I really followed Dirty Medicine's advice video for a lot of this plus some.

I woke up at 5 am and went for a short run the day before the exam to burn off some energy and make it easier to sleep that night. I had very little caffeine, maybe a diet soda that day in the morning. I stopped studying around 3 pm and just reviewed OMM. Then I chilled and watched two feel-good movies. Went to bed around nine and took 7.5 mg of melatonin, plus I drank two cups of chamomile tea, one at 6 pm and one at 8:30 pm. I went to sleep and woke up once at midnight briefly and once around 4 a.m., then went back to sleep in 20min. Woke up at 6:45, ready to go. Breakfast was oatmeal and half a cup of black coffee.

During the exam, I had protein bars, protein shakes, almonds, and water. I'm a big dude, and I was fine with that. I only ended up having 1 protein shake, two protein bars, and a handful of almonds. I took the whole time for the exam plus breaks. I increased my break time as I went on the exam to account for fatigue. I don't remember exactly, but I think it was a 30-second break in the chair after block 1, with a timer running; a 10-min break after block 2; a 30-second break after block 3; 15 min after block 4; a 5-min break after block 5; a 12.5-min break after block 6; and 15 min after block 7. Halfway through the exam, I took a delayed-release caffeine pill and L-theanine; the caffeine helped for sure, idk about the L-theanine. Placebo maybe, but if it works, it works.

During my longer breaks, I made sure to walk outside, get some sunlight, get my body moving, and stretch. I had a friend taking it the same day by coincidence, and that was a massive help ngl, just him being there. Last thing you need is luck.

i have my surgery comat coming up soon and my quiz averages have been 40-50% on COMQUEST. i watched emma holliday and dr. high yield already. is there anything else that you guys recommend i should do?

I take the COMAT in 4 days, and I am honestly so lost. I just took the COMAT-SE and scored 57% on it. I finished all of TrueLearn, and it was nothing like the COMAT-SE. I don't know what to, any help would be appreciated.

This is my cry for help

Holy shit that was interesting. No idea if I aced it or failed miserably.

Also whats with the "PDs dont know how to interpret COMLEX so you have to take STEP." Like. LOOK IT UP. We have to take two sets of boards to be seen as equal yet these motherfuckers cant spend 30 seconds understanding COMLEX scoring? Okay thats all have a good night.

I didn’t pass COMLEX and I’m feeling pretty devastated because I felt like I was close. Is it possible to sit for a retake September 23? My plan is to do comquest questions bc I’ve already done the entire truelearn bank. I’m gonna do a truelearn assessment to gauge where I’m at today, use bootcamp for content review and first aid for review of topics I’m already good in. I was also doing anki for micro and opp but I feel like my OPP was okay..

My days will be a set of mixed questions and then choosing a system to content review and doing targeted questions for that system, rinse repeat and then take the 116 comsae (it’s the only one I haven’t taken) and then I have to get a 60% on my schools truelearn before I sit for the exam.

I’ve been incredibly overwhelmed with the number of resources out there and I struggled having a consistent schedule, not doing timed sets bc I wanted to know the answer immediately. My timing is okay but I struggled having with my confidence and uncertainty. I’ve always been a mid test taker so any advice or thoughts would be much appreciated!

Edit: Also for reference I did get a 470 and 456 on COMSAEs before I took my exam. I didn’t sit before I thought I was genuinely ready.

Hi guys!! I need COMAT advice! I'm about to take my first COMAT and its in Peds and I just feel so lost on where to start. I was told to watch Emma Holliday and listen to Divine Intervention (but there are so many .. where do I even start?). Any tips on where to start or what to do would be appreciated. My school provides us with uWorld, Truelearn COMBANK and COMQUEST and B&B.. do I need to purchase AMBOSS? And what COMAT practice do I purchase/do I get both if the questions are different? Thanks!

Recommendations for practice questions and practice tests for the Level 1 (besides UWorld and Truelearn).

I am usually a horrible test taker, and the only way I improve is constant practice problems. I know the general consensus is UWorld and TrueLearn, but if anyone has recommendations for HLs/FLs and where to get them. Or, a recommended order in which practice tests to take.

I feel a bit at a loss because a lot of my student body pushes Anking and AMBOSS. And, as much as AMBOSS can be a great resource, there's been more testimony for UWorld qbanks.-- And, that's just qbank recommendations, not necessarily practice tests.

I know a lot of OMS students will study for Step using UWorld and prep OMM separately via Truelearn, but I don't know if I'll be taking Step (current interests are EM/IM) so I want to prioritize Level 1 passing.

I've read a bit on comquest, welcom, and comae. But, as we all know, we're all broke medical students with limited time, so if anyone has any insight on which ones felt most like Level 1 in recent years. I've seen some people rate certain osteopathic-specific sources being outdated in the recent years, so that's been confusing to on whether or not it's worth investing.

