AGNP AANP- The Dos and Don'ts

[momathoner09, BSN, MSN, APRN]

Yesterday, I passed the AANP exam! While this is all still fresh in my head, I wanted to write it out in case it might help someone out. I spent (wasted!) a lot of money and some things worked while others didn't. This will be long as this was a journey...

I was originally scheduled for the exam on 6/26 (Monday) at 9am. I wound up taking it 7/9 (Saturday) at 2pm. Time of day matters. I am a morning person so I thought 9am would be fine but I didn't anticipate the panic attack I would have the night before and get about 2 hours of sleep. I decided that I was not taking the exam early that morning. I emailed the testing place at like 4 am.

They do say that you have to reschedule 48 hours before and it is MUCH easier but if you find yourself in a situation like me you can be a no show and it doesn't count against you (besides the cost). It was a lot of back and forth with the APNA getting my account reset. It took about 4 days total.

I say this because if you have to change your mind last minute IT IS OKAY. The day before the exam the first time I studied all day (big mistake!) and failed those predictor exams. I was freaking out! Then that night like I said I didn't sleep and had so much anxiety. The day before for the time I took the exam for real I did study until 3 pm, took a cycle class, then watched Ms. Marvel my son. I went to bed at 10, got up at 7. Walked the dogs and reviewed just a few more things. I left my house at 1230 (exam was only 30 min away but I didn't want to be late). Got to the testing site and reviewed a little more from 1-130. Finally, just went inside because I had to go to the bathroom. They let me start the exam early.

I finished with 50 minutes to spare. When I saw that green "Pass" on the screen I didn't believe it! The exam was hard. It was not easy. There were some questions that I for sure knew and some that I had absolutely no idea. Then a lot of them I could narrow down to 2 answers. I kept telling myself that this exam was "you vs you.” The only person standing in my way was myself.

I am an older student (41) and so for most of you this will be overkill. I mean it was for me towards the end ha. But my biggest piece of advice is that you have to do what works for YOU. You can't get caught up in what other people are doing. I also didn't tell anyone besides my husband and son that I was taking it. Last time too many people knew and the well meaning "good luck" texts wound me up even more. I'll go through all the things I used and what worked and didn't. 

Fitzgerald

Pros:

• live review was very thorough
• I would advise doing the live review *before* you graduate or very soon after to get a jump start

Cons

• there was a lot of "hidden" info and things you had to print
• a lot of things were repetitive
• the Premier Plus package was overkill- I didn't use half of the items that I purchased and it was repetitive
• I do have friends that passed only using the spiral book and the live review but I felt like there were holes in the information
• The last month of studying I really focused on Liek and moved away from Fitzgerald

Liek

Pros

• Like I have read before and have had people tell me- Liek is bible
• I read the actual book, the online lessons, and did all the practice questions from each section probably 2-3x each per section
• I did the comprehensive 150 question exams 2x each
• The clinical pearls and exam tips were very helpful
• If I had to retake it or give advice, I would say spend a few days going through each section and use those exam tips/pearls like an exam blueprint
• I copy and pasted them from the website into a word document
• I believe if you can only afford or want to use one resource, then you will pass with Liek alone
• The dashboard helps keep you on track with days left to study, goals for the day, and you can access it on your phone and it syncs online

Cons

• The questions were "easier" than Fitzgerald and SM
• Some of them repeated
• There were some errors related to updated guidelines
• An instructor told me to buy the book while I was in school to practice questions when I did poorly on an exam
• I used it for one course but then not again but the online membership expires in 6 months so I had to purchase that AGAIN and I was not happy about that

Scores

• Average scores on exams: 87%
• Average score on practice: 84%
• I felt good about these scores but a lot of the questions I had memorized after awhile so I didn't know how true of a prediction they were

Sarah Michelle

Pros

• At this point you may be wondering why did this girl use so many reviews? Good question-  I don't know! Keep reading- it's going to get worse ha
• I purchased the question bank only for this
• She has a nice portal that organizes questions by systems and saves all your attempts on quizzes/practice exams

Cons

• No mobile app
• You have to take the quizzes all in one sitting and her questions were wordy
• It said you could "save" the quiz but I never could return to it

Scores

• The day before the exam I took her comprehensive exam and got a 86%
• When I took the other one (there are 2) I got a 70% a few weeks before

PSI practice exams

6/24: 81%

6/25: 69%

I don't think these were worth it (they were $50 each!). I thought I read you could take them again but you cannot. I don't know how I did so much better on one vs the other.

