I learned five or six important concepts tested on Step 1 from one question and its explanation.
They give detailed explanations of why the right answer is right and why the wrong answers are wrong. When I came to the test, I felt as though I was just taking another set of questions from USMLE World.Īlso, the explanations of questions are great. The thing that impressed me most about USMLE World was how similar the questions on the QBank were to those on the actual exam. There’s always the debate about whether Kaplan or USMLE World is the better question bank. I needed to spend plenty of time studying, especially since my first practice test was a 208. That way I wouldn’t be kept out of any specialty based on my score. I wasn’t too sure going into the test, so I set a goal of 245. If you’re not sure what you want to do, you’ll want to score as high as possible. If you know what specialty you want, you’ll have a good target for your score. Probably the best resource for what you need to do to match into particular specialties can be found here, the NRMP’s report on “ Charting Outcomes in the Match.” It goes into volunteer, research, and other activities as well as Step 1 scores for matched applicants in different specialties. The most competitive specialties have average scores of around 240. So, before you start studying, set your goal.
You might be scared by this score, but that’s good encouragement to study. To determine where you are, you need to take a practice test. In my opinion, before you start really preparing for Step 1, you should have two things clearly in mind: where you are with your score and where you want to be.