(Part 2) Best products from r/premed

https://www.amazon.com/Kaplan-MCAT-528-Advanced-Students/dp/1618656317

http://offers.aamc.org/mcat-study-materials-1

https://www.amazon.com/Princeton-Review-Complete-MCAT-Preparation/dp/0804125082

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCDkK5wqSuwDlJ3_nl3rgdiQ

https://nextstepmcat.com/course

You can google Anki. If you have some money it might be good to check out a program that meets in person near you. Depending on your knowledge, study habits, and natural test taking abilities. Altius is a program near me that people seem to like, it comes with personal tutors. If you were planning on a self study schedule, make sure you have time set aside for it.

I thought i would be able to devote two hours a day to studying, but with work, my school, my family responsibilities, etc. I have time for maybe an hour a day. When summer rolls around, i will be able to spend 6-8 hours until my test date. At that point, it will be a lot easier to sit down and focus.

You should also be aware of your cycles. From your other posts, it looks like you are mid-twenties, you might want to consider how old you will be when you enter school, and possibly make plans to at least take the test this summer, even if you apply next cycle.

Only you know who you are and how studying goes for you, but i would say that you should limit your studying to less than a year, probably less than 6 months, if we are being honest.

Check your reading comprehension, and make sure you are practicing CARS daily. As in, go get a CARS book tomorrow and start doing passages. It takes time to learn reading comprehension. Also, start leisure reading some adult books, even if it is just audiobooks. That helps your comprehension more than you think, and it is good for your brain too.

Good luck. I know a lot of people haven't given you straight answers as to what you need, hopefully this will help. Take charge of your destiny, the side bar is also helpful, and so is the one over at /r/Mcat

Tchau!

When Breath Becomes Air - Paul Kalanithi

Being Mortal - Atul Gawande

Better - Atul Gawande

Honestly anything by Atul Gawande

Start With Why- Simon Sinek (Just finished this one today. Phenomenal read. Not medicine related, but a great perspective on what leadership means and how you can inspire those around you)

The White Coat Investor - James Dahle (Financial literacy is always a good thing)

​

I have quite a bit more book suggestions if you're ever curious, but those should keep you busy for a while. Feel free to DM me if you want more!

I wrote one! People seemed to like it :)
It kinda covers everything from planning undergrad to study tips for med school, and I've got a resources chapter in the back for study guides, other books, and whatnot.

• iTunes
  
  
• Kindle
  
  
• Nook
  
  
• All Formats
  
  Also, the Kaplan book mentioned in Dezzypoo's comment is pretty good as well.
  
  For resources to prepare you for interviews, I recommend reading a few JAMA articles and going to KevinMD to get a good feel for what working in healthcare is actually like.
  
  Good luck!

It's not specific to those two courses, but the Khan Academy app has really good tutorials on aspects of physio, like action potentials and muscle contraction. You can download it here, or just search on the store on your phone (it's free):

https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/khan-academy/id469863705?mt=8

I haven't taken anatomy yet (I plan on it second semester this coming year), but I took a course on greek/latin origins in med terminolgy...this book is amazing and I feel will make anatomy a lot more manageble:

http://www.amazon.com/Exploring-Medical-Language-Student-Directed-Approach/dp/0323073085

Good luck this semester!

Thanks for the write-up, I'm just starting to study for the MCAT and I found it pretty helpful. I have a few questions:

1. I wanted to get some of the TPR books for content review and practice, but I'm not sure which ones to get because there are so many. Do you mind sharing the book titles of the ones you used? I did a search on Amazon and found this: http://www.amazon.com/Biology-Review-Graduate-School-Preparation/dp/0375427929/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1373685891&sr=1-1&keywords=the+princeton+review+mcat Did you use that one plus the others for each subject? Do those subject specific books have enough practice questions for that topic, or do I need additional books for that? When I did a search for TPR practice books, I found Cracking the MCAT 2013-2014, MCAT Workout, MCAT Elite, MCAT Hyperlearning... not sure which one to use.
   
   
   
2. How many full length tests did you take, and when did you take them with respect to your test date? For the TPR FL's I assume you have to buy the book new to get the practice exams. Do you get 2 different exams for each book you buy or are they the same?
   
   
3. Has the MCAT changed any in the past few years other than removing the writing section? (I just want to make sure the study materials I use aren't outdated).
   
   
4. In the month leading up to your exam, did you devote all your time to studying, or did you have other commitments (work, school, etc.)?

This site really helped me for my MMIs! (Especially NYMC). I also used Dr. Heberts Canadian medical ethics book Doing Right, which I thought was really helpful too.

