I was a regular MS2 in a large well know university and scored average on my tests in med school

Intro:
I was a regular MS2 in a large well know university and scored average on my tests in med school.
I was never really a class topper but i worked my ass off for this test and it paid off.
Books and question resources i used:
First Aid USMLE Step 1
Fundamentals of Pathology by Hussain Sattar
Rapid Review Pathology by Goljan
BRS Gross Anatomy
BRS Behavioural Science
BRS Physiology
BRS Embryology
Kaplan Biochemistry Lecture Notes
Doctors in Training
Firecracker
Self made Anki deck
UWorld
Kaplan Qbank

Work Experience Templates
User Experience Design
Part Time No Experience Jobs
Becker Qbank
USMLE Rx
Kaplan Qbook
First Aid Q&A
NBME 15,16,17,18,19 online
NBME 1-14 offline…it’s actually just 10 tests offline(some numbers NBME haven’t been released by
them so it’s not 14 tests offline but rather 10 offline…go figure !!)… Do all the NBMEs if you want a
score over 260 !! Don’t skip them !!
Topics to be done well divided by subjects:
Anatomy: Perineum and Pelvic anatomy; the nerve, lymph drainage, vascular supply,etc
everything of that part is important. CT Scan and MRI of the upper and lower limbs, head and
neck. Coronary angiography. BRS Gross anatomy has a TON of questions. Do that and the
questions from the question banks and NBMEs and you will be gold. You will do very well in
USMLE if you know the imaging and have done tons of questions. I was afraid of anatomy before
the exam and i got a very high percentile in it (based on the score report page with the bars i was
on the extremely accurate end)
Embryology: BRS Embryology questions were very good. In addition to this Qbanks and FA are
good enough to nail this. While you will get probably only 4-5 questions on this, don’t ignore it…do
things like pharyngeal arches and developmental anomalies very well. You will get all the
questions right
Physiology: Endocrine is very important as i had a ton of up down arrow questions from it. This
subject is dealt with well in Costanzo’s BRS Physiology. I did not do the big Costanzo book but this
book was enough. Do CVS well too… there are questions about responses to hemorrhage and
shock types in almost every qbank and also on the NBME
Biochemistry: This was the only subject in which i did Kaplan Lecture notes for biochemistry as
this s the only one which has to be done well. The doctor… i forgot his name Dr. Wilson or
something in Kaplan Biochemistry is very good and he does a great job of teaching Biochem. I
recommend you to do biochem from kaplan as it is tough well with a good integration between
normal biochem and the abnormal disease.
Microbiology & Immunology: This is one subject which i wish i had done less as FA + UW is actually
enough. If you know those 2 very well then you will ace this test, You dont need to go overkill this
subject as it is pretty much direct memory based. I used Sketchy from my room partner’s
subscription.
For Immunology you need to do Hypersensitivity and autoimmune diseases very well. You also
need to know things like normal lymph drainage of the entrie body. But that is very obvious…cant
expect to get a good score if you dont know FA and this is covered well in FA> The Qbank
questions and NBME questions were very helpful as seening the clinical vignettes helps
understand how these autoimmune diseases are presented in the test. Like we may memorize
SLE however we need to integrate things like the clinical presentation of pericardial rub explained
in word (they wont say pericardial rub they will describe it)… integrating the clinical vignette
knowledge into the way in which the disease presents in important.
Pharmacology: This is rote memorization
Behavioural science: BRS Behavioural science + Qbank questions + NBME questions. If you want
to do overkill you could do the AMA code of ethics handbook. I actually bought that book and
used it along with my prep as it was referenced throughout the Uworld qbank. You dont need to
but i did.
Pathology: Obviously the big dog of the hood. Lolz. This subject is to be done from as many
resources as you can do. As a matter of fact Firecracker was pretty helpful in this as the topics in
there are an aggregate of the pool of knowledge from Pathoma and Goljan and also some data is
in there from the Qbanks too