justdesserts

Hi there! I passed my NCLEX-RN with 75 questions on the first try. Initially, I tried using the Saunder's Comprehensive Review book. I found this to be too time consuming to read, and I felt like it had way too much information that I needed to know for the NCLEX. I wanted something that presented the core content for the NCLEX in a condensed style... During nursing school I never opened a textbook to read - I was a powerpoint/lecture notes type of person. I used the HURST Review. It's amazing. Tells you everything you need to know to answer any of the questions the NCLEX throws at you. Found this to be a resource gem. I did the review + 6 practice tests they give you (125 questions each). After that I used the UWORLD question bank and finished it in its entirety. UWORLD is an amazing resource with detailed rationales for every question. So yup, those were my 2 only resources: Hurst and UWorld. They got me my RN designation

I used the HURST Review and UWORLD

My Scores were as follows: 63/125, 73/125, 81/125, 69/125, 79/125, 78/125 I passed the NCLEX-RN with 75 questions on my first try.

My Scores were as follows: 63/125, 73/125, 81/125, 69/125, 79/125, 78/125 I passed the NCLEX-RN with 75 questions on my first try. Don't feel discouraged. I feel that the "mean score" they expect you to hit (86/125) is ridiculously over-estimated. Read the rationales, understand why you got the question wrong, and keep reviewing. I feel that if you hit above 60%, you should be fine.

My Scores were as follows: 63/125, 73/125, 81/125, 69/125, 79/125, 78/125 I passed the NCLEX-RN with 75 questions on my first try. Don't feel discouraged. I feel that the "mean score" they expect you to hit (84/125) is ridiculously over-estimated. Read the rationales, understand why you got the question wrong, and keep reviewing. I feel that if you hit above 60%, you should be fine.

I did 150 questions per day. A set of 75 in the afternoon and then a set of 75 at night. I was crunched for time to finish all the question on UWORLD, so that's why I did that many in a day. I would say do at least 75 questions per day to train your brain to get the minimum amount of questions. The most important thing with UWORLD is reading the rationales and learning from them. You must be able to understand why you got the question wrong and the background logic behind it. Try writing down the summary rationales of the questions you get wrong in a scribbler and studying them instead of retaking the ones you get wrong at the end to cut time and be more concise (that's just my personal opinion)

Good luck! Believe in yourself and you will pass!

