Feeling after the exam!!!
an IMG,graduated 7 yrs back.Gave my exam yesterday, and contrary to what I've heard from everybody i found the exam tough.probably not because i was finding questions too weird but more because in the time limit i was incapable of applying concepts properly and had to guess on many questions. i felt i was doing good with me and my wife(both gave it yesterday) both getting 252 n 256 on UWSA1 and UWSA2 and aggregate 72% on qbank(unused,timed,first time, random). I have such an awful feeling now that I might have barely passed or so.Both of us could not sleep more than 2 hrs before the exam despite taking meds early.did not read much a day before nd all. I just can't gauge how it went.can just hope for the best.How come people find it so easy and all?
adpa63306915 wrote:
an IMG,graduated 7 yrs back.Gave my exam yesterday, and contrary to what I've heard from everybody i found the exam tough.probably not because i was finding questions too weird but more because in the time limit i was incapable of applying concepts properly and had to guess on many questions. i felt i was doing good with me and my wife(both gave it yesterday) both getting 252 n 256 on UWSA1 and UWSA2 and aggregate 72% on qbank(unused,timed,first time, random). I have such an awful feeling now that I might have barely passed or so.Both of us could not sleep more than 2 hrs before the exam despite taking meds early.did not read much a day before nd all. I just can't gauge how it went.can just hope for the best.How come people find it so easy and all?
Two tips for all......1-Getting enough sleep. And 2- Do not use pharmacological any( includes: anxiolitic, antidepressant , hypnotic, even vitamins).
onedo wrote:
adpa63306915 wrote:
an IMG,graduated 7 yrs back.Gave my exam yesterday, and contrary to what I've heard from everybody i found the exam tough.probably not because i was finding questions too weird but more because in the time limit i was incapable of applying concepts properly and had to guess on many questions. i felt i was doing good with me and my wife(both gave it yesterday) both getting 252 n 256 on UWSA1 and UWSA2 and aggregate 72% on qbank(unused,timed,first time, random). I have such an awful feeling now that I might have barely passed or so.Both of us could not sleep more than 2 hrs before the exam despite taking meds early.did not read much a day before nd all. I just can't gauge how it went.can just hope for the best.How come people find it so easy and all?
Two tips for all......1-Getting enough sleep. And 2- Do not use pharmacological any( includes: anxiolitic, antidepressant , hypnotic, even vitamins).
I perfectly agree with your first point, but for the second one, the only thing I can say is don't be so judgmental about taking medicines being a doctor, people are different, they have different needs and some may even need medicines to sleep. What option does a person have who was sleeping well till a day before the exam but couldn't sleep just a night before, I understand that people can suggest a lot of ways to induce sleep, but more often than not we all know that they don't work.
Anyways got the result today, not so happy 'coz was expecting >250 before the exam but anyways we got 248 and 244, I feel it's okay.
For a tip or two for recent test takers, I'd say that the "necessary changes" which have been made to recent tests were pretty lot in my blocks, and they primarily included a more than usual step 2 material from "obs/gynae/radio/preventive medicine kind of stuff". As such one need not go beyond FA and UW but if one has time this might help in increasing the scores further, in all likelihood the later FA and UW this year will have all of these things included.I can say this as I started 2ck preparation just 3 days after giving the exam and found a lot of material which was there.To rapidly get an idea of possible questions one can go through these subjects from MTB 2 and that should suffice I think.
edited by on 7/10/2014
Congrats on your result.pls may I know how many months it took you for step 1 preparation before u sat for the exam and how many times you read FA?Thanks
yetunde25 wrote:
Congrats on your result.pls may I know how many months it took you for step 1 preparation before u sat for the exam and how many times you read FA?Thanks
We studied kaplan LN in some 2 months (started little before Jan '14), after starting preparation, we took UW in the mid of the second month and due to unavoidable break in between couldn't do anything for a month, then restarted and did tests for 2 months along wth FAx15 days, then repeated FA and UW in 15 more days , and gave UWSAs in between f/b test in may.
So overall some 4.5 months. Anyways, we have made a tight schedule of our exams with all steps within 1 year of preparation, thus we gave it just as soon as we finished bare essentials.
As per mocks it was
UWSA1/UWSA2/UW(random/1st/unused) as 254/252/72% for me
and 256/252/72%, and free 150-93% for my spouse.
I did pathology mainly from Pathoma videos which were great, I wish I could've done them twice.
adpa63306915 wrote:
I did pathology mainly from Pathoma videos which were great, I wish I could've done them twice.
