USMLE Step 1 Recall: Buzzwords for the Boards (Recall Series)

Regarded by many students as the strongest USMLE Step 1 tool on the market, USMLE Step 1 Recall: Buzzwords for the Boards is now in its Third Edition. The question-and-answer Recall format helps students memorize the facts that are most often tested on the USMLE. An especially popular Power Review section helps students brush up on the details and test how well they've retained knowledge over the study period. The thoroughly updated Third Edition organizes facts according to their specific basic science disciplines and provides current, accurate information at just the right level of depth for study and review.

Customer Reviews:

Not as bad as some of the other reviewers say

By Tin C. Ngo "Tin Ngo" - March 3, 2005

This book isn't so bad. It is true that the NBME is moving away from using buzzwords in their questions, but many of the questions in this book are useful to remind you of important facts. For example, the first question in the biochemistry section is "What is the rate limiting step in glycolysis?" Answer "PFK-1". If you're the type of person who likes to study by answering questions (which I do) this book will save you time. I normally make up my own questions as I go along but this book does it for me. And not all keywords are bad -- it's difficult to describe verbally what Howell-Jolly bodies in a manner that specifically hints at asplenia -- it's just plain easier to use the eponym. With those considerations in mind, I would recommend this book, not as a primary source for study, but a good way to form associations with material you've just studied and to remember important, frequently tested facts.

Meh. It's just okay

By Young Doc - April 9, 2009

This is a pretty good test of how well you studied material, but not a good way to review material for boards. Pretty much you will go through the book and be in love with yourself for having memorized a bunch of facts from notes and other reviews, or you won't. There are minimal explanations to mechanisms or etiologies, and a few mnemonics that seem helpful. Other than that, I just used it as a way to determine how well I had understood material from other sources. If you buy a 200 page paperback with writing on half of each page and expect to have a board review book, you aren't studying right.

Needs work

By Med student - February 8, 2006

Has the potential for being a very helpful book, but I found it to be filled with repeated questions and incorrect information - suprising for a 2nd edition. Wouldn't recommend this book until someone does a much better job editing it.