amygdalaa
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Hi all,
Just finished my exam today. And the word for it is grueling. Draining. It drains every ounce of energy out of you, atleast it did out of me. I am so completely exhausted physically and mentally out of it. The thing is by the end of it, in the last three blocks I was marking qs automatically. I was tired and my mind refused to be pushed. I was tempted to mark the last block randomly. I would say the blocks were equally tough. There long qs, short qs, short qs with lots of choices etc. Timing was not a factor. There was probably 1 block where I could not go back to marked qs. I finished several blocks earlier. And in fact I got almost 10-12 min extra time. I used the break time to the very last 2 min. I had to take breaks to bring myself together. At lunch I just sat in my car, completely got immersed in my favourite song and recouped my energy with coffee and a PBJ sandwich. Then I felt better. 3rd block was my worst and I found the last 2 tough, but I was pretty tired by then, so it could be that too.
My feelings about overall content- I felt the questions were fair, very clever, but fair. I would say 60% I kind of had an idea. The rest I usually had to choose between two or three choices. The subjects were well covered. IM the most, peds was about 20%, OBG 20%. I think surgery was 10% and psych about 10%.
The thing is, it is not like only diagnosis or management that was covered, but pathophysiology, mechanism, complications, best or next investigative stop. Many times I found myself having to ignore the whole picture for ABC of emergency. I am not even sure if that is right or not. But I found either the pt was unconscious or low ABG or low BP, so there were a lot of those. Not one MI q! Lot of joint swellings, rashes, hepatobiliary, OBG covered nicely, all aspects of labor and deliver, immunodeficiencies, endo. Not too much gyn, and a lot of normal situation qs. Some qs seemed too straightforward and I was looking for the catch. I probably missed many. There were so many qs which I answered out of general medical knowledge, not particularly step 2. There were a lot of qs I had not clue about and just marked and moved on. Overall, I think that step 2 is a test that you cannot prepare for in the last two weeks. Your preparation from day 1 counts. The matter has to be ingrained in you, because any short term memory-recall you cannot do in the exam, coz there is no time for that. My mind is just blank now, and I cannot think of specific topics.
Edited by amygdalaa on 05/26/06 - 12:15 PM
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| babli
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Congratulations & good luck!!!
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| 3535
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Thanx a lot!! You have given a beautiful description to us.Hope u get a great score.
There's a bunch of people taking exam in next 2 months. But very few people seem to be posting exam prep&score these days. So for our benefit can u pl share your _
prep time
nbme and UW score
UW experience and advice regarding its use and revision.Thanx
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| Alina T
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Congratulations! It's a huge achievement the simple fact that you got so far as taking the test. Relax now and enjoy your sleep.
I won't ask about topics or subjects, I know I couldn't remember anything from my qs after step 1, and I didn't even want to. My q is how did you feel about the difficulty of qs compared to UW or NBME or USMLE CD? did you generaly feel a lot less comfortable about them? or it was about the same level? what should we expect?
Thank you and I hope you'll get a stellar score!
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| srf
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I can only pray now that my work doesn't go in vain.
I think most of us feels in same way after ck. ck gives no time for recall only reflexes works. read a q at the end if you have a answer than good. if you do not get answer you may starts making intelligent guess but than you will run short of time. good luck for a great score.
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| amygdalaa
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Thanks babli, 3535, Alina T and srf.
3535 and Alina- I too was disappointed at the paucity of exam experiences in the step 2 forum. I studied for about 3.5 months, I did the UW with a first time score of 60%(always timed random), qbank abotu 75%completed- 77%, kaplan simulated 72%. Did not do the NBME, usmle cd was 42, 41, 41. I found the questions, majority of them structured like UW, but the choices were not so close. there were plenty of short qs like the uw too. UW prepared me for the time factor. I used t practise finishing 1 block in UW in 50 min or 55 min.
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| sot
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big congrats for taking the exam.am sure u did great and a 99 awaits u in 3wks time.it's now time to relax .would u recommend reading Goljan step 1 notes for pathophysiology?
thanks and good luck to u.
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| frontal
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Good luck with the score amygdala and thank you for posting your experience.
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| amygdalaa
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thanks sot and frontal.
sot- I did not read goljan since I did not have time. You could read it you have time. There is enough patho in uw and kaplan that you should know.