Hi have u read kaplan material or FA?
usmle369 wrote:
adpa63306915 wrote:
I did pathology mainly from Pathoma videos which were great, I wish I could've done them twice.
Hi have u read kaplan material or FA?
did Kaplan once only notes, i dn't know how much i retained.FA i did twice. but for pathology i did pathoma videos once and it was great.
edited by on 7/9/2014
Congrats Doc..
Thats really a great score in such a tight schedule..
I have been doing Kaplan LN , videos and uworld.Havnt started FA.Havnt done goljan or pathoma.I hear most of people doing them m scared if i missed on dat..is kaplan patho nt enough??suggest.
rukhsan5 wrote:
Congrats Doc..
Thats really a great score in such a tight schedule..
I have been doing Kaplan LN , videos and uworld.Havnt started FA.Havnt done goljan or pathoma.I hear most of people doing them m scared if i missed on dat..is kaplan patho nt enough??suggest.
If u have time I'd definitely suggest you go through most pathoma videos at a higher speed.Truly speaking I haven't heard well about kaplan path and never even saw the book, i tried goljan once but its a mammoth, in the end i just saw most of its snaps. FA pages of path are uber important but do not suffice.rest it also depdends as to how was your path during the school. Anyways I'd suggest do pathoma, it shouldn't take much time.
Additionally what I did not do and should've done was to take latest NBMEs, and take free 150 earlier.They give the best idea about the exam and later i saw that they had most of the new content included as a guidance that it'd be there. well all that's my opinion, there are many much better scorers who may guide you better.
edited by on 7/10/2014
Thank you Doc..thanx a lot really..
This is one of the genuine n honest advice i hav ever got from the person whom i evn dont knw..I really appreciate ur humbleness.
I will definately work on ur suggestions.Wish u and ur wife lots of prayer n best wishes for d steps ahead..God bless!!
Congratulations to both of you Doc...
I want to know that do I need to join kaplan classes? or by going through the kaplan lecture notes will be enough along wth FA and pathoma video lectures as you said? also where will i be able to join for pathoma video lectures?
Dr.Ana.D wrote:
Congratulations to both of you Doc...
I want to know that do I need to join kaplan classes? or by going through the kaplan lecture notes will be enough along wth FA and pathoma video lectures as you said? also where will i be able to join for pathoma video lectures?
Thanks.I would not be able to comment on live course as I did not join it.In general evrybody preparing agrees that kaplan LN is enough along with FA and UW.For pathoma you can buy it online or get it from your peers.I would not recommend you getting it from torrents etc.
Congratulations for the good scores to both of you.
thank you very much for your feedback and advice on useful tools including Pathoma. I have just registered myself to get access to the videos which seem extremely helpful for my preparation. I am currently going through UW qbank mainly with little additional help from FA. I want to know if you go beyond UW qbank and FA for microbiology, pharmacology, biochemistry. I still have some memory left from my basic science knowledge years ago but sometimes found it quite hard to retain the facts even after I thought I grasped it after doing the questions on qbank. Given that I only have a few months left before the exam, I am counting on how much I can consolidate by repeating as much as I can. please let me know your advice on this.
many thanks again and good luck for your next step!
nlthwin wrote:
Congratulations for the good scores to both of you.
thank you very much for your feedback and advice on useful tools including Pathoma. I have just registered myself to get access to the videos which seem extremely helpful for my preparation. I am currently going through UW qbank mainly with little additional help from FA. I want to know if you go beyond UW qbank and FA for microbiology, pharmacology, biochemistry. I still have some memory left from my basic science knowledge years ago but sometimes found it quite hard to retain the facts even after I thought I grasped it after doing the questions on qbank. Given that I only have a few months left before the exam, I am counting on how much I can consolidate by repeating as much as I can. please let me know your advice on this.
many thanks again and good luck for your next step!
Keep doing questions, specially NBMEs if you have enough time. Focus more on patho. Though micro is a huge subject it's usually particularly low yield, as there are only few questions and its not worth banging head on +ve -ve rna etc. if its taking lot of time for you. I was given the same advice but I did waste lots of time on it. UW and FA are more than enough. If you can go through biochem from Kaplan LN it'd be worth it, i'd suggest do not spend too much time on genetics portion there (though some people have had number of questions, mostly questions are either too easy or too tough, that's my opinion).Pharma is well covered with FA and UW, you'd hardly need anything else.Keep revising your material, focus more on patho(you can't prepare for an anomalous test filled with anatomy). Thanks and best of luck!
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