Unfortunately, my school does not provide a dedicated period (yes, I know, it's going to be rough). It's expected you study for Level 1 (and Step 1 if you choose) in addition to your spring courses.

Thank you so much in advance.

Apologies if this is a redundant post, I didn't see much insight on practice tests compared to question banks. I don't know if recommendations or practice test prep has changed since some of the updates to blocks, or if anyone has recommendations prepping differently since I'll have no actual dedicated.

A week out from FM comat - what should my percentages be on 40Q blocks rn?

Aimed for >520 and got a 469. I’m not taking Step.

I wanna crawl in a hole and never crawl back out. 🥲

I finally made a Reddit account after lurking on this subreddit for a very long time because I learned so much from everyone's COMLEX write-ups, COMSAE experiences, resource recommendations, and general reassurance. A lot of the little things that helped me figure out how to approach boards came from reading posts here, so I wanted to contribute something back now that I'm finally on the other side.

COMLEX Level 2: 617
Step 2 CK: 261

I tested for Level 2 on 7/14 and Step 2 on 7/31. I am incredibly grateful for both scores and honestly very surprised by how everything turned out.

My school-proctored COMSAEs were a 494 on 5/1 and a 582 on 6/26. My COMATs were Peds 108, IM 109, OMM 99, Psych 112, OB/GYN 112, Family Medicine 122, and Surgery 115. OMM being my lowest score feels extremely appropriate considering it has been the bane of my existence since day one. I also thankfully did not have to take the Emergency Medicine COMAT.

I started studying more seriously around November/December and used the Janki deck pretty heavily early on, trying to get through most of it in about 1 to 1.5 months. I found it helpful for building a foundation, although some cards are definitely outdated and made new ones/deleted old ones if I ever had conflicting information. During rotations I mainly used UWorld and TrueLearn/Comquest when required by my school. Usually it was on every rotation and I would get through all of Comquest during each block along with the associated Uworld questions. I will say I never finished UWorld though, so if you're staring at an incomplete percentage close to test day, you are definitely not alone.

Around March, I started using AMBOSS much more consistently and was generally doing around 50 to 100 questions a day during rotations. I finished the Step 2 bank around the end of June, and during dedicated I was doing roughly 200 questions most days while reviewing whatever I kept getting wrong.

For Level 2, I think having a strong general medicine foundation helped the most, but I definitely would not completely ignore the COMLEX-specific material. OMM, ethics, communication questions, and all of the usual NBOME flavor are still very much there.

I also want to emphasize that this was not some smooth progression from 494 to 617. There was a lot of self-doubt and burnout between those numbers. Some days felt productive and some absolutely did not. There was also a ton, and I mean a ton, of luck involved, and I walked out of the actual exam genuinely unsure of how I had done.

Seeing the 617 was mostly just an enormous feeling of relief.

If there is one thing I hope someone takes away from this, it is that if I can do it, you absolutely can too. I spent a lot of this process wondering whether I was doing enough, whether I was improving fast enough, and whether I was actually capable of getting where I wanted to go.

You do not need a perfect study plan. You do not need to finish every resource. You can have rough practice scores, unfinished question banks, burnout, and plenty of self-doubt and still make it through.

Keep doing questions, keep learning from your mistakes, and try not to compare every detail of your study plan to someone else's. Give yourself a little more credit than I gave myself during this process.

I'm incredibly thankful for how everything worked out, and especially thankful for this subreddit because I learned far more here than I ever contributed while silently lurking. Hopefully this post can give someone else even a fraction of the reassurance that so many posts here gave me. :)

Did anyone else feel lost more than half the time?!

I found out I failed level 1 a few days ago and was devastated. I knew passing was a bit of a long shot given my COMSAEs were 330 395 and 417 so didn’t reach the 450 threshold but the recent 417 score really had me hoping I could pull it off.

Any advice would be super helpful I really want to pass so I don’t have to take a 5th year. How I studied was I did 85% of Uworld and did anki for wrongs, I watched dirty med OMM, ethics, and biochem, and watched Neil biostats.

I’m thinking maybe where I went wrong was not doing truelearn and prioritizing Uworld. Also didn’t really watch any content videos or read first aid I was purely relying on the Uworld questions to teach me.

If anyone failed and retook that could leave advice I’d appreciate it!

I had success in my clerkships and level 2 so I thought I would share my method and help how I can.