For health care reform /affordable care act, watch this video first for an overall summary http://m.youtube.com/watch?v=3-Ilc5xK2_E .. Reddit's explain like I'm 5 has a good summary too if you search for it.

Health policy is kind of a frustrating topic to understand without understanding US's history with other types of health policy. When I took my health policy class, we had to read this book that discussed US's history with health reform all the way until obamacare was passed:
http://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/030018915X?pc_redir=1406547347&robot_redir=1 Remedy & Reaction by Paul Star
The author/book is super liberal and biased against conservative policies but i think it definitely made me understand all the stakeholders involved in health policy decisions and how/why Medicare and Medicaid were developed, and why creating these and using private health insurance systems were an awful idea to begin with + and the repercussions of this on health policy development in the US. It's worth reading if you have the time and if you can get through the history parts at the beginning. It goes through Bill Clinton's original similar plan to Obamacare and how/why it failed.

This was helpful in interviews because you could understand and discuss all the stakeholders involved and why such policies would or would not work. I know a really common MMI question is to have a hospital or the govt propose some sort of health policy as an example and they ask for your opinion on whether or not it would work, what are the implications, etc. So it's good to be able to "see" all sides of an issue, which I thought the Paul star book did a good job of.

I studied the crap out of Lippincott's Illustrated Review: Biochemistry.

I still think I could have done better on the MCAT if I had taken both classes in addition to studying from that book, but even then, I think the book covered more material and gave me a better understanding. My genetics class had also covered enough biochemistry that it actually ended up being more useful in the long term... not that that helps you if you don't have time for a genetics class, but it might be a good idea to include genetics material in your biochem studying.

Ochem II was pretty unnecessary/useless for my mcat, but then again, not everybody gets the same questions, and more importantly, not everybody covers the same information in an Ochem II class. If I made a list of all the Ochem II topics that I wish I had studied going into the test, I think only about one or two of them even ended up being covered in my actual Ochem class... it was just a very low-yield class IMO.

It's probably not quite as directly tied to the specifics of first-year curriculum as Klein, but Feynman's Six Easy Pieces is a great intro to the big picture in physics. If you really want to understand physics, Feynman is one of your best resources.

Don't bother, you'll get enough of it in med school haha.

As far as I know, one of the gold standards for anatomy is the Frank H Netter material. There's a nice Atlas of Human Anatomy (keep in mind an atlas usually doesn't have information about the functions of any anatomy, just the names), and study cards (even referenced here).

Gray's Anatomy is good (obviously), but really long. The student's version may be shorter/more manageable.

My undergrad class used Grant's Atlas of Anatomy/Grant's Dissector, and a Human Anatomy textbook. They were not bad as well. Anatomy material is always pretty dry.

If you can, maybe see what your school uses? That way you won't start reading and then have to switch to a different book (though I suppose extra reading is never a bad thing).

And congrats again on getting into med school!

You should know the basics of healthcare, but to be honest, I was never asked a single question about healthcare, and I've only asked a healthcare-related question once, and it was as a follow-up to something that the candidate had said.

My advice is to work on commonly asked interview questions (which you can easily obtain from Google). It's also very helpful to find people to practice with in person and have them give you feedback.

Also, I don't know how helpful this would be for you, but I read this book when I was interviewing. Most of the content was stuff that I already knew, but there were a couple of tips that I found to be particularly helpful.

I searched my library for "medical school interview" and perused this book which was pretty helpful.

This was a great book to prepare for MMIs:

https://www.amazon.com/Multiple-Mini-Interview-Mind-Advisor/dp/1628908637/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1466318494&sr=8-2&keywords=multiple+mini+interview

I used this [book] (https://www.amazon.com/Multiple-Mini-Interview-Mind-Advisor/dp/1628908637/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1480737225&sr=8-2&keywords=multiple+mini+interview) to prepare for MMIs. You can also just find scenarios online. Get with a friend and practice

So I read a couple of books because even though I've interviewed for jobs, I realized I had no idea what adcoms on a med school were looking for. Link Here: https://www.amazon.com/Medical-School-Interview-Strategies-Admissions/dp/193797801X/ref=pd_lpo_sbs_14_t_0?_encoding=UTF8&psc=1&refRID=3BM4D155KR9XWQ3TCT0A

That got me in the right frame of mind. There is a MMI version too. After that, I practiced the more common 8 questions aloud and got them within 2 minutes time frame. Did some mock interviews. I usually over research and read on ethics too. Haven't been rejected or waitlisted post II yet.