APEA predictor exams

DO NOT TAKE THESE EXAMS

If that's the only thing you take away from this post than do not take these! I took one the day before my originally scheduled test date and it REALLY messed me up. I may or may have not been ready but taking these exams mentally told me I was going to fail. Every question is like the hardest question you will see on boards. Every.single.one.

They say <60% is unlikely to pass, 65-69% at risk to fail, and >70% high likelihood to pass. I just call BS on the whole thing. One star. Do not recommend.

6/26: 61%

6/26: 72% ( I believe I looked some answers up for this time but I had no idea what I was reading!)

6/29: 59%

7/5:63%

Timeline- how all this played out over the last 2 months. They recommend 4-6 weeks of studying. I think it really all depends on how MUCH you will be studying. I had some family obligations that got in my way so for me it wound up being 8 weeks but I would have felt comfortable in 6 weeks personally. 

May 6- graduation

May 8-14: originally, I was supposed to take the Fitzgerald live zoom class this week. But I had a job interview for a job that I really wanted so I rescheduled the class so that I could focus on interview prep. It was worth it because I did get the job.

May 15-21: I started to go through the Fitzgerald content. I had purchased the "Premier Plus AGNP Review Package.” It was a lot of information and I didn't quite know where to start but I didn't want to let another week go by without starting to study (Since I couldn't reschedule until the following week). I started listening to the "Audio program,” which is basically Dr. Fitzgerald reading you through every module. It was good but very long winded and not time efficient. And there was no way to speed her up.

May 22-28: Fitzgerald live review I had on 5/24-5/25. The reason I say to take this as soon as you can is because this is basically your week. It is SO much information. You need some time to take it, regroup and get back into it.

May 29-June 4: Fitzgerald/started Liek

June 5-June 11: Fitzgerald/Like/purchased SM on the advice of fellow students taking the exam sooner than me

June 12-June 18: vacation with the in laws. Yeah this messed me up. I tried to study there but didn't get nearly what I would have gotten done at home

June 19-25: studied Like, did SM questions

June 26-July 2:July 26 was my original exam date. I  no showed and had to reschedule but I locked myself in my room to study. It was at this point that I really took it back to basics and started making flashcards to get some of the info into my head.

July 5-11: took the exam on Saturday (7/9) at 2pm

[barcode120x, RN, NP]

Thanks for the tips/advice. I've been using Fitzgerald textbook and APEA lectures and just ordered Leik today and will crack it open when I get it tomorrow.

I'm a huge fan of APEA as it was incorporated into my program. Dr. Amelie and staff are engaging lecturers and funny at that as well. Good for both factual content as well as clinical content. I'm curious as to why you would not recommend taking their predictor exam. For one, it's a predictor exam. It's supposed to check your knowledge and it supposed to be hard. It's also an estimate. Just because you scored low 60's doesn't mean you are gonna fail. You could still score in the 50's and still pass. I had taken 2 APEA predictor exams during my program, both of which I scored in the 60's. My last one was in November and I scored a 65%. I was initially devastated but my instructor had mentioned to me that it's a prediction and that although I'm "at risk," it's still borderline of doing well/passing and I would just need a bit extra time to study for the actual exam. Also, taking any predictor exam the day before an exam is probably not the best idea. Heck, I wouldn't take any practice exams or questions the day before. Need to let the mind rest and relax. Anyways, congrats to you, and thanks again for the info. Hope you get your dream NP job soon!

[momathoner09, BSN, MSN, APRN]

I agree about the predictor exam- that was stupid to take it right before! My issue with this whole process is that our instructors/school gave us zero input or advice. And this is a reputable brick and mortar school. I understand that they don’t *have* to hold our hands but a little direction would have been nice. 