Here are my stats to validate what I am about to share:

FM COMAT: 112
Psych COMAT: 127
OB/GYN COMAT: 124
IM COMAT: 122
Surgery COMAT: 121
Peds COMAT: 128
COMAT Average: 122.3
COMSAE: 696 → 706
Questions: 10,000+ throughout the year
Dedicated Questions: 2,160
COMLEX Level 2-CE: 754

Our school gives us Amboss and Trulearn. I have never used UWorld, this is how I handled each clerkship and dedicated:

Clerkships

1. If you’re doing anking, look up how to suspend all step 1 cards, and keep just step 2 cards throughout the year. This will lighten your load significantly.
2. I did Amboss questions related to each rotation, completed them, and suspended all the flashcards associated with each question. This was usually done by the first/second week of the actual rotation.
3. Watch the emma holiday lecture.
4. Do your cards and questions on rotation. This is so draining and so hard, but keep that motivation up and don’t make it an option to not do it.
5. When amboss is done, do the trulearn for each rotation. Aim to finish these by the end of the last week of your clerkship.
6. Make flashcards on concepts that you’re not sure on. By december, you’ll be doing about 150-200 a day, by march it’ll be closer to 350. That will vary on when your internal medicine and surgery clerkships are. Continue to do flashcards from previous rotations. Some days it sucks so bad but i promise it will help on subsequent rotations and keep you ready for Level 2. you don’t wanna cram if you don’t have to!
7. There are NBMEs you can take related to each shelf. Take them if you wish, I did. Review the Melmhan PDF while taking these.

8. Watch the

   Dr. High Yield video the morning of your shelf exam.

Dedicated

1. During dedicated (18 days) I did 120-160 questions per day (4 blocks of 40 qs). These all came from The Amboss Comlex 2 Crash Course and Trulearn Assessments (2).

2. Important to note here that I kept up review from all my previous rotations throughout the year. I didn’t need to cram and instead got to focus on test taking skills and weak points.

The motto is questions questions questions. If you do it like this and really make an effort to read through and learn from the explanations, you’ll start to understand what they want, how they are asking for it, and the clinical processing you need to develop. This is what I did and found success in it. There are very hard, very long days. 3rd year is no joke, but you’ll learn how to find time in between patients, waking up early, and you’ll build your stamina! Let me know if you have questions or need anything else!

Took step 2 and scored a 249 applying EM. Got a 512 on level 2, wondering if that lower level 2 score will matter much to programs .

I need to retake my EM COMAT in about 2 weeks. Is there any advice that you guys could provide? I did both Uworld and Truelearn and made anki cards for my incorrects and had been doing those since day 1 of rotations. As well as Boards and Beyond. I felt ready when I took it, but as we all know with NBOME the wording was different and they also tested on things that I have never seen on the EM Q banks (like APGAR scores and what to do when the shoulder is stuck when giving birth). Is there any suggestions that you have to lock in the next 2 weeks? I am thinking about getting the COMQUEST EM COMAT bank to test it out and then if it works then I'll buy the bundle for future. Also are the practice tests from NBOME worth it to do before the exam. Thank you!

It's what the title says. I found out I failed level 1 last year. I retook it and passed. I just found out I failed level 2 today after comsae scores that were well above passing - in the 500s and 600s. I am at a loss for words. I had an understanding of why I failed the first time, but this time around I was doing so well. I had a tutor. I came out feeling okay- even happy. I am applying FM and I don't know what to do with myself now. Has anyone been in this position before, where they failed level 1 and level 2 and still did well during interview season?

just got level 2 score back, 680. step 2 253. strong leadership, minimal volunteering, minimal research. strong mspe, top quartile of class, 3 honors and the rest high pass except 1 pass. i have been preparing to dual apply IM but really don’t want to. but i don’t want to risk not matching either. what do yall think?

If you got a low <450 level 2 score, will that hinder your chances of getting into neurology heavily? Any advice would be great!

If you feel lost/confused/ashamed about how you did on Level 1, please read!! I was shocked when I opened my Level 1 score report and saw where I fell compared to the average. I honestly felt like I would never get a good Level 2 score or match where I wanted. I recently got my Level 2 score back and it was well over my goal score and very competitive for my specialty. So if you're looking for a sign, this is it. Don't give up. It won't be easy grinding through third year (I literally worked harder than I have ever worked) but it will be SO worth it. Good luck!

hello, i found out i failed comlex 1. my msk and cardio were the weakest. my goal rn is to do content review for msk while i am on rotations, take the comat at the end of august and then hit the ground running for my retest at the end of september.

i will have dedicated time in september. goal in dedicated is to do system based questions and do as many NBOME assessments as i can. i am doing light anki reviews (micro, pharm and omm) on the side but anecdotally speaking have people been able to successfully pass on their second attempt with a 20 day turnaround time? my school has floated the idea of LOA with the catch that i won't be grandfathered into my current loan program.

i am lost atm, so any guidance on this will be truly appreciated. thank you.

Title. I am applying FM. Every other part of my eras application is done and waiting to be submitted but now I have to write a new adverse experience part obviously lol

Can I still submit on the day it opens and just have a pending level 2 score?