Alhamdulillah. Full time parent and passed PLAB 1 with 10-14 days preparation and PLABABLE
- Preparation time: 10 DAYS INTENSIVE PREPARATION
I tried to maximize my study/revision time up to 12 hours per day. I’m a full time parent with a baby who has just found her feet, so I’ve got my hands full with her during the day. I focused on my studies from 10pm to 3am every night for the 10-day intensive preparation period and tried to find the time where possible during the day.
- Preparation materials: PLABABLE
I stick to using Plabable only.
Day 1-4: 1st round topics revision
- Went through everything once (questions, explanations and links to Plabable extra notes), I even tried to read some info from external links.
- Tried to make my own notes as much as I could.
- I flagged questions that I wasn’t sure of even if I got them correct. I went back to them once I finished each system before starting a new one.
- *I noted which topics I wasn’t confident with and ranked them from the worst to the best e.g. 1. Infectious disease 2. Pharmacology 3. Genetics 4 Ethics…etc as I will go through them according to this ranking for my 2nd round review.
Day 5: Mock 1 & 2 and 2nd round topics review
- Mock 1 & 2 : I pushed myself to finish them in 2 hours and utilized the remaining time check for my answers. I averaged around 74% for both mocks.
- I flagged each question I wasn’t sure of, went through them once.
- *I reviewed the topics ranked 1st - 4th quickly, paying extra attention to the flagged questions and made my own notes.
Day 6-8: Mock 4-7 and finish the rest of 2nd round topics review/revision.
- As steps explained previously, I did mock 4-7, reviewed flagged questions, finished the rest of 2nd round review.
- Noticeably, I improved my mock scores average to 78% (80% the highest I ever got)
Day 9-10: Mock 8 and revised my own notes + targeted topics review.
- Did mock 8, revised my own noted, went through certain topics for the 3rd time ( for me I paid extra attentions to pharmacology, infectious disease, ethics, genetics and anatomy)
Day 11: PLAB 1
- Revised my own notes in the train on my way to Manchester. I arranged my notes according to the topics I knew the least to best.
- TIME MANAGEMENT
- PLAB 1 is hard to tackle if you don’t manage your time effectively. In the actual exam I finished answering in 2:15 hours, the remaining time I used attentively to review all questions including those I circled* and corrected my mistakes.
- *I circled questions that I wasn’t sure of their answers.
- I learned to go through questions fast as I pushed myself to complete each mock I did under 2 hours, this way I got to spend the rest 1 hour to recheck my answers thoroughly.
- RECOMMENDATIONS
- I don’t recommend studying this way, it was stressful and risky for me.
- Ideal prep time is 1-2 months, plan your own timetable and stick to it.
- I recommend using Plab1keys as from what I’ve seen, I found their notes simple, direct to the point and easy to use along with your PLABABLE revision.
- Please do review past years recalls, some of them actually did come out in the September exam.
I wasn’t a top student back in med school and struggling a lot maintaining my medical knowledge as I haven’t practiced medicine once I finished with my studies due to family commitment.
Please pray for me as I’m too struggling to finish these exams back to back.
I have an exam coming next week and PLAB 2 in early December. InshaAllah we will all pass!