Step 2CK,CS

CK
Many students say they wish they'd scheduled / taken Step 2 CK earlier - it's essentially a cumulative shelf exam, and if you wait long after your core rotations you'll forget a lot of stuff on the test. It's not a bad idea to just take a few weeks and knock them both out immediately after Block 6 ends in June / July. If you take it in September or so, you'll have the option of reviewing your score before deciding if you want to release it to programs, letting you leave a bad score out of your application. The latest acceptable date changes a little from year to year, but generally get both Step 2 CK and CS done no later than November: scores can take 3 months and many programs require you to pass before they will rank you in February.

Scores matter less than Step 1. More competetive specialties are rumored to still take Step 2 into consideration. It's also a chance to work hard and show improvement if your Step 1 score wasn't what you hoped for. If you're not looking for a competitive specialty, this should be a low pressure test: make sure you pass.

Step 2 CK is essentially a compilation of high yield material for all the M3 Shelf exams, so you're already pretty well prepared if you've done all your core rotations.

Study Resources (in order of best to worst)
If you're looking for a great score, I would recommend taking about 4 weeks and using a combination of UWorld, Master the Boards and Step Up to Step 2. Both books are concise, quick reads and they help fill in each other's deficiencies.
 * UWorld Q-bank for Step 2 CK. Recommended as the single best resource by almost all students. Many students don't use anything else. Some students advise purchasing a year long subscription and using it to study for the clerkships. Make sure if you do this you divide up the Internal Medicine questions through other rotations - they make up half the q bank and can't be done in one rotation.
 * Master the Boards USMLE Step 2 CK. Kaplan review book. Comprehensive review of high yield material for Step 2. Better than First Aid for Step 2 in that it not only gives high yield facts, but also teaches you to think through, "the next best step," which is so often the way questions are asked on step 2. For this reason, this would also be a useful book to use for your clerkship shelf exams.
 * Step Up to Step 2. Dense, bullet point book of high yield facts, comparable to Goljan for Pathology but much shorter. This has more facts than Master the Boards, but doesn't teach you "next best step."
 * First Aid for Step 2 CK. Don't buy this just because you liked First Aid for Step 1! IT'S NOT AS GOOD!!! The format is more cluttered and there's a lot of extraneous, low yield information.
 * Step Up to Medicine. Great book for the internal medicine shelf, and since this makes up 66% of the knowledge for Step 2 CK, could be a useful review.
 * Step 2 Secrets. Cliff notes for CK in Q&A form. Use this as a last minute review or if you don't need a great score.
 * Boards and Wards. Another very concise summary. Probably most useful as a last minute review.

If you're just looking to pass, UWorld and a brief review of any weak clerkships from any of these books should be more than enough.

CS
'''Schedule early! '''Chicago slots fill up very quickly. You can set up e-mail notifications for slots that become available, but these get taken very quickly by the vultures that apparently hover over the rescheduling calendar.

Read (or skim) First Aid for CS for an idea of common scenarios and expectations, including notes.

WASH YOUR HANDS!!!

This is not a hard test. Very few of our students have had to re-take, generally either because they weren't prepared for the weird format and timing (only 10 minutes for encounters and 5 minutes for charting - you need to be very brief and focused), or because they got nervous and froze up. The OSCEs are good preparation to keep this from happening to you.