 1 deal with very recent changes in medical knowledge? For instance, the cutoff for hypertension was recently changed to 130/90 I believe.

First aid is arguably one of the most overrated and overused books of all time (in my opinion). It tells you everything but teaches you practically nothing.

Step 1 is largely a thinking exam. Having a book that spits facts at you will only help you so much.

 

[teenagemutant]

First aid is arguably one of the most overrated and overused books of all time (in my opinion). It tells you everything but teaches you practically nothing.

Step 1 is largely a thinking exam. Having a book that spits facts at you will only help you so much.

What do you mean by "thinking exam"?

 

[Newyawk]

What do you mean by "thinking exam"?

For one, first aid often doesnt go into enough detail about how symptoms actually present to be sufficient to answer a question. For example, a guy with hematuria could have a kidney stone because of hypercalciuria, bladder cancer, pyelonephritis, hyperparathyroidism, nephritis, etc.
While it will give you enough info to rule some of these out, without prior medical education it would be difficult to understand how to navigate the book to determine an answer.
Sure, some of the Qs are "what drug causes this condition (aka side effect)" which first aid almost invariably will cover. But even then, it may say "thrombocytopenia" and the exam wont say that exact word, itll just show a decreased platelet count. So no, a person with no medical background cannot be given first aid and do well on the exam.

Granted, these arent even the questions that trip most med students up. Most med students know these things already. Most med students have gone thru first aid at least once - some several times - before step 1 and STILL do poorly. How? No, its not because they needed 10 more passes. Perhaps its because their intelligence is limited. But i think a major issue is a poor preclinical education and moreover poor effort on the part of the student for the past 2 years. first aid doesnt compensate for 2 years of poor education. You would need months and months of actual tutoring/lecturing to compensate for that.

In fact, most students i know who bombed step 1 were those who chose to cram with first aid before every exam all thruout med school. I guarantee you those students thought they were benefiting themselves because im sure they heard from their upper years that first aid is everything. I know because i heard the same things, i just refused to listen.

 

[Brucelaa67]

To answer your 1st question is pretty difficult.
A reasonably intelligent person, even without medical background, while reading First-Aid will have doubts, will be eager to understand the mechanism behind various stuff written in first aid (They do explain lot of things, but still lot many remain mentioned just as facts). So s/he'll naturally consult other resources, which'll lead to better understanding of the concepts, something that is vital for a good score exam.
So, if we say we give the First Aid to a 'Robot', who can memorize and apply things based only on Fist Aid, then it might become difficult to even pass the exam.

 

[68PGunner]

For one, first aid often doesnt go into enough detail about how symptoms actually present to be sufficient to answer a question. For example, a guy with hematuria could have a kidney stone because of hypercalciuria, bladder cancer, pyelonephritis, hyperparathyroidism, nephritis, etc.
While it will give you enough info to rule some of these out, without prior medical education it would be difficult to understand how to navigate the book to determine an answer.
Sure, some of the Qs are "what drug causes this condition (aka side effect)" which first aid almost invariably will cover. But even then, it may say "thrombocytopenia" and the exam wont say that exact word, itll just show a decreased platelet count. So no, a person with no medical background cannot be given first aid and do well on the exam.

Granted, these arent even the questions that trip most med students up. Most med students know these things already. Most med students have gone thru first aid at least once - some several times - before step 1 and STILL do poorly. How? No, its not because they needed 10 more passes. Perhaps its because their intelligence is limited. But i think a major issue is a poor preclinical education and moreover poor effort on the part of the student for the past 2 years. first aid doesnt compensate for 2 years of poor education. You would need months and months of actual tutoring/lecturing to compensate for that.

In fact, most students i know who bombed step 1 were those who chose to cram with first aid before every exam all thruout med school. I guarantee you those students thought they were benefiting themselves because im sure they heard from their upper years that first aid is everything. I know because i heard the same things, i just refused to listen.

What about doing a crap ton of Qbank quests?

 

[Newyawk]

What about doing a crap ton of Qbank quests?

Qs are vital. Do a lot of them, treat the explanations like a textbook, and youll learn a lot.
Doing Qs is one of the few ways to really challenge your knowledge/thinking.

 

[arcus]

First aid is arguably one of the most overrated and overused books of all time (in my opinion). It tells you everything but teaches you practically nothing..

FA is not meant to teach but rather review. So that is your first mistake

Step 1 is largely a thinking exam. Having a book that spits facts at you will only help you so much.

Half of Step 1 is rote memorization so FA comes in handy. The other half is analytical concepts.

The “thinking part” is what you develop during your first two years of PreClinical's. No book can teach you that

IOW, you can not breeze through it with a review book. You have to acquire the understanding and that lots of work and time, an awful lot of studying core concepts and practicing thoudands of practice questions in multiple tests over and over and over again

If it were easy everybody would score a 270