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| achilles
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thanks amygdalaa for the wonderful post and the very helpful tips...
i am sure you will get a gr8 score. hard work always and always pays. if we do not get the greatest score(read 99) then it sure does help us in becoming better doctors and that will be very useful when we are seeing real time patients. i wish you good luck and the best of scores.
i will be taking my step 2 in about 40 days from now and i am going thru my 2nd reading and also doing the UW. and i was again heartening to read that the questions are very much like UW. i am reading just kaplan and the UW.
good luck to you again for a wonderful score.
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| 3535
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Hi, you said in your earlier post- choices were not as close as in UW.Did you mean that
1-- choices in exam were not that close/linked to each other. So were EASY
OR
2-- choices in exam were not that close to / related to Qn. So were DIFFICULT to pick right answer.
 
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| 3535
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Actually i am doing UW these days. So I really want to know how related it is to real exam, according to a recent exam-taker. So thats the reason for the dumb Qn above.
Thanx. 
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| sot
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thanks man!u are the best.
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| amygdalaa
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3535- no q is a dumb q. I mean choice 1. At least I felt that way. I did only kaplan and uw. Refered CMDT.
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| amygdalaa
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Achilles- thanks for your wishes. I have been reading the qs and discussions here and you are doing great. I read only kaplan and uw. But I dont have my score yet, so may not be the right person to advise!
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| Rasul
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Dear Amygdalaa!
Congratularions, You went through the stress of the test, and I'm pretty sure You'll get a high score!
Yesterday I took practice test- total shock!!!I can only imagine what You went through with the real deal.
My exam is in 18 days, and I hope I'll make it.
R.
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| aimhigh
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Hey, Amygdala! Thanks for sharing your exam experience. Good luck with your score and I am sure that you will get a great one!!
If you don't mind, may I ask you to tell us what you arranged your study time in the last couple of weeks in details?! I am in the middle of deciding whether to do lots of questions in the end or scan kaplan notes quickly. I will greatly appreciate your reply!
God Bless you
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| hardhead
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I would like to know just for curiosity... why do we have to go thru such an exausting test? i would just like to hear.. their explanation. as it its now, almost any one who prepares well for it will pass.. but does have to be so uncomfortable? 
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| amygdalaa
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Thanks rasul and aimhigh.
aimhigh-I was not able to study much last 2 weeks. But I went thro kaplan once and the uw notes once. Did not do too many qs except my wrong answers in UW.
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| aimhigh
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Thanks, Amygdalaa!
For Hardhead: I think we just want to be confident in front of our patients...I will escape and cry if I cannot help those (our patients) that so believe that I can help them. So work hard and be useful as a doc in future. Correspondingly, the score is just the icing on the cake.
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| AAAAA
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I have told everyone in this Forum and is not confirmed.
1. The exam covers everything and you will see one or two questions of chest pain but they cover from A to ZZZZZZZZZZ !!!!!!
2. Arthritis, common things, Women medicine, side-effects, diagnosis, what is the first thing to do, etc are the key.
3. I want everyone here to learn one thing, ONE THING IS
CODE WORD, KEY WORD, KEY phrase,
what is small testicles mean, diagnosis of small testicle in an adult ?
the code word is small testicle ?
What is hypertension and hypokalemia means? Conn's Syndrome?
How you do the screening test? Aldo/renin ratio
What is the confirmatory test ? 24 hours aldo urine test and salt loading and cortisol challenge test
What is the diagnostic test ? CT scan
What is the confirmatory diagnostic physiology test? adrenal vein sampling
If you can understand this, then you will pass !
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| AAAAA
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"is NOW confirmed"
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| AAAAA
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Hardhead,
Come on !
You will see a 16 year old with right abdominal pain and what do you do ? It is a 2 million dollar lawsuit if you don't know.
16 y/o M with right testicular pain , severe---->testicular torsion. Who care? I care, 4 hours window
16 y/o female with right lower quadrant pain, UCG-, leukocytosis------>appendicitis, pelvis abscess
16 y/o female amenorrhea 6 wk, with rt lower qualdrant pain and rt shoulder pain------>ectopic--------->die
What if your wife or gf has abdominal pain and the doc does not know what's going on?
If you don't know, YOU WILL NOT BE A DOCTOR to save people's life.
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| cyra
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Good luck with the score amygdalaa...I am sure you'll do great!!
Thanks for posting!
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| hardhead
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Guys guys.. the dificulty is okay, its the nine hours of you taking the test that makes it hard. and I KNOW important is to master this material for the patients.
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