What to annotate into First Aid?

[ImNotBritish]

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Hey all-
My original plan was to go through the Kaplan videos and some of their Q bank, and then annotate UWorld into FA. Now I'm wondering if I should be annotating all of the Kaplan stuff in there too. I'm in school right now, so I wouldn't be able to get through very much of Kaplan during the semester if I get slowed down by annotating. I haven't even read through FA yet, so I'm not even sure what info is covered and what isn't. Any thoughts?

 

[secants]

I was actually going to do what you were planning on doing but kaplan was too much information and recopying it all in FA makes me feel like I'd just make a pseudo-medessential copy. From what people have told me, do uworld and any question you got wrong or right but for the wrong reasons, write it down either using the uworld note box or in the relevant FA section; additionally, anything in FA you don't understand or can't remember, either look it up in wiki/uworld qs and write a one liner mechanism down.

Also, I haven't done this yet but it seems useful, for integration purposes, whenever FA mentions another topic or disease or drug, cross reference the pages and put one liner pathogenesis/mechanisms down so that you don't have to keep flipping back and forth.

 

[qmcat]

I would get familiar with the layout of FA before you annotate too much. When I was studying for Step 1 last year, I remember annotating stuff into FA only to find out later that it was already in FA... just in another chapter. For example, there was a section on beta blockers in the cardio chapter and also in the pharm chapter that contain some different info. I think the lead poisoning entry was also in a weird chapter where I didn't expect it to be.

 

[thedoctor8706]

I almost made this a thread too, as I was wondering the same thing!

My problem is knowing specifically WHAT to annotate into First Aid. I wrote a review for the new 2012 FA edition, and noticed it has been getting a lot of hate for reducing the space available for annotation. But for me, if I was to try and annotate, I wouldn't know what to add or leave out. I would want to annotate until their was more of my own writing then text itself! My own justification for barely adding to the text FA already has is that most people BEFORE the exam have been the neurotic type who are afraid of omitting something, while those AFTER the exam who didn't annotate FA that much still did fine.

Can anyone offer any advice on how much or what I should be annotating into first aid?

 

[secants]

I have the same question as above; as for the space, that's why I got .38mm pens so that I can squeeze stuff in and I also cut the binding/3 holed it to put into a binder so that I can just add paper or whatever in the future.

 

[missmedschool]

Hey all-
My original plan was to go through the Kaplan videos and some of their Q bank, and then annotate UWorld into FA. Now I'm wondering if I should be annotating all of the Kaplan stuff in there too. I'm in school right now, so I wouldn't be able to get through very much of Kaplan during the semester if I get slowed down by annotating. I haven't even read through FA yet, so I'm not even sure what info is covered and what isn't. Any thoughts?

You should be very familiar with the layout of FA before you begin annotating in earnest (I went through it once before I started annotating). The index sucks and stuff is scattered everywhere. Knowing FA well can help you find pages quickly instead of searching and/or putting annotations in the wrong spot.

I'm going through both UWorld and Kaplan QBank and annotating wrong questions and questions I "guessed correctly" on into FA. Annotating anything other than that is overkill IMO.

To be optimal, write down wrong answers and answers you guessed correctly on in the FA margins or add a sheet of paper to make sure you put it in the correct place in FA. I take step in June 2012 and I'm glad I'm sticking to the FA 2011 version; EXTRA SPACE is optimal when you're annotating (& knowledge of complete errata)! FA 2012 essentially means you'll be adding a lot of extra paper to your binder because you can't fit the words onto the actual text.

Make sure you're not skimping on the annotations. If you just write down the questions you got correct, who knows if you'll still "guess correctly" the next time you see a question you weren't really that sure about?

 

[Valadi]

You'll know what to put in. The same concepts come up over and over again in other review books and uworld as important.

Some others to consider are 2nd and 3rd line treatments for disease (or labeling which are 1st, 2nd, etc..), and pharm mechanism of action diagrams that combine several drugs. Also everything to do with the kidney.

If you're really stuck, ask to borrow a 3rd years who did well on the exam.

Personally I don't see a problem with putting in something twice if it's included somewhere else. At least you won't forget it that way.

 

[kumis_or_shubat]

You should be very familiar with the layout of FA before you begin annotating in earnest (I went through it once before I started annotating). The index sucks and stuff is scattered everywhere. Knowing FA well can help you find pages quickly instead of searching and/or putting annotations in the wrong spot.

I'm going through both UWorld and Kaplan QBank and annotating wrong questions and questions I "guessed correctly" on into FA. Annotating anything other than that is overkill IMO.

To be optimal, write down wrong answers and answers you guessed correctly on in the FA margins or add a sheet of paper to make sure you put it in the correct place in FA. I take step in June 2012 and I'm glad I'm sticking to the FA 2011 version; EXTRA SPACE is optimal when you're annotating (& knowledge of complete errata)! FA 2012 essentially means you'll be adding a lot of extra paper to your binder because you can't fit the words onto the actual text.

Make sure you're not skimping on the annotations. If you just write down the questions you got correct, who knows if you'll still "guess correctly" the next time you see a question you weren't really that sure about?

THIS