This morning I found out that I passed my board exam!!!!!! I am so happy and relieved, but before I start celebrating I want to reach out to those of you who are still studying. The NCLEX is depicted to be one of the biggest hurdles in your nursing career. I'm going to lay out everything I did in order to prepare and help instil some confidence in those who have yet to write it. My background: My previous degree is a BSc in Biological Sciences and Physical Sciences. I graduated from a nursing after degree program in August 2016. I took the rest of August and all of September off to give myself a break to recover from going through nursing school 2 years straight year round. On October 1st, I decided to use the Saunder's NCLEX-RN Comprehensive Review book. I got through all of fundamentals. However, I realized that it was taking WAY TOO LONG to even get through a chapter. I was getting bored, easily distracted, and the information just wasn't sticking. It was SO DRY, and quite frankly, there was way too much excessive information. As a result, I decided that using a comprehensive review book was just not an adequate resource for me. I needed something that gave the CORE information in a condensed style. On November 1st, I purchased the HURST Review. I printed out the fill-in-the-blank notes that were associated with each video. Every day I would watch 2 videos and thoroughly fill in the notes for those. This took roughly 2 weeks. Once I was done the videos, I studied my notes for 1 week making sure that I had memorized and learned from the notes. I had to make sure I knew the information like the back of my hand. THAT WAS THE CORE CONTENT. I really liked this review. They presented information in a style that helped it stick in my brain. It was entertaining, and each video was on average 50 minutes long. After learning the information on the HURST review, I decided to do the HURST Q Review. Each Q Review was 125 questions, and I did 1/day. Let me tell you: I was not scoring the mean average they tell you to get (85/125). My scores were as follows: 63/125, 73/125, 81/125, 69/125, 79/125, 78/125. This CRUSHED my confidence. I read through the rationales. However, I felt like I needed more practice. PRACTICE PRACTICE PRACTICE = THE KEY TO PASSING THE NCLEX The last resource that I used was the UWORLD question bank. This is an AMAZING question bank. UWORLD has the BEST rationales - they're so detailed and go through the whys and hows of each question. I finished the ENTIRE Q bank doing a minimum of 150 Qs each day. I would do 2 sets of 75 question tests in tutor mode and read the rationale for each of the questions I got wrong as I went through the exam. Sometimes I would write down the rationale summary in a scribbler that I would review the next day. My score at the end of the Q-Bank was around 67% average and 86th percentile rank. This gave me a confidence boost because you can tell where you stand in comparison to others. It also tells you what percent of people answers the question correctly for EACH question. The statistics they give you, really put your mind at ease. For example, if only 17% of users got a question right, I would feel that this is one of the harder questions and it's okay if I didn't get it right. If 78% of users got a question right, this would be a key fundamental question that I should be getting right. All in all, I highly recommend UWORLD to everyone! The NCLEX: I wrote on Dec 16, 2016. The night before the NCLEX, I was a complete mess. My stomach was in knots. I could barely eat. I scarfed down a DQ cheeseburger meal to get a dense calorie rich food in my body. I was so NERVOUS. I briefly reread the HURST review notes and the UWORLD rationale notes I wrote in my scribbler. Decided to go to bed at 2am. My test was at 8am and I had to be up by 6:30am. However, every time I would put my head down on the pillow, I could hear my heart beating so fast and it taunted me all night. I tossed and turned - tried relocating to the couch, the spare bedroom, back to my bed.... let's just say I max slept an hour. In the morning, I showered to wake myself up, made a cup of coffee, ate an omelette, and went to the writing centre in downtown. The other TA was late so my exam didn't start till around 8:45AM. During that time, I chatted with some former classmates that were also writing. It helped calm my anxiety. After being palm veined scanned, I went into the writing room and was placed in front of the computer. I was done the exam in about 2 hours. It shut off at 75 questions. My first thought: "NOOOOO I can do better!!! Please don't shut off." I WALKED OUT THINKING I FAILED. TEARS WERE RUNNING DOWN MY FACE. About 40% of the exam was SATA questions. I felt like the questions I was getting throughout the exam were TOO EASY and not enough critical thinking. I was preparing myself using UWORLD and those questions were WAY HARDER than any question I got on the NCLEX. Distraught, thinking I failed, I went to my cousins house and cried for about 4 hours straight while sipping on a rye and coke. For about the next 3 days I moped around feeling ultra depressed. My results didn't come till about 2.5 weeks due to the holidays. I did not do the PVT - didn't want to give myself false impressions in case it was wrong. I decided to not dwell on it and chilled with my family and friends, making the most of the holidays. Jan 3, 2017: I opened up that email to find that I passed!!!!! WOW I'm an RN. Thank you God. So for anyone reading this, don't feel discouraged. There's always hope! And I realized that basically EVERYONE walks out of that exam feeling like they failed. So have faith. There's always light at the end of the tunnel!! BELIEVE IN YOURSELVES AND GOOD LUCK TO YOU ALL

