Hey everyone, this is for anyone who is looking for any bit of reference (as I did for the last 3 months) about the NCLEX. I had my exam on the 10/13 and it shut off after 75 questions. I traveled home (2 hour drive) and did the PVT and got the good pop up. I did the quick results and found out I passed today. I have lurked, commented, and used this site for a good 3 months, so a huge thank you to everyone on this site. Here is what worked for me....
I graduated in August, and had been doing UWorld and Nurse Achieve questions since mid July. I took a CAT exam at the end of my 30 day trial for Nurse Achieve and got a pass-pass. For my UWorld I did the entire 2100+ Qbank and averaged out to a 61, I had around 900 questions I marked/flagged to go back to later, even some I got some right, but said "Oh, damn good question I want to see that again". I also did around 1000 questions on Nurse Achieve. I finally got my ATT in mid September and scheduled for Oct 13th, which gave me pretty much 30 days, so I looked at UWorld to see what were my low points and worked on them. Instead of hand writing notes, I copied and pasted the rationales to desktop folders and would review these once a week. I also added in Mark K's lectures, listening and typing notes on his lectures. Additionally, I went through a decent amount of the LaCharity prioritization and delegation book. Finally, I did 3 more CAT exams (pass-pass on all 3) and 2 UWorld assessments with a good chance of passing.
As I mentioned, I traveled 2 hours to the site, stayed in a hotel the night before as I had scheduled my exam for 9am. I looked over nothing in the hotel room last night, as I felt I had been doing close to 4000 questions (between UWorld and Nurse Achieve), and just wanted a break, as 3 months was probably too long and I started getting bored the last 2 weeks. I either knew it or I didn't.
I got to the testing site 30 minutes ahead and went through their screening process. I got through the first 10 questions and thought, yea it is vague, but this is a lot like my nursing exams. If there is one good thing I will say about my nursing program is that it was a *** (there were no A students, there were barely any B students, it was 60 students clawing their way to C's). That's why I feel there are nursing programs out there designed to get a student through their program, and programs out there to get them to pass the NCLEX. My program was tough, and I felt it was a normal nursing exam.
My exam had I think 25 SATA, 1 drag and drop, no math, no EKG. It was a mix of everything, from maternity, peds, to priority, some mental health, and legal/ethics. I had no delegation, maybe 1 or 2 peds, pharm were basic beta blockers. There were a few random vocab that made me do a double take (thinking what the hell is that word), but only 2-3 questions that I had no idea what they were asking. I got out in 90 minutes and drove home. Did the PVT and got the good pop up.
I hope this helps at least one person, as I know a lot of posts helped me through the last 3 months. Good luck to all.
