everyone agrees that step one is by far

the most difficult but important test

that you'll take during your medical
school training the score you get on
this test can either open or close doors
for you in different specialties
depending on how competitive they are
and how well you do on the exam this day
and age there's dozens and dozens of
resources and guides and ways that you
can help prepare and get through step
one and so this is my own personal
opinion about the strategies that you
should look into for overall how to do
well on step one and make your
preparation as low stress as possible
I'm gonna make some individual videos
later on where I go into more detail
about the different aspects of what
should go into your preparation for step
one but this is just a general video
about my overall strategy and approach
that I took with the test that might be
helpful for you as well so thanks for
watching the video and I'll put links
here to the rest of the videos in this
series where I go into more detail and
let's just talk about general step one
strategies now full disclosure I got a
232 on step one so by no means amazing
but by no means a failure either pretty
much right in the average for my medical
school and pretty reasonable for the
overall average on the test so know that
going into this I'm not gonna try to
make this out to be like this is what
you need to do to get a 280 it's not the
point of this the point of this is just
some general tips and strategy for how
to do good on step one the best that you
can do and to make the preparation as
low stress as possible when it comes to
the overall strategy that you take for
step one it's important to first of all
understand how well you need to do now I
would argue that you should do as good
as you can on step one and there should
be no reason to do anything but your
best but it's important to know ahead of
time if you want to go into more
competitive specialties what you need to
score on step one to prevent any doors
from being closed for those fields now
I'm talking about the things like
dermatology plastic surgery orthopedics
we all know what the more competitive
specialties are and you should look at
some data about what the average step1
scores are for that field
that's not intended to discourage you
it's not intended to make you feel down
and like you're never gonna do it but
it's important to be realistic about how
well you need to do on this test if you
score 200 on step one I hate to tell you
but you're gonna have a really hard time
becoming a dermatologist
that doesn't mean need to get a 280 but
it means you need to do pretty well and
so understand going into it how well you
should be trying to do on the test well
at the same time just making sure that
you're doing the best that you can have
an overall strategy for how you're going
to approach step one as you go
throughout second year some people will
say that they want to start studying
right away from day one a second year
some people will start during the summer
before second year other people will say
you know what I'm just gonna wait and
worry about that when it comes time for
my dedicated study period just have some
general sense when you start second year
about what approach are gonna take that
way you can be preparing throughout the
year if that's what you want to do and
if you know that you're gonna wait until
your dedicated time then you could have
everything set up and in place so that
you're ready to hit the ground day one
and take off during your dedicated study
period now this means looking at the
different resources available there's a
lot of different online guides there's a
lot of different online resources
there's first aid there's path omma
there's audio lecture series Kaplan
courses there's endless amounts of
things out there that you can find to
suit your own individual learning style
but it's important to understand which
one you're going to use so that when it
comes time for your dedicated period
you're already prepared and you have the
resources in place if you think you
might like Firecracker try firecracker
if you think like the other ones try the
other ones just be ready for your
dedicated study period to make sure
you're not trying to jungle a bunch of
different resources and you've kind of
selected which ones you want to use part
of that is also knowing how to plan your
question bank purchase so whenever you
buy a cue bank particularly you world
there's a dedicated time that you have
access to it and I think you usually get
one free reset where it completely wipes
out your progress and starts it back off
from day one and this is important to
know in the context of how you're going
to use the question Bank I personally
wanted to get through it twice and so
the first time I went through it I did
very selected groups of questions
focused on the organ system that I was
studying at the time but then my goal
was to get through all of it once reset
it and then for my dedicated study
period do completely random blocks to
more simulate the actual test but you
need to have a sense of that upfront so
that whenever you start your
subscription you're planning for down
the road whenever you're gonna reset it
and
you're gonna use it try to think also
about what General Schedule you're going
to take do you want to break it down by
month do you want to break it down by
week it doesn't really matter just start
it whatever your test date is and then
work backwards have some idea of where
you want to be at various points in the
year so that you can set very attainable
goals and then meet those goals
so if you want to have gotten through
half of first aid by Christmas great
then it can be as simple as that
if you want to get through you know one
section of first date a week that's fine
to just come up with whatever you think
works best for your individual time and
schedule and then have goals that you
can meet and cross off as you advance
through second year well break down some
ways to make an individual schedule for
step one later on but regardless of how
you do it make some sort of schedule so
that you have a plan that you can stick
with as second year progresses and gets
more busy there's no doubt that this
test can be overwhelming and deserves a
lot of attention and respect for how
important it can be it's very
complicated in terms of the different
resources you can use to prepare for it
and can be a little bit overwhelming
especially with everything that's coming
out now versus even just five years ago
regardless of how you pick these
individual resources think of your
overall strategy and how you're going to
attack this test early on in second year
you don't need to start studying day one
a second year but you need to start
thinking down the road so that you can
be best prepared later on when it does
actually come time to start doing your
dedicated study period that's it for
this video we're gonna break down and
more individual ones kind of the
individual aspects including making a
schedule how I use different resources
how I used a question Bank what my
approach was for practice tests in order
to get some more detail if you're
looking for individual tips and
individual thoughts on how you can do
things yourself check those out linked
over here on the side and thanks for
watching this video everybody we'll talk
next time bye