Passed Step 3 with 2 weeks Study time - AMA
I’m a second year general surgery resident who studied for Step 3 within 2 weeks. Tbh i’m not sure how i passed, i’m very religious so i owe it to God. Essentially, I needed to pass Step 3 before i could advance to PGY3, & my grueling schedule as a surgery resident, combined with the general surgery internal exam (ABSITE) that we have to take yearly, and another endoscopy exam (FES) that i had to take before the end of second year, did not make it an easy year in the slightest. I prioritized my Absite exam, did well on it but was absolutely knackered by the time it was time for step 3. My step 3 was initially schedule for 10 days after my ABSITE exam, I ended up just not showing up for the step 3 exam cos i couldn’t find a date to reschedule it to, then my permit expired. Had to pay another $1000 for a new permit, & got it re-scheduled in May.
I studied for step 3 during my 2 week vacation. I essentially studied with the Uworld self assessment 1 & 2. I did not feel like spending $500 on the Uworld practice questions cos i knew i wouldn’t get through even 20% of it before my exam date. I did the free nbme 137 or 167 i forget exactly, but got through maybe the first 20 questions & gave up. I relied on the fact that I was 2 years into being a doctor, had taken step 1 & 2 in 2021 & 2023, & this test was essentially asking me to combine all of these. This would be even easier for an internal medicine resident for example, because i haven’t done much medicine in the last 2 years. For CCS, i will say that i had completed a full pass in 2024 (just before graduating medical school when i was initially planning on taking Step 3). I paid for a months worth of it TWICE in the last 6 months when i was trying to get myself to take Step 3, but im not sure i completed up to 50 cases both times. You might read this & say well this post isn’t helpful, and that’s fine, but if more than anything, I’m trying to tell you that it is not as scary an exam as it is made out to be, especially if you’ve taken step 1 & 2. I was literally remembering answers to questions based off of sketchy images i went through for Step 1 (Eg: someone has milk coming out of their breasts & they’re asking which meds they’re on - I literally remembered seeing milk come out of someone’s nose/head in the pharm sketchy images - Lurasidone/Ziprasidone or something similar). There were a bunch of weird experimental drug trial/biostats questions, but all around it was doable. I can answer specific questions but yes, it’s doable.
Passing score - 214, and I didn’t need a good score. I just needed to pass.