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| My advice......if it matters. |
| I don�t think I am any expert on this subject but as I have been through this process and have had first hand experience, I will try to point out some important things which might help somebody like me.
Well I wont go into stuff like what books you should read or how to prepare because that is quite a subjective thing and also there are lot of other websites on net which can give you that info but I'll discuss few other things which I think are also important. Let�s start with CS I don�t know about u guys but for me, this one was the toughest to crack. If u ask me what�s the one thing u want to tell us than it�s the single word-- PRACTICE! No matter how good r ur clinical skills or which book u read or even how good is ur English, if u don�t practice, the real exam will be full of Surprises for u. As PIPE season is gone and so is the free practice. Consider enrolling in any csa course which offers real SP encounters. Kaplan or any other. what matters is that u practice. I took the Kaplan�s 1-day course at NY. Not because I am very rich and I have $s jumping out of my pockets but because i didn�t wanted to take any chance with this cos had I flunked than it would have meant 2000$ down the drain and another year of flipping burgers. I'll be honest here. The class in the Kaplan course which was taken by a chief resident of the hospital was nothing more than an average cos the person didn�t had any personal experience of the exam whatsoever hence he talked very general which wasn�t much helpful but another person who was from Kaplan (the one who was coordinating the whole thing) did gave us some very important points to focus on. But the best thing was the actual SP encounters (there were 5 in total).I had read OSCE and usmleworld cases but The moment i went inside first room my mind went total blank. i couldn�t figure out what to ask. where i should have been asking about DM, i kept on looking for depression and than i forgot to wash my hands before examining. Ultimate screw-up. Infact i forgot to wash my hands in 2 cases. but with time things started to settle. There was guy who took cs on the same day as me and he hadnt had any practice and he did the same mistake in 2-3 cases in the real exam. Those 5 cases helped me a lot. i was able to concentrate on my mistakes and most importantly when i went for real exam i was relatively more Confident. People who got PIPE spots were quite lucky but there no more pipe spots i guess. Practicing with partners is good but nothing compared to actual SPs. The SPs at Kaplan were exactly similar to the real exam ones and in fact bit more difficult so that we can have a good practice. I think as far as Kaplan is concerned, its their materiel that is only necessary i.e books and qbank and not the lectures. Frankly speaking I find the video lectures a pure wastage of money unless you are senior citizen or a newbie. If you wanna spend some money on Kaplan than I would say use it on CS course and not on step 1 or step 2. Well if u can spend some money, than definitely so for some kind of practice it doesn�t matter weather its Kaplan or some other. Whichever u feel suits you. 2) Reach the centre 1 full day before the exam. In this current political climate, U never know when ur flight is going to be cancelled or delayed and u don�t want to miss this exam or do u ? My exam was on 18th but i i was here on 16th noon. Have a walk to the centre and if possible around 4-430 pm. By this ull know ur way and the distance to the centre and u may meet ppl who just finished the exam of that day. U can get the first hand advice from those (i hope u r getting what i mean to say). I met somebody who reached the city late night before exam, had a bad night's sleep and than made mistakes in the exam. For most it�s a 2000$ game. Don�t take any chance just to save one night's hotel rent. 3) Stay closest possible to the center even if the hotels rent are 10 bucks more than other. If ur center is LA hacienda hotel is good, just a 5-7 minutes of walk and its prices are ok. and also ull save few bucks from ur taxi fare. 4)Carry ur clothes, white coat, stetho, permit and id in ur hand bag and not in the suitcase cos u never know when ur airline is going to mess things up and lose ur luggage. And now the MOST IMPORTANT THING- BEWARE OF ONLINE PRACTICE PARTNERS.I will tell u what happened with me. I contacted a guy who was looking online for a partner for practicing cases in NY. As i was going to NY for Kaplan, i thought it would be a good idea if i could have some more practice. Well i emailed him and he replied positively and asked me to contact him when I reach there. And than after few weeks when i went there and contacted him, he replied with an email with 2 lines "I am sorry. i already have a partner and best of luck" The first words that came out my mouth were WTF ? I was shocked. there's nothing wrong in having a partner but what offended me was that he should have emailed me and informed me about this so that i could have looked for someone else but instead he just screwed my whole schedule and program at the very last moment and which meant that i wasn�t left with any other option. whatever, he just gave me another reason to hate Chinese food. So be careful of these unholy souls. Contact them but don�t depend on them and have some backup plan cos u never know. OK now coming to STEP2 CK 1) I didn�t do USMLEWORLD questions and nor the current qbank so i wont comment on them. i had some questions from qbank which one of my friend gave me and which i think are bit old. I also did MOCK exam by brochert and i also saw questions of NMS etc. The questions that are most similar to the actual exam are the Assessments available on NBME's website. Each 4 block test is for 45$ each. i did the first one and i think it was worth it. I did it 3 days before my exam and scored 680. though I wasn�t happy with my result but still it pointed out my weakness and I worked on those point in next two days. a nd i was surprised to see similar (and not the same) questions in the real exam. I did nbme 1 2-3 days before my exam and my score was 680. I don�t know why but i wasn't very happy with it. Although it did helped me a lot as i focused on my few of my weaker aspects. NBME assessment is the most realistic assessment available and the questions on the real exam are almost similar so focus on ur deficiencies. 2) Practice with 50 Q per hour. if u r able to finish 50 in an hour than in exam u'll be able to have sometime to revise and reconsider as there r only 46q per block. 3)10-20 % questions will be straight from step 1 so don�t dare to forget ur patho/pharma/physio and genetics. But no anatomy or microbiology. 4) Time is not a problem. You are able to finish the block with 3-5 minutes to spare. so don�t worry. Many who when describe their exam experience excessively emphasize on long questions but infact only 30-40 % questions are that long and not all. So don�t worry that much about falling short of time. 5) Use CMDT as a reference. for consulting treatments and current guidelines. Kaplan are good but they have their limitations. They don�t cover all the topics and the scope of real exam is much wider than what kaplans project. So if u wanna do good, look beyond kaplans. if possible read few topics from Swanson which are not covered in kaplans. 6) Than there are few questions u just can�t answer without actually doing years of actual practice. I just cant figure out what�s the point in having them on USMLE step2 exam. For example there was question about a patient who needs an analgesic and u have to choose from options 1) oral X 2)i/v X 3)oral Y 4)i/v Y 5)s/c Z. all were opioids. Now these things one could learn only with actual practice and not just by reading Kaplans (at least i cant) 7) Now the most imp thing FORGET THE BUZZ WORDS.- This is especially for those who give bit extra emphasis on books like CRUSH the BOARDS. Question writers are a bunch of smart cookies and they know what we read and what we look for so when they describe a condition they give u all the possible signs and symptoms but not the pathgnomonic one or what we call a buzz word. 8) Read forums - spare some time and do read the forums. They have wealth of information. Match Timing for step 3 depends entirely on your program. Some programs want you to pass step 3 before dec 31, some ask for Jan 31 and some are good even till may so it entirely depends on program. for example my program clearly stated during interview that you should have take step 3 before April 1 to be eligible for H1. Better ask them specifically during your interviews Still under construction........ |
| Crunching the Numbers
....since Step 1 21 Total No. of flights (including connections) 4 Train rides (excluding commuter trains and subways) 2 Greyhound Bus rides 90 Total programs applied 13 No. of Interview invitations 12 Interviews attended 10 Cities visited 5 Exams taken $$ spent ....still counting. |
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