I wasn’t planning to write an experience bcuz there are a lot of experiences

I wasn’t planning to write an experience bcuz there are a lot of experiences out there that are much more valuable than this one but some friends and colleagues asked for it so here it is …

Time frame: intended 13 months

Actual (d.t covid-19 and a month of messing around) 17 months

This brings us to question #1 : could it be done in less than 13 months ?

-absolutely I think if you really commit to it even if your basics are weak you can do it in 9 months … less than that if being a genius is not one of your qualities then it’s gonna be really difficult.

Desired score: b4 taking assessments I was actually aiming to get anything >240 and then I took the self assessments. And my scores were :

Amboss SA at the end of February : 247

UWSA1 in early April: 269

NBME 13 –just as practice I was really rushing through it- : 246

UWSA2 in late April: 263

Real deal 2 and a half months later :256 ________________________________________________________

And here are the details : I started my preparation in February 2019 -after I finished med school and before my internship year-with my study partners and here is tip #1: have a study partner

Tip #2: it’s better if your SP is going through the same shit you’re going through (from your country – college – if possible same class) and so don’t hide from your friends and colleagues the fact that you are studying for the USMLEs it can actually –as in my case- help.

We started with Kaplan videos 2014 and notes in some subjects as :

1-biochemistry and Genetics (Dr Turco is the best don’t miss him).

2- physiology (I watched Dr Wilson videos he was good but I think you can skip his videos I think it was reproducible)

3-anatomy (I liked both of Dr white in neuroanatomy –a must- …and Dr Seiden he just mentioned the high yield points and he explains embryology amazingly but again you can get the same results from which ever source you like)

4-immunolgy and microbiology (Dr mascatello is good but I Found the videos to be a waste of time and actually BnB in immunology and Sketchy in micro were the best sources for me )

5-pharmacology (watched Dr harris and liked him but I would recommend doing the general part and leave the systematic part during your first aid time)

6-pathology (we used pathoma directly and it was actually good with the videos of course )

I don’t remember exactly but I think it took a long time for us to get through these. And actually during reading FA it felt like we were starting from a scratch. And this brings us to Question #2 :

Was it worth it ? -for me I would say yes, yes I didn’t remember most of the info but I had the outlines carved in my brain and I knew where was the info if I needed it and I did need it later indeed and I revisited some parts of Kaplan and pathoma multiple times.

And here we get to tip#2 and the most important one : Don’t rush and if there is something you need to understand don’t hesitate to get back to a previous phase of your study plan to master it .

After this phase we got into FA, Boards and Beyond, and Rx side by side chapter by chapter and then we added UW and went over these a couple of times and then I found a free code for amboss and I would say amboss is amazing this was the first time I start solving Qs in a random manner I would do a Q and if I got wrong or felt there is some parts of the subject I didn’t understand and so on and so forth, and it’s safe to say that during this period I actually started to reach the level of knowledge that I wanted I was solving NBMEs offline and making many mistakes till 2 Wks of amboss when I took the amboss SA … and then by the time I was done with amboss after 1 month.

That brings us to tip#3 :If you can’t get free codes for amboss get a 1 month subscription.

About 2 wks later when I took the UWSA I knew I could take the exam and this brings us to tip#4: we tend to under or overestimate our level in preparation don’t be the Judge on your readiness let the Self assessments do that for you, without the self assessments I would have never thought that I was ready.

A few days after the Assessments I was supposed to get the exam but it got cancelled for a 2nd time and that was frustrating … I decided that I would take a 7-10 days rest but when I tried to restart my studying it was really hard and it took me 35 days to be able to restart studying and that brings us to tip#5: don’t take prolonged periods of rest or abstinence … try to study for limited number of Hrs a day with a consistent rhythm than interrupted study with many Hrs a day.

This period of abstinence made me feel like I foregut a lot of the info I already had but 20 days later I felt like I was again ready for the exam and then it happened.

I have 1 tip regarding the period before the exam and it would be to get your circadian rhythm adjusted … I felt that I could’ve done better and saved more time if I slept more than 1 hr that night.

Good luck for all and sorry for being such a babbler.

if you have questions I’ll be more than happy to answer it.

PS: I have no working links 😅