By NEJM Knowledge+ Team | 2024-06-25T16:05:07-04:00 May 31st, 2024 | Internal Medicine, Your Experiences | Comments Off on Internal Medicine Question Banks — Which One is the Best Option for You?
If you’ve got an ABIM certification or recertification exam looming and you’re searching for the best Internal Medicine question bank, you’re in the right place. Myriad studies have shown that answering questions, a form of memory retrieval practice, is one of the best strategies for successfully preparing for and taking exams. And to help you make an educated decision about which IM question bank is right for you, we’ve compiled a list of key question bank features we believe you should consider.
We know a lot about question banks, but let’s acknowledge right off the bat that we’re a little biased. Of course, we hope you’ll choose NEJM Knowledge+ Internal Medicine Board Review, which delivers personalized learning, has more than 5,100 questions, two practice exams, and includes many other features that will help you pass your ABIM exam. But regardless of which ABIM question bank you choose, the following considerations will be beneficial when evaluating your options.
Let’s begin with why you should use Internal Medicine QBanks to study and learn. If you know all about the testing effect and are already sold on using a question bank to study, then feel free to skip to the section: What to Consider When Searching for an Internal Medicine QBank. But if you want to understand why answering questions—leveraging the testing effect — is such an effective strategy (plus enhance your ability to learn in the process), keep reading.
The testing effect, in short, says that by testing your memory, you not only assess what you know, but you also enhance later retention. There are many reasons why testing yourself improves learning outcomes. One reason it works is because you engage in active learning.
Honor Schoech, MD, a Colorado internist who has recertified twice, responded to a survey we did a few years back about how physicians prepare for certification/recertification exams. Here’s what she had to say:
“Questions are the only way to go. It’s much more effective [than other study methods]. Answering the questions makes you think about the topic.”
Honor is onto something. As you answer questions, you actively pull out knowledge stored in your memory. This allows you to make connections to and integrate that knowledge with new information. This retrieval practice, as it’s known, reinforces learning, makes future recall easier, and strengthens long-term retention.
Stephen Russell, MD, another survey respondent and a double-board certified Internal Medicine Physician, used to study by reading study guides and working through the questions embedded within.
“Prospectively, I thought that studying the ‘core curriculum’ was more what I needed. Retrospectively, I needed the questions more,” reflects Russell. Answering questions has “honed my focus on knowledge gaps and allowed for quick learning points in reviewing the answers.”
When you grapple with a question, oftentimes, you’ll realize very quickly what you know and don’t know about the topic. Other times, you’ll think you know the right response, but then when provided with the actual answer, you’ll realize you didn’t know it or that you did not have the complete story. And sometimes you won’t feel confident at all in your response, only to find out that you knew more than you thought. By answering questions, you’ll not only uncover knowledge blind spots, you’ll also strengthen your intellectual self-awareness and metacognition. This, in turn, accelerates learning as you become more conscious of topics that warrant further exploration.
Questions help to pinpoint the specific information you need to learn to pass your exam (and accurately diagnose and successfully treat patients). Honor Schoech, MD, reflects that there’s too much information to tackle for exam prep — reading thousands of pages isn’t an effective option. She says, “Questions target your learning.”
But the questions can also serve as a springboard for deeper learning. You may realize that you want to dig more deeply into a topic. You can then use textbooks and online evidence-based tools to enhance your knowledge. Indeed, following up on a question by examining feedback about your response and expanding your learning about the topic leads to deeper understanding and better long-term retention. That’s why quality resources behind the answers to questions is an essential part of a good question bank. You can quickly move on if you feel confident with the topic, or access detailed feedback and resources if you get stuck or want to explore further.
Testing yourself also enhances learning as it primes your brain to be on the lookout for new and relevant information in the future. Answering questions promotes active recall, which is when you actively stimulate your memory to retrieve information. This triggers future learning, because your mind will become vigilant for related information as you collaborate with colleagues, attend courses, read journals, and interact with patients and their medical conditions. This cognitive process will also help you to remember the information on exam day and successfully apply what you have learned in your practice.
Microlearning — small lesson modules and short-term activities intended to both teach and reinforce learning objectives — is an innovative pedagogy that lets learners control the place, method, and time of access to information. Questions make for perfect bite-sized, stackable learning opportunities. You can fit questions into the “in between moments” of your life. Or, you can answer multiple questions at once and dive into the topics during focused study sessions. Between patients? Attend to a single question. Eating lunch? Devour five questions. Long layover between flights? Soar through 20 questions, or more! ABIM question banks empower you to learn anywhere, anytime, and for as long as you want.
Simulating the actual test environment is one of the most powerful ways to improve your score and reduce anxiety on exam day. Taking a timed practice exam will not only reinforce many of the benefits we’ve already discussed, but it also parallels the experience of taking the ABIM exam. Does the Internal Medicine question bank include timed practice exams so you can fine-tune your ability to apply effective strategies for working through ABIM questions?
When looking for a quality Internal Medicine question bank, here are some key factors to contemplate:
CME Credits and MOC Points: It can’t be overstated: Your time is a precious commodity. So, it’s understandable that you will want to kill two (or three, or four) birds with one question bank. Ask yourself, “How many credits and points can I earn by using this question bank? And how easy is it for me to submit my points to ABIM?”
What Additional Supporting Resources Come with the IM Qbank? Will you gain free access to valuable journal content and foundational, distilled, topic-specific information? Career development and life balance resources? Other educational media and interactive tools for learning and sharpening your diagnostic abilities? Try listing out all the bells and whistles that come with the question bank you are considering, and then ask yourself, “Which of these features are just shiny objects designed to distract me, and which will add true value?”The best ABIM question banks are developed based on the above list of essential considerations. We hope the list will help you in your search for an IM QBank , even if you don’t choose ours. But to make sure you have all the information you need about NEJM Knowledge+ Internal Medicine Board Review , we’ve outlined a few of the reasons why we think you should consider our internal medicine question bank below.
At NEJM Knowledge+, we understand what works and what doesn’t when preparing for the Internal Medicine exam. In fact, NEJM Knowledge+ Internal Medicine Board Review has been engineered with all of the above considerations top of mind. For example:
Our 5,100+ gold-standard questions — the largest and most comprehensive Internal Medicine question bank available — are not just mapped to the ABIM Blueprint. They are created and reviewed via our rigorous editorial process to ensure the quality and standards you’ve come to trust from NEJM Group.
Our Adaptive Learning algorithm not only uses spaced repetition to deliver questions to you in intervals that promote long-term retention. It also tests your knowledge in different contexts and question formats so you develop the deep understanding you’ll need when answering the case-based questions you’ll see on the ABIM exam. The adaptive learning algorithm won’t waste your valuable time asking you questions about topics you’ve already mastered. Instead, it will tailor your learning experience in real-time to create the perfect learning path for you, saving you hours.
NEJM Knowledge+ Internal Medicine Board Review will also amp up your metacognition by asking you to consider how confident you are about the questions as you answer them. You’ll be prompted to “think about your thinking,” which will strengthen your metacognitive muscle, helping you tackle questions on exam day adeptly and with confidence.
The program has two timed practice exams, performance reports with actionable data that will make you a more efficient and effective learner, and a Credits Center that keeps track of and automatically reports your MOC points and CME credits.
In other words, we think NEJM Knowledge+ is THE Internal Medicine question bank you need to prepare for and pass your ABIM certification exam!