This morning I found out that I passed my board exam!!!!!! I am so happy and relieved, but before I start celebrating I want to reach out to those of you who are still studying. The NCLEX is depicted to be one of the biggest hurdles in your nursing career. I'm going to lay out everything I did in order to prepare and help instil some confidence on those who gave yet to write it. My background: My previous degree is a BSc in Biological Sciences and Physical Sciences. I graduated from a nursing after degree program in August 2016. I took the rest of August and all of September off to give myself a break to recover from going through nursing school 2 years straight year round. On October 1st, I decided to use the Saunder's NCLEX-RN Comprehensive Review book. I got through all of fundamentals. However, I realized that it was taking WAY TOO LONG to even get through a chapter. I was getting bored, easily distracted, and the information just wasn't sticking. It was SO DRY, and quite frankly, there was way too much excessive information. As a result, I decided that using a comprehensive review book was just not an adequate resource for me. I needed something that gave the CORE information in a condensed style. On November 1st, I purchased the HURST Review. I printed out the fill-in-the-blank notes that were associated with each video. Every day I would watch 2 videos and thoroughly fill in the notes for those. This took roughly 2 weeks. Once I was done the videos, I studied my notes for 1 week making sure that I had memorized and learned from the notes. I had to make sure I knew the information like the back of my hand. THAT WAS THE CORE CONTENT. I really liked this review. They presented information in a style that helped it stick in my brain. It was entertaining, and each video was on average 50 minutes long. After learning the information on the HURST review, I decided to do the HURST Q Review. Each Q Review was 125 questions, and I did 1/day. Let me tell you: I was not scoring the mean average they tell you to get (85/125). My scores were as follows: 63/125, 73/125, 81/125, 69/125, 79/125, 78/125. This CRUSHED my confidence. I read through the rationales. However, I felt like I needed more practice. PRACTICE PRACTICE PRACTICE = THE KEY TO PASSING THE NCLEXThe last resource that I used was the UWORLD question bank. This is an AMAZING question bank. UWORLD has the BEST rationales - they're so detailed and go through the whys and hows of each question. I finished the ENTIRE Q bank doing a minimum of 150 Qs each day. I would do 2 sets of 75 question tests in tutor mode and read the rationale for each of the questions I got wrong as I went through the exam. Sometimes I would write down the rationale summary in a scribbler that I would review the next day. My score at the end of the Q-Bank was around 67% average and 86th percentile rank. This gave me a confidence boost because you can tell where you stand in comparison to others. It also tells you what percent of people answers the question correctly for EACH question. The statistics they give you, really put your mind at ease. For example, if only 17% of users got a question right, I would feel that this is one of the harder questions and it's okay if I didn't get it right. If 78% of users got a question right, this would be a key fundamental question that I should be getting right. All in all, I highly recommend UWORLD to everyone! The NCLEX: I wrote on Dec 16, 2016. The night before the NCLEX, I was a complete mess. My stomach was in knots. I could barely eat. I scarfed down a DQ cheeseburger meal to get a dense calorie rich food in my body. I was so NERVOUS. I briefly reread the HURST review notes and the UWORLD rationale notes I wrote in my scribbler. Decided to go to bed at 2am. My test was at 8am and I had to be up by 6:30am. However, every time I would put my head down on the pillow, I could hear my heart beating so fast and it taunted me all night. I tossed and turned - tried relocating to the couch, the spare bedroom, back to my bed.... let's just say I max slept an hour. In the morning, I showered to wake myself up, made a cup of coffee, ate an omelette, and went to the writing centre in downtown. The other TA was late so my exam didn't start till around 8:45 AM. During that time, I chatted with some former classmates that were also writing. It helped calm my anxiety. After being palm veined scanned, I went into the writing room and was placed in front of the computer. I was done the exam in about 2 hours. It shut off at 75 questions. My first thought: "NOOOOO I can do better!!! Please don't shut off." I WALKED OUT THINKING I FAILED. TEARS WERE RUNNING DOWN MY FACE. About 40% of the exam was SATA questions. I felt like the questions I was getting throughout the exam were TOO EASY and not enough critical thinking. I was preparing myself using UWORLD and those questions were WAY HARDER than any question I got on the NCLEX. Distraught, thinking I failed, I went to my cousins house and cried for about 4 hours straight while sipping on a rye and coke. For about the next 3 days I moped around feeling ultra depressed. My results didn't come till about 2.5 weeks due to the holidays. I did not do the PVT - didn't want to give myself false impressions in case it was wrong. I decided to not dwell on it and chilled with my family and friends, making the most of the holidays. Jan 3, 2017: I opened up that email to find that I passed!!!!! WOW I'm an RN. Thank you God. So for anyone reading this, don't feel discouraged. There's always hope! And I realized that basically EVERYONE walks out of that exam feeling like they failed. So have faith. There's always light at the end of the tunnel!! BELIEVE IN YOURSELVES AND GOOD LUCK TO YOU ALL

I'm a Canadian student. I have been using HURST and UWORLD as study resources. I am wondering if the NCLEX-RN Canada has BOTH American and Canadian units. I've been studying the American ones because of the resources I have been using. I'm freaking out. If someone who's taken it in Canada can tell me

Were both units on the exam? I'm using American based study tools and they use mg/dL instead of mmol/L and micomol/L.

I'm having a hard time finding a position as a new graduate. I recently graduated this past August from nursing school (RN after-degree program). I have my graduate license too. I'm literally applying to everything, but no call backs Any tips?

I was just wondering which one is better to use to help prepare for the NCLEX. Really want to pass the first time!!! Hearing great things about both question banks. I like how Kaplan offers a money back guarantee if you don't pass, but I also hear UWorld has better rationales. Help

Hello, I'm planning to take the NCLEX at the end of November. I am wondering how the Kaplan Online Self-Paced Review Course is like. If someone could let me know that would greatly help me! a) Does it come with review material videos and quick fact sheets? Or is it more like an ebook that you have to read? b) What are the q-trainers and how are they different from the Kaplan Question Bank? I already have the Saunder's comprehensive review book, but I would like an additional resource because the Saunder's book is so thick and it's taking me a while to get through. I really need a good question bank too. If the full review course is fast and effective, then I might just get the entire course over just the q-bank.