For all my wonderful rising MS3 followers, here’s the list of things I used for each shelf exam. I was completely clueless about what to study at the beginning of third year, so I hope this can be helpful! Third year is INFINITELY better than first/second year, so don’t stress. It is possible to get honors on shelf exams. Don’t let anybody tell you otherwise.
Resources for Every Rotation:
Online Med Ed: didn’t get a chance to use all of it for internal, but used it for every other rotation. It is best to use these videos during the first few days of the rotation to get a nice foundation of knowledge.
Emma Ramahi powerpoints: just google her name and they will pop up. She has powerpoints on IM, peds, psych, and surgery. These are easy “gimme” points and are always amazingly helpful. Best to do these at the beginning and towards the end of the rotation (during the week before the shelf). Easily got me 10 extra questions on both IM and surgery shelves.
NBME practice exams: I always did at least 1-2 of these for every rotation (except family medicine…because they don’t have any for family med :( ). Best to do them the weekend or so before the shelf. Sometimes, the questions in the practice exams are eerily similar to the real shelf questions.
Rotation-Specific Resources:
Family Medicine: My Family medicine shelf was based off of CaseFiles…so this won’t be helpful for schools that use NBME’s version.
CaseFiles: Literally every question from my shelf was pulled from these 43924890238 cases. So, memorize them as best you can if your shelf is set up this way.
AAFP has a set of practice questions. Just sign up for a free membership and you can access them.
Unfortunately, there are no practice shelf exams, no OME videos, and no Ramahi powerpoint :( This shelf can be tough. Focus a lot on health maintenance and screening stuff.
Internal Medicine: At my school, this rotation was SO SHORT for the amount of things you need to learn (only 6 weeks). Start studying early and stay on top of it.
I did not have time to do OME videos. At all. I don’t really regret it, but I hear they are good.
I did all the U World questions. There are like…1400? of them. It is a LOT for 6 weeks in addition to working from 6am-5pm. However, they are excellent prep.
Step Up to Medicine chapters on cardio and ambulatory medicine are da bomb and added to U World. This whole book would honestly be really great prep, but I just didn’t have enough time to read it all. I’m using it more during Step 2 study time, and I really love it.
Neurology: This was only a 3 week rotation for me, but the residents and attendings were amazing teachers and absolutely saved us for the shelf exam.
First Aid: around 40 pages. Good foundation along with OME.
Case Files: I thought this particular Case Files was super helpful.
OB/GYN: Gyn-Onc week was possibly the hardest week of third year as far as hours and work went, for me. Benign-Gyn and L&D were also super busy weeks. Basically, just try to plan your study schedule as best you can with the knowledge that this is an extremely busy rotation.
First Aid: pretty long section (like 70 pages), but good foundational knowledge.
APGO questions: 550 questions that are a little more “detailed.”
Case Files if there is time.
Pediatrics: Wards and clinic weeks are super busy. Residents are amazing and very good teachers. You will learn a ton. This shelf was a bit of a sleeper in that it was more difficult than people were expecting.
First Aid: 50 pages of goodness
Case Files: honestly didn’t find this one as helpful as neuro or OB.
Psychiatry: Residents and attendings are very nice and hours are great. Know the drugs really, really well. Supposedly, the shelf this year will now officially contain all the DSM-V diagnoses.
First Aid for Psychiatry: This book is honestly all you need to get honors on the psych shelf. It is unequivocally the best study aid for this rotation. Its also pretty short and if you really want to, you can probably get through the whole thing in one weekend.
Relax during this rotation!
Surgery: Long hours, rough days, but also very challenging and exciting cases (sometimes).
Dr. Pestana’s Surgery Notes: great review of high yield topics, but leaves out a lot of detail.
National Medical Series (NMS) – Surgery: I absolutely loved this book. It gets pretty detailed at times, but provides a more comprehensive review of shelf information.
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