Passbook Series Study Guides

[TheCommuter, BSN, RN]

Although I am enrolled an online/distance RN-to-BSN program other than Excelsior College, I regularly use study materials that are designed to help students pass the ECEs because I find that they adequately prepare me for the exams in my program.

I've successfully used study guides published by the College Network, Chancellors and so forth, that I obtain from Ebay or Amazon for about $15 to $30 apiece. Right now I'm currently enrolled in a Community Health course, so I decided to purchase a study guide from the Passbook Series that prepares students to pass Excelsior's Community Focused exam.

Buyer beware. Boy was I disappointed! Although the book's copyright is 2014, the information is obviously from several generations ago. One question asks about the leading cause of death for persons in the 15 to 24 year old age range. According to the Passbook, the answer is tuberculosis. However, I know the answer is accidents and unintentional injury. Tuberculosis hasn't been the leading cause of death for teens and young adults in generations.

Other issues glared at me. The book uses statistics from the 1970s. Some terms are grossly outdated such as "oculist" and "puerperal fever." Some pages have modern print whereas other pages look as if they were prepared on an old-fashioned typewriter.

My biggest issue is the fact that no rationales are provided for the correct answers.

[NotMyProblem MSN, ASN, BSN, MSN, LPN, RN]

I used this book for Excelsior's Community Focused Nursing exam. Remember my "Ok! Ok! This is my confession!" thread? Well, this is what contributed to my needing to compose it! I was EXTREMELY hurt and disappointed because this became my first-ever FAILED nursing exam! Reading your post just brought back that heartache because it was a year ago in August, (the 7th to be exact), when that fiasco happened. Took me a couple of months after that to admit my defeat here on allnurses.

I used a Passbook for the Bioethics: Philosophical Issues exam. I passed that exam and started asking myself how was that possible back in the early spring of last year and not possible a few short months later? Then it dawned on me, (as such, I stopped recommending the book), that the difference was that I did a lot of googling while studying for the bioethics exam and I did very little else (other than the Passbook) for the CFN exam. As you said, there were some things that I knew was outdated but that red flag didn't wave hard enough for me, apparently. To say that I was disappointed with that D is such a MAJOR understatement!!!

[Medic85907]

Thanks for the heads up!

[TheCommuter, BSN, RN]

As you said, there were some things that I knew was outdated but that red flag didn't wave hard enough for me, apparently.

For me, the biggest red flag should have been the fact that the publisher and author are still using the 'Regents College' name on these books when the school officially changed its name to Excelsior College many years ago. I figured that, despite the outdated name, the study material would still be current since the copyright date was 2014.

If it seems to good to be true, it probably is. Now I must deal with the consequences of my decision.

[NotMyProblem MSN, ASN, BSN, MSN, LPN, RN]

Been there, done that! My failure dealt a tremendous blow to my GPA. I worked very hard to get all A's after that, and you can believe it took each and every one of those A's to drag my GPA out of the gutter and into MSN status (should I decide to go further). My attitude during the ASN landed me a few C's that I honestly believed were no big deal....until that CFN exam. The cushion I needed to offset that disaster was not there. Lesson learned! What's funny is that once I got into the nursing courses of the BSN, we were not allowed to use ANY resources older than five years. Like you said, the date was current...probably the only thing that was. Oh well....it happened, I paid the price for it (dearly), and I struggled but did bounce back. Undoubtedly, you will too.

[TheCommuter, BSN, RN]

UPDATE: I passed my community health exam yesterday. I studied from the aforementioned Passbook study guide and the ATI Community Health 6.0 study guide. When studying with the Passbook, I googled most of the questions and disease processes to ensure I wouldn't be bringing a bunch of outdated knowledge to this exam.

The Passbook helped the most when answering questions about 'older' community health menaces such as smallpox and TB. Yes, I actually did receive a question about the smallpox immunization on yesterday's exam.

[NotMyProblem MSN, ASN, BSN, MSN, LPN, RN]

Congratulations!!!!! That exam was definitely a tough one for me! No more passbooks in my future, ever!