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loserdoc
Forum Newbie Topics: 3 Posts: 7 |
Yeah so I just took the Step 2 CK in mid-September. First of all, I got only an hour of sleep the night before so I was very tired, but somehow the body physiology worked wonders for me and gave me the surge of Adrenaline that I needed. One more thing, I am a Surgeon at heart and Surgeons don’t give up! so this attitude pushed me through the test. I just imagined myself scrubbing into a case in the middle of the night to save a trauma patient's life. So for people who dont get their sleep the night before the test, this should be a motivation for you. If I can do it, so can you. Length of my prep: 2 months on and off. I had my rotations going on. Resources that I used: Internal Medicine : Step-Up to Medicine- Read it once cover to cover. Best book for Medicine. It has everything you need but I must emphasize; every word in it is important. Obstetrics and Gynecology: First Aid for Obstetrics and Gynecology-Read it once cover to cover. Pediatrics : Used First Aid for CK and First Aid for the Pediatric Clerkship (as a quick reference). Surgery: Did not read anything. Just relied on my Clinical experience from my rotations and did Uworld Questions. I was doing really well on Uworld on Surgery. Learned every word from the explanations in Uworld especially focusing on physical exam findings. Surgery as a specialty focuses a lot on the physical exam! Surgery questions are very trauma, GI and Orthopaedic oriented so these areas are what I focused my studying on. Psychiatry and Biostats/Epidemiology; USMLE Step 2 Secrets and ofcourse learning from Uworld questions. I have an MPH degree and my publichealth background helped me with the Biostats. For Psychiatry, I just relied on my Step 1 Knowledge and this helped me a lot. Did not read Kaplan. Kaplan is great and extensive but I didn’t have much time to read those bulky books. Plus, I felt like there is a lot of stuff in Kaplan that is low yield for the Exam and I had limited time. Uworld : Did it twice. First time, did it by system for IM and then by subject for other specialties. Always did 44 question-timed blocks. : 65% overall correct. After going through it once, I took the NBME 3 and scored a 232. I did very well on all disciplines; the bars were high-It was some of the Ob/Gyn management questions that got me and so giving me a 232. Second time,: Did all blocks random and timed, to simulate the actual exam. 80% overall correct. Did not have time to do an NBME after this. I wish I would have just to see where I stand. Used Uworld as a learning tool extensively. This was my most important and best study aid for the exam. It is a very powerful qbank with almost 90% of the concepts covered on the actual exam. This is not a lie! Also, after you do the questions, its very important to learn every word of explanation. Read the other answer choices as well and learn from them. Know why you picked a certain answer choice and basically scrutinize your thought process. Now about the test: Majority of the questions seemed familiar and similar to Uworld. Some questions were vague and just seemed impossible, so I just took my best educated guess and moved on. This is what you have to do, you will never know everything! (Also, Uworld teaches you how to think like a die-hard clinician focusing on not just the lab values and diagnostic methods but also, on the history of the patient and physical exam findings and arriving at a diagnosis). The questions on the exam were firstly, making a diagnosis but almost equally in percentage were treatment and management so make sure you know what to do for each condition if they ask you for it. Most of it was Internal Medicine. I would say around 60-70%. Second in line was Ob/Gyn, Surgery, Peds, Biostats and Epidemiology and Psychiatry in that order evenly balanced out. I had more Biostats and Epidemiology than Psych which was a surprise. Had just a few ethics questions. I had about 5-6 EKG’s; Nothing too tough. You just have to keep your calm and tell yourself that this is easy, I can read it and you will eventually discern the arrhythmia. Had about 4 Audio Heart Sounds. Heart Sounds are always hard unless you practice listening to them online somewhere but I felt like Uworld covered almost all of them. Knowing the auscultation hallmarks of every abnormal heart sound helps a lot. For example, both Aortic Stenosis and HOCM present with Crescendo-Decrescendo Systolic Murmurs but the differentiating factor is where on the chest are they most prominent. Is it Second right intercostal space or Left Sternal Border or Apex of the heart? In the exam, you can use the mouse to click on a specific location on the chest to see if the sound is louder at that point. Images were not that many and they weren’t too hard to detect the underlying pathology. You could make the diagnosis usually from the history. Drug Ad Questions; Again people, don’t freak out. Keep your calm and focus. They were not tough. Just, easy interpretation of the data if you just calm down. The Drug-Ad questions on Uworld were harder. Two Step based questions: Well this was for Ob/Gyn. Not many of them maybe just a couple. The other 2 step questions were relating to the Drug-Ad. I finished each block with almost 3-5 minutes remaining. Usually when I did Uworld I would finish with 10 minutes remaining but you see, I didn’t get my sleep the nite before so this made me a little tired so I took my time in answering each question steadily. I didn’t think that it affected my performance, atleast I don’t believe so and hope that it didn't. 3 weeks later, I get my score back. It’s 242/99. Couldn’t believe it when I saw it because this was on only one hour of sleep. Hope this serves as a motivation for everyone out there preparing for the exam.
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Obecalp
| Forum Junior  Topics: 13 Posts: 293
Good job.
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himawari
| Forum Newbie Topics: 3 Posts: 307
Congrats!!!  and thank you for sharing your experience!
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Kurt_Lennon
| Forum Junior Topics: 2 Posts: 27
Thanks doc, It was really helpful, since now I am starting my step 2 CK. You are a surgeon, got MPH and now 99. Thats what any doctor could dream of. I myself only got about 3 hours sleep before my step 1. because I stupidly and carelessly drank a cup of very strong coffee that evening. I am sure lack of sleep really affects your performance. You really are a piece of work doc.
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loserdoc
| Forum Newbie Topics: 3 Posts: 7
Thanks Kurt, but I am just a very simple average person who works hard. Hard work with the right techniques and skills of studying can beat anything! Just remember this simple point and you will get what you want. Good Luck to you!
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zoe87
| Forum Newbie Topics: 10 Posts: 35
Congrats on the great score loserdoc! I still remember how u got all worried before the test but glad to see u did well I am planning to do my ck in feb preping from kaplan and solving UW. Wish me luck!!
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TIRTH1987
| Forum Newbie  Topics: 5 Posts: 44
great job...congratulations!
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