Subject NBME's vs Step 1

[medstu2006]

Our class requires us to take the Subject NBME's at the end of the yr. I always do terrible on these. I performed in the 30th percentile in both Micro and Pharm NBME's. I am just really boggged down because I studied for them through FA. Are the questions on the Subject NBME's representative of Step 1?

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[agranulocytosis]

It's my understanding that the NBME's are simply retired Step 1 questions. I'm probably mistaken.

 

[medstu2006]

It's my understanding that the NBME's are simply retired Step 1 questions. I'm probably mistaken.

I think the NBME Forms 1-6 are retired Step 1 questions, but i'm talking about the Subject NBMEs.

 

[agranulocytosis]

I think the NBME Forms 1-6 are retired Step 1 questions, but i'm talking about the Subject NBMEs.

That's what I mean. My school required us to take them for our courses and one of the professors said something about them being from the old pool of Step 1 questions. Of course I have no proof.

 

[osli]

Our school doesn't use shelfs, but wouldn't you think that a shelf exam to be taken after a specific course/subject would be a little more detailed and difficult than a board exam covering two years? i.e., I'm sure that the boards contain questions that are just as difficult, but I would think that the percentage would be a lot smaller relative to the number of general concept and "everyone should know" type questions.

But then again, I haven't taken a subject shelf and am pulling stuff out of my posterior side.

 

[Law2Doc]

Our school doesn't use shelfs, but wouldn't you think that a shelf exam to be taken after a specific course/subject would be a little more detailed and difficult than a board exam covering two years? i.e., I'm sure that the boards contain questions that are just as difficult, but I would think that the percentage would be a lot smaller relative to the number of general concept and "everyone should know" type questions.

But then again, I haven't taken a subject shelf and am pulling stuff out of my posterior side.

I actually think it's the other way round. The Step will require you to know the shelf level info and then take it a step further (ie multiple step questions), whereas you will get more single step questions on a shelf. The level of detail you need to know to answer the question is pretty similar, but what you do with it is quite different. However in my experience, the shelves are not realistically timed, so it's much harder to complete a shelf in the time allotted as it is to complete the Step exam. And since most schools don't use shelf exams in the first two years, the grading is going to be quite different (probably more favorable), because you are not competing with the whole pool of future physicians, only those at places that don't require their profs to make up their own tests.

 

[osli]

Really? Strange. I would have thought that a test covering a specific subject given immediately after that subject was taught should be pretty difficult. UWorld questions are generally not that much different than what our school gave as block exams, perhaps more picky about details in some areas but certainly not more integrative. I had assumed shelfs were similar. We did take the NBME "two year cumulative" shelf (whatever it is really called), and it was ridiculously easy compared to our school's cumulative, and certainly nowhere near UWorld difficulty. I've only taken the NBME form 1 assessment, and I guess it was pretty similar to the cumulative shelf though. I had assumed (from what I had read here) that step 1 was quite a bit harder than form 1, however, and that it is the most likely to err on the overprediction of your knowledge side.

huh... a lot of assumptions in there!

 

[BrazilianDoc]

I guess you would have found the subject nbmes ridiculouslyyyyyy easy then what school do u go to?

 

[osli]

KCUMB

WTF? I just edited this post three times trying to get the letters in caps and it kept changing them to lower case. I guess this forum has an "anti-screaming" filter... with this additional text it allows the school initials to remain in caps.

 

[InternationlDoc]

Took Pharm, Micro, Path and Behavioral Shelf at my school.

Also took NBME 3 today (well yesterday now)

My scores were what I averaged on the shelf exams for the NBME!

hence, my conclusion is, that the shelf exams really are the questions that the NBME/CBSE or whatever you call it are made of. And probably the real test?

 

[Mediculous]

To add another experience: my shelf exam scores in Path, Pharm, and Micro were much higher than my baseline NBME scores. I took NBME 5 two days after my last shelf, and NBME 4 five days after my last shelf with minimal physio studying in between the two exams. My shelf exams were all within a week's span.

Micro Shelf: 570 (I studied for this---I actually felt like I did the best on this one)
Path Shelf: 570 (I didn't study for this)
Pharm Shelf: 660 (I didn't study for this---I felt like I bombed this because there was a lot of guessing)
NBME 5: 520
NBME 4: 530

Maybe my NBME scores were lower because I lucked out on my Pharm shelf and my true Pharm knowledge was reflected in my NBME scores.
I took the UW assessment recently and my score was about the avg. of the 3 shelves, but I've been studying for 3 weeks now 😀

 

[HPSPpayissue]

I thought they were pretty similar. USMLE world to me was similar too