[HarleyvQuinn, MSN, RN, NP]

On 7/11/2022 at 2:49 AM, barcode120x said:

Thanks for the tips/advice. I've been using Fitzgerald textbook and APEA lectures and just ordered Leik today and will crack it open when I get it tomorrow.

I'm a huge fan of APEA as it was incorporated into my program. Dr. Amelie and staff are engaging lecturers and funny at that as well. Good for both factual content as well as clinical content. I'm curious as to why you would not recommend taking their predictor exam. For one, it's a predictor exam. It's supposed to check your knowledge and it supposed to be hard. It's also an estimate. Just because you scored low 60's doesn't mean you are gonna fail. You could still score in the 50's and still pass. I had taken 2 APEA predictor exams during my program, both of which I scored in the 60's. My last one was in November and I scored a 65%. I was initially devastated but my instructor had mentioned to me that it's a prediction and that although I'm "at risk," it's still borderline of doing well/passing and I would just need a bit extra time to study for the actual exam. Also, taking any predictor exam the day before an exam is probably not the best idea. Heck, I wouldn't take any practice exams or questions the day before. Need to let the mind rest and relax. Anyways, congrats to you, and thanks again for the info. Hope you get your dream NP job soon!

My program also incorporated the APEA predictor exams into our program. We took the 3P exam after we finished with advanced pharm, phys assessment, and pathophys as an overall check your knowledge there. Then we did an initial pre-predictor exam during the Winter break of our final year and the predictor exam at the end of the program. For any of the topics we scored lowest on, we submitted remediation assignments as a way to help build our knowledge base, and our thesis was based on the lowest scored topic of the pre-predictor. We also utilized the question banks. Fitzgerald was also used in our program as one of the required books. I purchased Liek on my own for study material and preferred it over Fitzgerald, but ultimately used both. I used the APEA review videos for focused studying, as well. I passed on my first try at the AANP FNP exam and felt confident while taking it. I do recommend Liek and the APEA review videos/live review for those who find they learn best with these methods. 

[momathoner09, BSN, MSN, APRN]

I guess I wish I knew more about the APEA predictor exam before taking/using it as a tool. I still think that if you have no experience with it then it isn't the best tool/study guide out there if you are *only* using the predictor exams. 

[HarleyvQuinn, MSN, RN, NP]

On 8/4/2022 at 11:27 AM, momathoner09 said:

I guess I wish I knew more about the APEA predictor exam before taking/using it as a tool. I still think that if you have no experience with it then it isn't the best tool/study guide out there if you are *only* using the predictor exams. 

It probably isn't a good tool to use by itself, especially if you aren't familiar with what it is exactly and how it works to make the best use of it. The APEA tools work best after spending some time researching them and implementing them into either your actual program or other study methods. The tools they offer are rather expensive and a bit too niche to be used as singular, stand-alone items. Their question formatting and difficulty are on a different level than I've found from other study tools. You really have to get used to it. I actually plan to purchase their clinical update for CME hours, though, because I enjoyed their video format and the information they provided previously. 

[barcode120x, RN, NP]

On 7/11/2022 at 3:26 AM, momathoner09 said:

I agree about the predictor exam- that was stupid to take it right before! My issue with this whole process is that our instructors/school gave us zero input or advice. And this is a reputable brick and mortar school. I understand that they don’t *have* to hold our hands but a little direction would have been nice. 

Funny thing, same here. I honestly do not recall my school/instructors ever providing any recommendations on what to use to study for the boards. APEA was incorporated into my program (lectures once each year and predictor exams once per year). Maybe they assumed we'd use APEA as a resource. The more I think about it, the more I realize my program was more of "figure it out on your own." It was all about making sure you got your hours and total patient #'s be the end of graduation more than anything else. Interesting thought now heh.

@OP
I'd like to thank you again on your advice, particularly Leik's text and its online resources. I passed AANP recently and made kind of a similar post as yours in regards to advice for the AANP. Leik's for sure the main reason why I passed and the content stuck with me (in addition to Fitzgerald and APEA as well).