Historically, keeping to a study plan has proven quite difficult for me; I often make plans and then push them off. Luckily, I have been pretty successful despite that bad habit, but the PANCE is something altogether different, so my hope is to make a study plan/schedule and actually keep to it so I can be as prepared as possible to take and pass the exam.

Since the last day of my final rotation is December 25th, I anticipate that I will be taking the PANCE at the end of January, giving me about 12 weeks to prepare starting this Monday. I am fortunate to be in my Emergency Medicine rotation currently, because the topic list for the EORE in this rotation is pretty broad and covers a great deal of what I would expect to prepare for the PANCE. I think 12 weeks is more than enough time to be properly prepared, especially considering that I might procrastinate some of this time or purely dedicate some of the time to my last rotation (OB/GYN), since that is a bit more specialized.

The first thing I plan on doing as I prepare to study is to go through the didactic PACKRAT and EORE score reports and see which topics I was strongest and weakest in to figure out how much attention I need to dedicate to certain topics. I definitely want to spend a nice chunk of time on cardiology, pulmonology, and GI because those carry the highest percentages on the PANCE. I definitely feel least confident in cardiology, so I want to be able to prepare well for that.

With that said, I plan to spend the next 3-4 weeks purely reviewing the content that is covered on the PANCE starting with the PANCE Prep Pearls. I feel that this book provides a good overview of all the topics, allowing me to refamiliarize myself with everything. It is also ordered from greatest to lowest percentage on the PANCE. At the same time, I will be going through the Emergency Medicine topic list and going a bit more in depth with those topics. At this point, I might skip the OB/GYN related topics not specifically covered in the EM topic list, because I know that the following 4-5 weeks will be full of that focused studying.  At the end of each topic I plan to do around 60 questions on Rosh Review, Kaplan, Exam Master, or a combination of these. This will help me determine what I know versus what I need to take a second look at. I think it will also be important to read each answer explanation to clarify why I answered incorrectly or just to verify that I answered correctly for the right reasons.

I want to dedicate weeks 5-8 to OB/GYN and going over problem areas based on the previous weeks. Luckily, I will have also taken the clinical PACKRAT during this period, so I will be able to see where my overall deficits are in an exam that is in a similar format to the PANCE. I will look over these topics in the PANCE Prep Pearls and supplement with my lecture notes from didactic year and Osmosis videos as needed. By the end of each week, I want to have answered and reviewed 60-100 questions.

I plan to dedicate the remaining weeks after I finish rotations to practice questions and time to relax. I have never had a problem with timing on exams because I am fortunate enough to be able read quickly, but this is the point where I want to start doing timed blocks of 60 questions in 60 minutes. I want to be able to give myself 1-2 days off from studying during this time because I think it is easy to get really fatigued in the studying process and that will ultimately hurt my performance on the PANCE. In the last week leading up to the exam I am considering purchasing the practice PANCE provided by the NCCPA depending how I feel at that point. I do work best under pressure, so while I say I don’t want to study or do questions the day before the exam, I don’t necessarily want to set that in stone just yet. If anything, I will definitely call it an early night so I will be fresh in the morning and ready to tackle a 5-hour exam.

Of course, all of this is subject to change, and I am okay with that. I understand that some topics will take longer than others and I don’t think I will be too disappointed in myself if I don’t completely fall within my time frame.