I'm having a really hard time with pathophysiology.

[Coriander, BSN, RN]

Hello, friends. I hope your weekend is bright and beautiful!

We're 9 weeks into our first semester, and I'm settled in all of my classes except for pathophysiology. I've never struggled with a class like I have with this one. I loved physiology and was hopeful that I would like this class, too.

There is a ton of reading, which I'm fine with. I supplement the readings with corresponding chapters from our Med-Surg textbook just so I fully understand what I'm reading.

We have two exams and several quizzes, which all have the same point value (except for the final). I've flat out failed two quizzes, getting a 40 and a 50 respectively. These quizzes are online, but were incredibly in-depth and almost impossible. Almost all of my classmates have failed these two quizzes. We've asked the professor for extra time, and now have another five minutes on each quiz (20 minutes total). The scenarios she gives us require a lot of thought and sometimes it's up to us to guess which answer might be "most right" or else we run out of time.

Last week we had a session in class about why we're having such difficulty with the quizzes, and we thought we were very clear with her about why we're having these problems.

Does anyone have any ideas about how to fully absorb 20 chapters of information for the exam we have coming up? I go through notes, read chapters, and work with my classmates to study. I do the review exercises at the ends of the chapters. We honestly have no idea what else to do.

Thanks in advance.

[Armygirl7]

Whenever we are struggling with the "test" our Prof always recommends taking hundreds of practice exam questions. She always says the students who do poorly on exams bring their grades up considerably after adding hundreds of practice questions to their studying plan.

Now, how you find the time to do that?? Ha!

Most textbooks come with a CD of questions, or you can buy an NCLEX book or CD that lets you narrow down the questions to the subjects you'll be facing on your exam.

Good luck!