The single most important advice to pass Step-one.

The single most important advice to pass Step-one is: study to the test.

Be clear about your goal. Decide when you will take the exam and what score you want to achieve. You may also be inclined to decide to master a specific subject area because it’s your favorite subject or you are interested in that residency. Setting goals early help your sanity and avoid headaches that come along tardiness. The more detailed your goal, the easier it will be to create a plan with clear objectives, specific directions and achievable milestones. This also helps manage obstacles which will appear on the way and give you the necessary time you will need to manage them.

Learn from others. This may be your first time taking Step-one, but it is not the first time Step-one was taken. It is imperative that you find someone who has not only taken Step-one, but has also achieved the goals you are looking to achieve. The person will be able to help you carve out a plan of action. They will share ideas with you that only come with experience. The tips and tricks of an experienced Step-one taker will help you lessen your anxiety about the process. Learning from other is an invaluable necessity in passing Step-one. No one has passed the exam on their own, and there is no reason to think you will. Learn from others early and often

Gather your resources. Keep your eyes on the prize. The goal is to pass Step-one. You are not preparing to defend a PhD dissertation. The American Journal of Medicine is a great resource for a licensed medical physician, a researcher or even a curious mind. It is not helpful for a medical student attempting to pass Step-one. It cannot and will not help you pass Step-one. The fewer the resources you use, the better. There are no official resources identified by board examiners. However we would recommend identifying one book that will be your ‘go to book’. You should develop it as your central authority for the facts and concepts YOU learn and need to revisit through this process. This ‘go to book’ should be well annotated at the end of the process.

Study to the Test.  Learning medicine and passing Step-one are not the same, despite what your favorite professor may say. In fact it’s our opinion that the best professors should advice students to ‘learn medicine’. However, your effort to become a master medical student can lead to failure of Step-one. You want to learn medicine to be able to practice good medicine as a learned doctor. You want to study to the test, to pass Step-one and make it clinical rotations. You don’t want to be the best student who flunked out of medical school because they failed a board exam.

There needs to be a laser focus on how examiners write questions. You want to know what concepts are being tested. You want to know what needs to be memorized and what needs to be understood conceptually. You want tips that will save you time as you go through the exams. No one can tell you what will or will not be on the particular exam you take. However, there are high and low yield topics. You want to be able distinguish the two. You also want to be able to focus on high yield items. Studying to the test means taking a lot of practice exams, doing a lot of questions and correlating them with them with your studying. Studying to the test is what ‘gunners’ do. They ‘drill and kill’ their way to high scores.

Step-one will not determine what type of doctor you will be, but it will determine if you become a doctor.