USMLE Dedicated Study: How I Improved My Step 1 Score by 21 Points (238 to 259)

At my medical school, we were given 7 weeks of dedicated study time for USMLE Step 1. I had originally planned to take 5 weeks to study and 2 weeks for vacation. My original plan did not work out though. I ended up studying for nearly the full 7 weeks and only took 4 days off before starting 3rd year. Had I been a little more prepared and deliberate in my pre-dedicated study period, I think I would have been able to have my cake and eat it too. Although, USMLE is a terrible cake. Maybe I should have said I would be able to swallow the poison that is USMLE Step 1 and then immediately detox by going on vacation. But as this didn't happen, I will talk about how my actual dedicated study period panned out. I began by trying to get through every Anki deck that I had made. Each deck correlated with a FirstAid section. So, I had a biochem deck, a cardiology deck, a neurology and special senses deck, etc. I decided to start by studying material that I was weakest in: MSK and Heme/Onc. I thought I could easily do both deck in one day. WRONG! It took me nearly 3 days of studying to get through each deck. I then thought I could do a first pass of every FirstAid section and then begin reviewing. WRONG AGAIN! I ended up not remembering material I had studied the day previous. It was after those 4 days of trial and error that I came up with the following plan. Daily Schedule: 6:00-7:45 am: Wake up and learn new Anki decks until 7:45 8:00-10:00 am: Do one UWorld 40 question block and review. Start at 8:00 am because that is when I will begin my actually USMLE exam. 10:15 am - 1:15 pm: Continue to learn as much new Anki deck material as possible 1:30-4:00 pm: Start reviewing old Anki cards as scheduled 4:00-4:30 pm: Work out 4:30-10:00 pm: Continue to review as much old material as possible. If finished, start learning new material. 10:00-11:00 pm: Shower and get ready for bed (meditation, talking with family, reading a book, etc. Absolutely no electronics!) Weekly Schedule: Every day is the same except: Friday: I took a practice exam on Friday. Those mornings I did not review material. I wanted all my energy for the exam. Sunday: Weekly reflection in the morning. This involved review my old tests to see if there was an area that I was struggling in, reviewing Anki deck progress, and calculating remaining UWorld questions. Day before schedule: 6:00 am-4:00 pm - Review Anki Decks As always, if you have any questions, please feel free to reach out with any questions: [email protected]