Hi all, I 'm a silent observer on this platform for a few years. I wanted to share my experiences finally.
I'm a 1994 admission from Guntur medical college,India and passed out with Internship in Dec 2000. Unfortunately, I opted to do USMLE's as I listened to my mom's advice who is a US P.R back then. Underestimated the US visa policies. Completed my Usmle Step1 in Feb 2002 and Usmle step2(not step2ck then) in Feb 2003, TOEFL in March 2003 and GRE in April 2003. Both TOEFL&GRE are for purely academic reasons. My US visa(GC)went into process in March 2003.It's originally due for June 2005 but I got actually got it in July 2010! Cleared CS on the 6th attempt in May 2012.

Coming to Usmle Step3, I prepared for maybe 40 days in 2012 as I tried for MS P.A which was a big futile exercise. I lost lot of time and money behind that for admission based on my Clinical experiences and MBBS degree. I decided to start studying for Step3 soon after I returned from my only P.A interview from Misericordia univ,PA on 01/24/2013. I studied about 20 days a month till April 25th and after that,fulltime till my exam date 06/26/2013 & 06/27/2013. I studied Kaplan step3 3-4 times, MTB Step2ck and MTB step3(around 8-10 times), Archers premier notes(lectures and PDF) multiple times, Archers CCS strategies($88), UWorld Qbank(once-1360 questions- 59% and later repeated all wrong questions multiple times), UWorld CCS(practiced 52 cases 3 times+ went through the 41 cases theory like a few times). Did Kaptest once(wouldn't advice. would advice all to rather do the Kaplan Internal medicine boards) ,repeated mistakes once more and made important notes like i did for UWorld qbank. Also, went through Neeraj notes etal though outdated versions within 30 days before exam.

Coming to the exam, the 1st block of 47 and first half of the 2nd block of 47 were easy. Thought for a while that the exam is so easy. Then started struggle, the next 400 questions(Rest of day1 and 4 blocks of 36 on day2) were for all practical reasons Greek and Latin. The questions were short and almost all questions had only 4-5 options but I reached a stage where I had to do 10 questions in 9 mins! Mind you, then the medium-big questions started to prop including the Abstract questions in the end of 46 question block. Almost all the 10 blocks went to the last second and I waited for the block to end for itself in he last 3 seconds or so.

Coming to the all important CCS, the 1st 3 cases ended very prematurely. I thought I did properly but the cases ended even after the initial orders! Took a 15 min break and did 3 more cases. Tried my best. All 12 ccs cases finished before the scheduled time. Took a break after every 3 cases. The Break time kept adding so much that when I finished the exam, I finished at 2pm after I took a good few 10-15breaks in between and I had more than an hour of break time left still!

Know that I gave my all but wasn't sure about the result. Got it yesterday and felt very happy to note that I passed on the First attempt with no prior USCE as I worked in the Caribbean till last year. Got 212..

As a old graduate with 6 attempts in CS, though I passed steps 1,2ck and step3 first attempt with scores of 87,86 and 212 respectively and has GC, I know how difficult it is but I will persist. I started prep for Usmle step1 in March/April 2000 and finally finished my journey yesterday after more than 13 years of perseverance, motivation and dedication to complete USMLE's and to be a MD in USA.
edited by RaPi69714393 on 7/25/2013
edited by RaPi69714393 on 7/25/2013

Hi,
I took my exam yesterday and I felt very bad about the CCS cases because every case finished abruptly after 8-10 minutes even I tought I was doing well.... now I read your post and I found out that you had the same experience and you passed!!! I didn't know what to think!!!

Super Simo, Hope for the best buddy. God willing, u will pass too soon..