Hello everyone,
my name is Ahmad Moneeb yousef. I’m a 5th year IMS at Al-Azhar university medical school in EGYPT and this is my STEP 1 Experience. I hope that anyone find it useful and help as many people as I can just as I was inspired by other ppl’s. this is a detailed and very lengthy one!
GOAL: 260+
A) INTRO (skip if in a hurry)
it’s a long journey with lots of ups and downs so I’ll try it to make it as short as possible without missing on important details. I started by exploring USMLE path as early as 2nd year but I knew I wasn’t ready yet, so I kept reading other ppl experiences till the end of my 3rd year. I was so confused because EVERY single experience seemed different so let me emphasize that there are million ways to do this. don’t listen to anyone who says that bla bla is “a MUST” just because he said so. everybody’s experience is unique so try to find what suits you (I had to learn this the hard way) and never do anything because you just “have to”. DO IT YOUR WAY.
Resources
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kaplan lecture VIDEOS ONLY for physiology and Biochemistry: Absolute waste of time and energy IMO. I used to sleep or go do something then go back without even pausing during lectures. Don’t recommend it at all!
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***BOARDS and BEYOND by Dr. Jason Ryan : hands down the best video lectures out there for STEP 1. *he’s amazing and he’s my mentor in this journey. very very high yield and straight to the point if you do it by heart I think you won’t need anything other than FA+UW.
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**FIRST AID BOOK **(GOLD): cannot emphasize how every word every pic and every diagram is important. more than you need+ UW) make sure you master the concepts. Don’t worry about memorization at all.
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UWORLD 2x.
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Pathoma (videos): didn’t use the book for a minute.
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**AMBOSS **Qbank (during dedicated): I needed to get more expousre to new questions to solidify the concepts and it helped so much. great resource.
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USMLE Rx (not necessary but doing more new Qs was the best active way of learning so I did benefit from it but not that much as UW and amboss).
Goljan audios(didn’t use the book): I really enjoyed this one. it was more of an entertainment Lol. but seriously, he’s a legend do it if you have time.
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Anatomy shelf notes: a great anatomy pdf with High yield topics. highly recommended.
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100 cases by conrad fischer: not that useful but you may use it to extract some general ethics rules but UWORLD+FA+NBMEs sould be your main concern here. anyways, you can skim through it in just one day.
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**Anki lightyear deck: **suspended the whole deck then unsuspended the topics in which I’m weak and easy forgettables (some pharm, cancer drugs, etc…) **HOWEVER **I did it only for 28 days and I realized I prefered doing Qbanks and reviewing my handwritten FA notes.also I have some kind of visual memory of the book so reading the whole topic really did it for me moreover I kinda felt like a robot for a while LOL so eventually didn’t continue.
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uworld biostats review: did it immediately after UW biostatistics (good for practice but definitely can skip\again skimmed through in 1 day)
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NBMEs and UWSAs
C) Study schedule and thought process:
It was a hectic journey full of Hardships and challenges but VERY DOABLE. I started studying 2 months before my 4th year by doing kaplan before I figured it’s not for me so it was 2 months of nothing I didn’t even read the books after videos. Then I started doing subjects I’d just finished during 3rd year curriculum (microbiology this thing is crazy volatile…)
-finished micro general pathology and pharm and 1 or 2 systems then I completely stopped studying due to personal issues then followed by college exams. I was disappointed and didn’t touch a book for a whole 6 MONTHS! then I started fresh in october 2019 (beginning of my 5th year)
that’s when I found out the best method for me which was: I would go through first aid system by system using boards and beyond videos ( yes I took notes n it just sticked into my brain) followed by pathoma videos of the same system and goljan (2 hours per system not that much) then I did UWORLD on this corresponding system. I did well but I didn’t use it as an assessment tool and didn’t count mistakes I just added notes to my fa using a pen of different colour which helped me review uw notes while simultaneously reviewing FA it was super helpful. I solved Qs and read the explanations and the wrong answers thoroughly, did about 80Qs on most days just of UW. My schedule was 5 days a week one day off and one spare day for any delays or unplanned circumstances (which was a lot). the whole system would take around 2 weeks.
this phase took around 6 months during which I had gaps in studying for quarantine situation( I tend to do well under pressure only!) and that’s it I’m finally done with my first UWFAP round. I cannot stress this enough; Do not feel disappointed by your slow progress. **CONSISTENCY **IS KEY! it’s better to do 1 our daily than 4 hours 1 day and 3 days off! It took me a while but I made sure I didn’t pass a subject until I MASTERD IT. it’s the most important phase of the whole journey, so take your time!! I started 2nd round of FA+annotated notes of UW then took my first self-assessment NBME 15 (scored 242 i was happy because I KNEW I still have a lot to do and I definitely can do better!) I reviewed my weak subjects and did another one in a week NBME16= 248
did AMBOSS Qbank in 15 days. followed by
***nbme 13= 257 ***(WO! stunned!) I was really happy I’m making a real progress!
I started doing USMLE Rx Qbank and finished in 2 weeks then did another round of First aid (I wass obssessed with forgetting the concepts I wasn’t used to go 1 month before the Exam without EVEN TOUCHING THE BOOK! But it’s the beauty of this Exam and USMLE!
every week I used to do an nbme just for practice(see below) and to follow my progress. Then I started doing my 2nd Uworld round Random timed and made flash cards of important and new concepts only as I’d already taken notes 6 months earlier, did UW for a month with a rate of 4 blocks/day finished with 94% correct along with NBMEs and UWSAs every week until the last week.
