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Originally Posted by white-rose
...I have just started preparing for USMLE and I was wondering if anyone else was feeling that in order to do well in step 1 you should have a good clinical knowledge? I feel like many questions are case based. Can someone please correct me if I am wrong because this will help me in the way I prepare. Thanks!
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While the questions are case based - they only test you on info in basic sciences. The test is designed to have moderate time stress - but has time endurance factor also. Meaning you can actually read the 50 questions and answers in between 25-35 minutes if you read at 400-500 words per minute. What gets you is having to guess or realized you don't know a question. Just take a 50 q block from Kaplan or Lange and just read with a stop watch - how long did it take to just read it. Then go back and answer the questions with a stop watch - what is the difference?
Ever play computer solitare? It takes more time to play a losing hand than it does a winning hand. Same factor at work on the USMLE/NBME tests. You will hang around a question you don't know and waste time guessing. Also most people are trained at putting information but not trained on retrieval. Doing the q-banks trains you to retrieve the information. It also builds up your endurance. When I first started doing q-banks 50 questions felt hard to do. The day I did two 50 question blocks back to back - I felt like my brain had been wrung dry. So you have to train yourself to do questions - just like you train to run a race. You build up your milage over weeks and months. You do speed training to run faster. Get the idea?
What the questions do is force you to make integrated decisions based on most commons. So a question may have micro - pharm - and physiology all in one questions. This is why Dr Goljan's lectures help people - he helps you visulize integration of what you learned in basic science. Just my few grains of salt and a couple of cents thrown in. Hope it helps you.
06-29-2006, 11:09 AM
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