berkeleyboy
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Sooo...just took the exam. I haven't posted here for over a year now since step 1, but I just wanted to give a little break down of my preparation of how I thought the test went.
The format, font, program, length of questions, and difficutly of the exam is almost exactly like UW. IF I had to say which one was easier I would say the actual exam is slightly a bit easier than UW but than again...there have been many times on UW I had thought the set of Qs was really easy and I ended up getting around a 50%.
Overall, I probably guessed (or checked off and marked anywhere from 9-14 per block) so on average I guessed on about 11-12 per block out of 46 and was fairly confident in my answer for the rest of them.
I had problems with peds, CHF, and neuro on my exam. Almost half the peds questions I got were super tough, although it was one of my weaker subjects thru out my preparation.
CHF and cardio in general was tough for me, I had a lot of it too, as was neuro which I probably had like 10-15 Qs of where is the lesion type if the pt comes in with Right sided 3/5 weakness, upper extremity, 2/5 Left lower extremity ect....those Qs I was basically taking a random guess.
Materials I used mainly UW and 2005 Kaplan lecture notes. I also have Crush but I didn't really use it.
Total prep time 5 weeks hard core anywhere from 10-14 hours a day. In addition I took some extra time to study random stuff maybe if you add it up like 3-4 weeks while I was doing my clinical rotations. So I guess I studied about 2 months+ in total if you include time I studied during my rotations.
Read the kaplan books at least 3X. Medicine/Surg. I read like 4-5 times....no videos, no lectures, just the kaplan lecture notes.
UW finished 2000Qs. I did it untimed, unused, and mainly by discipline...Medicine, peds, OB, psych, and surg...in blocks of 25 with overall score of 68%. I didn't do NBME or any practice tests...didn't have time. I only had 5 weeks off from my clinical duties so I took advantage of as much reading and Qs as I could in that time span.
If I could have studied over now after taking the exam. the exam is really really really similar to UW. I would just keep doing UW over and over again with maybe like 2-3 reads of kaplan untill I had UW down cold. That would have probably been the best preparation possible.
Anyways hope this helps, nice to post on this forum again.
Berk
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PGY-1 Ohio State University Plastic Surgery
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| drk1980
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good going! looks like you beat this thing down. altho u dont need it, all the best for ur results!
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| NicoToscani
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Welcome back! I remember reading your posts when I was prepping for Step 1. So when I saw your name on this forum, I was like, "Whoa, there's a post I wanna read!" Well, I'm sure you'll do fine, Berk. And I hope "fine" and the score you want end up being the same or better. Best of wishes and thanks for the tips!
Nico
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| berkeleyboy
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thanks for the support guys. i feel like my preparation was adequate althoughi i would have liked to have gone over cardio maybe with the videos before i took the actual test. I guess i'll just have to wait and see what happens. thanks nico and drk for the nice post.
berk
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| infliximab
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WISHING U A GREAT SCORE
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| cyra
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I read your posts in the step 1 prep journals during my step 1 prep too.Good to have you post here again.Hope you get an awesome score!!
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| berkeleyboy
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thanks inflix (congrats! you passed!) and cyra for the support. Its really really nice to have a welcome back to the prep4usmle forum. I've been away for the last year doing my 3rd year clinical rotations. I didn't always have internet sooo it was hard for me to really to keep up with this place. This place was a such a great motivation for studying for step 1. Actually another reason I haven't been back is that the kids at my medical school don't put so much emphasis on step2. infact, our dean in a lecture told us that we should study a solid 2 weeks for this test and just get it out of the way. Its not such a big deal as step1 is....but its still nice to get a good score. Hoping for the best...now the wait begins...
the time will pass pretty fast I guess, I have surgery coming up and I'll be q3 for the next month!
cheers and thanks again
Berk
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PGY-1 Ohio State University Plastic Surgery
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| berkeleyboy
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I got my score from the Dean of students today. 235/95
not bad for 5 weeks of studying. Although its a bit lower than my step1 score 240/97. I'm not complaining at all.
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| cutedoc
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congratulation..good job.
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| tolito
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good job berkeley!!! quite a short prep too. i wonder if i can also get away with 8 weeks and 95 too. ( am no spring chicken tho )
all the best at the match.
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| cyra
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Congratulations Berk!
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| berkeleyboy
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thanks everyone for the support. I feel like even tho the prep was short 5 weeks or so...I had just came off my clinical rotations for the 3rd year. I was studying periodically for the shelf exams at the end of each rotation that were pretty hard exams. The shelf exams are 100Q exams at the end of each rotatation that every US medical student at every medical school in the US takes. The tests are averaged against every medical student in the country and preparing for those is already a great headstart for step2.
Thanks again everyone
Berk
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PGY-1 Ohio State University Plastic Surgery
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