Studying in Clinical Years

[NewZealandStudent32]

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[LChristmas]

www.onlinemeded.com is probably the best resource I found for the clinical years.

 

[ButterButter]

Step Up to Medicine is a great book. Mostly for internal medicine, but great breakdown of disease, workup and treatment by organ system. I liked Surgery Recall for surgery and the Case Files series for OB, peds and family medicine. I also bought a UWorld subscription and did questions for the block I was in. I learned a good deal from UpToDate by keeping a tiny notepad on me at all times and writing down disease states and looking them up. Know basically 1) what it is 2) how to diagnose it and 3) how to treat it. UpToDate will give you all this information!

 

[shadowlightfox]

I feel like onlinemeded is overhyped. It was definitely useful for obgyn, but I had a hard time getting the most out of it for peds and psych.

 

[Stagg737]

I feel like onlinemeded is overhyped. It was definitely useful for obgyn, but I had a hard time getting the most out of it for peds and psych.

OME was garbage for psych two years ago and had a lot ignore straight up wrong info in it, especially in the pharm section. Apparently it has been edited and is now much better. Best source for psych is the FA for psych book hands down. Simple and very easy to get through in 4 weeks but had all the info needed to honor the shelf.

 

[ButterButter]

For me, OME was just concise little factoids that barely scratched the surface of what is useful for the clinical years. The people that found it useful in my class were either supplementing with other resources or were content with just passing exams and skating through blocks.

 

[LChristmas]

To each their own, I suppose. Everyone needs to find what works for them. I used OME and COMBANK and scored well on the shelf exams. Interestingly, psych was my best subject of 3rd year.

 

[shadowlightfox]

To each their own, I suppose. Everyone needs to find what works for them. I used OME and COMBANK and scored well on the shelf exams. Interestingly, psych was my best subject of 3rd year.

Psych might have been my worst. I just got done taking it, and my friend and I agree that roughly 30% of it was straight up geri and peds, and so many questions weren't in OME.

 

[Black Coffee 24/7]

OME is straight up trash. It’s a good resource to build a baseline if you’re satisfied with scoring 20-40% on your COMATs.

But, you need more in order to score 105+ on your COMATs.

Had been scoring 90s in both Surg and FM, mainly using OME videos and their notes.

Very disappointed especially when you’re honoring the rotation evaluations from preceptors.

Will incorporate Visitors and Zanki decks to my study and see how it goes from here.

 

[shadowlightfox]

Will incorporate Visitors and Zanki decks to my study and see how it goes from here.

WiWa's where it at, bruh! IMO I'm liking that better than Zanki for step 2! Not that Zanki step 2 was bad, of course!

 

[Stagg737]

Imo, Qbank + 1 text is the best method of studying for shelf exams. My school used all NBME exams other than FM, so I used UWorld (did every question) and a different textbook for each exam as follows:

OB/Gyn: Blueprints
Psych: FA for Psychiatry
IM: Did not use a textbook, just did all 1300 UWorld questions
Peds: BRS for peds (old, but still really good)
Surgery: Pestana (good enough to pass, probably not to honor unless you know it inside and out)
FM: Combank + Case Files + AAFP guidelines (this was my last shelf, so didn't really study much other than Qbank)

Imo those are the best resources for those exams. I wasn't a fan of Step Up, felt like way too much info to try and cover in a short period. The IM shelf was basically a smaller version of boards imo, and I wish I'd focused more on the questions than Step Up (as this was by far my worst shelf). I also like Case Files just as extra questions/resource for OB and psych. Didn't use it for other tests, but it was a good filler source (certainly NOT comprehensive though).

I'd also advice using the Lange QBank for psych instead of UWorld as the Uworld questions for psych were nothing like the shelf exam imo.

Edit: I'll also mention that I scored >60th percentile on all of my shelf exams other than IM and >80th percentile on a few. There were extenuating circumstances for IM, but probably still wouldn't have done great anyway.

 

[Black Coffee 24/7]

Disagree. I've honored both shelfs so far I've taken with just ome + comquest/ uworld. Ome + comquest/ uworld is all you need to do well

Which shelf exams are those? Feel free to PM if you don’t feel comfortable posting those info here. Thanks

 

[LChristmas]

Mine were COMATs, so I can only speak to that situation. Worst was surgery (85) and the rest were low to mid 90s.

 

[LChristmas]

Are you speaking percentiles? Or was the scoring diff last year? My reports both said the avg was 100

They are scaled scores, and the formula to calculate it was not shared with us. Passing is 70 and max is 100. The average varied for each subject.

 

[AlbinoHawk DO]

They are scaled scores, and the formula to calculate them were not shared with us. Passing is 70 and max is 100. The average varied for each subject.

We didn't do them that way. It was always the NBOME score then you have to fall within 2 SD. Typically 80+ is passing with 100 being the average