My Step 2 CK Experiences
Hello everyone, I am a Bangladeshi medical graduate of Sir Salimullah Medical College (2015).
USMLE Step 2 CK score: 263
Exam Date: 27 November 2019
Report Date: 18 December 2019
Duration of preparation: 4 months
Resources:
UWORLD
Biostat portion of First Aid
UW First round- Random (Offline, Used timer)
Average: 82%
Second round- Random, Online ( Couldn't complete due to a deadline, about 700 qs were left)
Average: 91%
Target was: 270s
UWSA1: 273 (2 weeks before exam)
UWSA2: 274 (3 days before exam)
No NBME, CMS , Free 120 or anything
Real deal: 263
No NBME, CMS , Free 120 or anything
USMLE Step 1 score : 255 (26.02.2018)
*You can ignore this [ ] portion.
[I Started MD cardiology residency in my country after step 1 and got stuck there. One and half year passed by, i couldn't even decide whether go for the next steps or not. I started my preparation for CK in August, 2019 with UWORLD. But it was very tough to have appropriate concentration while doing residency stuff. I wanted to take exam in end of October, I took a break from residency program and started to study dedicatedly. I finished uworld first round in two months. Then i started doing anki flashcards. Flashcards were very very useful . It helped me tremendously to retain easily forgettable stuffs.
I started online UW in October. There are lot of new concepts in online version. Doing only Online UW would be the easier and wiser choice.
I wanted to do MTB, bought the book, read it for 4 hours but i couldn't like it. I never touched it again.
So i recommend to stick with the online UW. This is pure gold. Everything we need for a good score is there. There are lot of resources everywhere, and there is no limit for clinical knowledge. Every resource you will go through will definitely help in some way. But i think we don't need that. Learning everything and preparing for the exam are completely different matter. UW is very similar to the exam and ENOUGH.
After finishing around 1800 qs i took UWSA1 (2 weeks before exam), got 273.
Then i worked on my weak areas, also did some back to back UW blocks to improve the time issue that I felt during uwsa1. I had a deadline for joining my job in December. Otherwise i would finish whole UW and may postpone exam to December. While searching the dates, whole November was unavailable that made me bit anxious, fortunately 27 November opened ,i booked the date. I took UWSA2 next day. Got 274.
EXAM DAY experiences were mixed. First three blocks were smooth, while doing 4th block i was experiencing lack of concentration, i was reading every question twice or thrice. It was also the hardest block and also had drug abstract. I thought, maybe it was because of not taking the break after 3rd block. Then i took a break for about 12-14 minutes, tried to relax, ate chocolate. When I started the fifth block, felt exactly the same, lack of concentration, was repeating the stems again n again, then i realized i was having caffeine withdrawal. Luckily i could finish these two blocks without leaving any question unanswered. But i marked almost 20 qs in each block, couldn’t recheck them. I took break after that block again, took coffee first then ate something again to avoid hypoglycemia. I got my concentration back, rest of the blocks i did smoothly. Don’t forget to take coffee with you if you are used to it, and take it in your usual time. (that was stupid)
There were some odd questions and lot of new concepts in the exam, if u can master UW enough, you
will be able to answer these questions by exclusion method and own experiences. Some questions were like out of the limit, forget about them, just click any answer according to your first impression/judgement and move on.
Plan your break time wisely. Try to be in your usual head and be confident. Forget about what happened in the last block. Move forward, have faith in your whole hard work.]
Tips:
1. First of all you have to change the step 1 mindset. If you are done with step 1, try to take CK soon, you will have a great advantage. But it is also pretty much doable even without knowledge of step 1. CK is more practical then theoretical. Treat every question as a real life patient and find out what you want to do to them and then learn what you actually need to do. Studying will be easier and exam will be more fun.
2. Stick with the UWORLD, it's more then enough. Real exam felt like doing UW. Some stems are shorter then UW but very few were longer.
3. Try to explain every options in every questions. If you can do it in a good way, it will solidify 4-5 different other questions.1000 questions with solid grasp in REASONING ( why other options are not the right answer and in which scenario they will be the right answer ) will cover 4000 concepts. Then everything will seem to be known to you. You will feel very comfortable if you can do that for the whole UW.
4. Once again, understand, explain everything to yourself and retain algorithms and charts. It's different then step 1. You have to MEMORIZE a lot of stuff.
5. Space repetition is awesome way to retain what we are learning daily. Self made Anki cards are the best, but if you have less time there are so many decks you will find online. Dorian/Wiwa/Zanki; pick anything that suits for your pattern.
6. Try to be review ECG, Heart sounds and Murmurs and Drug abstract questions. They are usually neglected. But you will get many questions with ECG and Murmurs.
7. Don't panic for the DRUG ABSTRACT questions, they are usually easy but too long. Don't read everything. Read the question carefully and find out what they are asking, then give a fast glance to the options (don’t read them). You will know where to look to find the answer.
For example, They usually ask about the data interpretation ( they are usually found in graphs/tables or whatever they use, match them with options) and then about the study related things like bias/statistical significance/types of study/something like that ( here you will have to read few lines from the description to understand about the study).
Whatever, they take lot of time, doing them at last is wise, so that they dont ruin the whole block.
8. Biostatistics questions are usually more analytical. I think UW and FA are enough.
9. I wanted to take exam in a hurry, that's why i was always searching for the exam experiences who took exam in short time. There are lot of people who took it in two months. Try to follow a path and modify it in your own way. It's very doable in short time. But I recommend to appear in exam when you feel comfortable and assessments are over your target zone. Because they usually overpredict.
10. Don't try anything new during exam day, try to have a good sleep at night. Don’t forget to take coffee with you if you were taking it regularly.
11. Avoid negativity in life, it will just shatter your confidence. You can do it if you have the confidence. Have faith in yourself, if things don’t work well just change the strategy. It's never our fault, defective strategy is the culprit. We all have almost same kind of capacity for everything, we just don't know the right way sometime.
12. Don't let anything to drag your energy and concentration down in last 1-2 months. Distraction is the single most important reason we tend to prolong the time for preparation.
**I am blessed with some wonderful people in my life who supported and motivated me all the time, and most importantly believed in me. I am grateful to them.**
Have faith. Best wishes for all of you. Pray for me. You will do great. Thank you.
Comments
Post a Comment