D) self-assessments and correlations:
ordered by date I took them
(16/5/2020) NBME 15=242
(23/5/2020) NBME 16= 248
(13/6/2020) NBME 13= 257
(21/6/2020) NBME 19= 250
(28/6/2020) NBME 17= 252
(8/7/2020) NBME 24= 257 BOOKED MY TEST
AMBOSS= 83% (97th percentile)
Usmle Rx= 93%
UWORLD 2nd pass= 94%
last month:
NBME 21= 20 mistakes
NBME 22= 12 mistakes
NBME 23= 27 mistakes
NBME 18= 10 mistakes
Free 120 at prometric= 94% 5 days to go!
UWSA2= 258
E) last week and test day:
I started setting up my alarm to wake up daily at 6/7 am and on 2 occasions I simulated the real exam by doing 7 blocks back to back with breaks in between slept well and ate well and had the best study partner I could’ve ever had during this week Ayman khalid who is hopefully crushing step 2 ck as I’m writing this RN we used to ask each other questions and all. I was so motivated I even went through whole first aid in 2 days (skipped easy sections for me and many topics like physiology which only required thinking)
anyway, I completely stopped studying at noon the day before my test and went out with friends had a good time and good food then went early to bed to wake up early.
even though I waked up at 6 am that day I didn’t sleep until 2 am and had the worst headache of my life ( not subarachnoid hge xD) and finally took 2 pills of diphenhydramine+acetaminophen and talked to Nada who is very close to me then I managed to get 4 hours of sleep thankfully.
test day:
I was a bit worried cuz people always said fatigue gets you there but alhamdulillah I felt great through the exam. did 2 blocks then 15 mins washed my face used the bathroom ate a banana and drank some caffeine and went back. followed by another block then 5 mins in my place then another one then 15 mins then another one then 10 mins then another one then 10 (LOL) then the last block.
NOW THIS IS THE TAKE-HOME NOTE from all this talk: I walked out of my test feeling ABSOLUTELY CRAB! I felt I might score anywhere between 200 and 260! My form really hit my weakness and it had a considerable amount of WTF questions. I was feeling down the whole 2 weeks of waiting and even had nightmares about my test which only got worse as the time passed! PLEASE TRUST YOUR ASSESSMENTS AND PREPARATION it’s totally normal to feel this way! they even say people who feel this way are the people who end up scoring high (luckily this was the case for me alhamdulillah!) hard form means a generous curve! you don’t want to get easy 1000% test and all the people get high % and you end up scoring average or below so no one knows how they actually scale it but the score will be fair insha’allah.
I binge watched series waiting for this to end I thought I’d be relieved but was so anxious and sometimes felt I did great sometimes felt I may have failed the test but it’s all just in your head! trust yourself and god. )إنا لانضيع أجر من أحسن عملًا)
F) General thoughts and advices:
• start Uworld as early as possible don’t get hassled by all the low yield stuff.
• have faith in yourself.
• consistency is KEY. do as many questions as you can they’re the way to learn and know your weak areas you’ll never get it wrong again on the real deal!
• Build a stamina and train yourself to do question timed random whenever you can! this what you’re studying for so don’t get overwhelmed by books and forget this fact.
• be patient. you will go through times where you feel useless and you’ll see people around you achieving things DON’T RUSH ANYTHING just stick to the plan! you’ll get there! slowly but surely 
:))
Conclusion:
Enjoy the ride as much as you can. many people did it and if they did it so can you!
I want to thank god then my Family for being my everything. without their help, support and affection I wouldn’t have achieved anything.
I also wanna thank *Nada *who was the most supporting and closest person to me through hard times when I felt It was impossible, she’s the one who gave me a push and stood by my side all along.
I wanna thank my friends for their kind words and support and good times namely; helmi, Ayman( who always inspired me and was like a mentor to me thank you), Islam, Isma’il, abdelfattah and salama.
thank you Hosam Saif for your help!
to my aunt abeer who passed away 2 years ago today may your soul rest in peace. I miss you so much!
I want to thank everyone in this great community which was of great value to me in every step of preparation. I hope you find it helpful like others before me whose experiences I found helpful and inspiring. And sorry for its length but I wanted to make myself as clear as possible. may you all get your dream scores and residencies.
Feel free to ask for anything I’ll be more than happy to answer!