NBDE 1 done!

I took the first part of my dental boards on July 13, and after a couple of weeks of cruel uncertainty, I got a letter last week saying I passed! Praise God!

In case some dental student stumbles upon this blog looking for NBDE Part 1 advice, here’s what I used and how I studied. I know I was Googling like a madwoman for any help while I studied, and came up with very little that wasn’t an advertisement or geared toward international students who, according to the random forums I would get weirdly sucked into and panic over, study for six months to a year straight to take the test. Uh no. I had less than a month for this.

How long did I study?
-I took about 20 “hardcore” days to study. I was in a Pathology course this summer as well, and while I tried to study for both that class and boards, boards definitely took a back burner while I was taking the class. So I didn’t really start until school was officially out.
-By “hardcore”, I mean a minimum six hours of uninterrupted studying a day. A few days it would be less, but most of the time it was the norm. Also, I basically said goodbye to a social life. Fourth of July was a bust, and friends/family got used to me answering the phone in a whisper because I was in the library so much. 

What did I use?
-Dental Decks, 2012-2013 edition, but I think they're basically all the same.

Not my picture. Thanks internet.

-Board Busters, first edition, courtesy of my generous roommate. There's a second edition, but unless they're correcting for the atrocious spelling errors from the first edition (have these people never heard of spell check? It's pretty bad), there's no need to pay more for the second edition.

Again, not my picture. And again, I used 1st ed.

-Old tests. This was probably most useful in getting used to how the questions would be asked, and simulating the actual test.

-Wikipedia. When you're in the thick of all this material and you want to remember that little tidbit from yesterday's study session, this is your best friend.

I wouldn't suggest more than three main sources of study material (not including Wikipedia), because 1. there's only so much material that one can memorize in a few weeks, so any extra info that may be in other sources will just be that-extraneous, and on the flipside 2. there's probably going to be a lot of overlap, so it's not necessary and it'll be easier to stay organized.

How did I study?

-I initially started with the Decks, but when it got boring/confusing after a point, I started reading Board Busters to get the general outline of the subject, and then used the Decks to quiz myself and glean any info I might have missed from the book.

-About a week before my test, I started taking practice exams, 200 questions at a time, while finishing going through Decks/Board Busters in between. I then went over questions I got wrong to make sure I understood the concept.

-Prayed a lot. Asked others to pray for me.

And after all of this, I took the exam. I actually pushed back the date (originally supposed to take it July 9), and I think those extra days helped. Also, I used the entire eight hours to take the test. There were a ton of questions I didn't feel confident about, and didn't feel confident about the results coming out of the exam. Thankfully, though, the test is now just pass/fail and not scored, so even though there's a high chance I barely made it over the threshold, I still made it and if I can, definitely anyone can. ;)