Should I take the HESI practice exam before RN boards?

St_Claire, ADN, RN · Feb 20, 2013

I would not compare the HESI to the NCLEX. The HESI questions are not very straightforward and can be very long. They are very few alternate format questions such as SATA. The school I attended used the HESI as an indicator of success on the NCLEX, if you have 850 or better you are considered likely to pass the NCLEX.

I never studied for the HESI because it was part of our curriculum. I do have a HESI study guide with a CD. I did the questions on the CD for practice but found they were not very like NCLEX (I had already taken the NCLEX PN the year before). I glanced at the book for comprehensive review but preferred to spend my time on test questions.

You probably already know where you are weak. For me it was peds and meds. I didn't study meds at all and ended up with two med questions on the NCLEX RN for drugs I had never heard of. I did do a reasonable amount of peds questions and reviewed all the rationales.

http://nursing.slcc.edu/nclexrn3500/mainMenu.do this is the website I used for practice. This comes from the school I attended and is highly recommended. I found the questions here were most like the NCLEX and had great rationales.

itsdebraanne, ASN, RN · Feb 20, 2013

I would not compare the HESI to the NCLEX. The HESI questions are not very straightforward and can be very long. They are very few alternate format questions such as SATA. The school I attended used the HESI as an indicator of success on the NCLEX, if you have 850 or better you are considered likely to pass the NCLEX.
I never studied for the HESI because it was part of our curriculum. I do have a HESI study guide with a CD. I did the questions on the CD for practice but found they were not very like NCLEX (I had already taken the NCLEX PN the year before). I glanced at the book for comprehensive review but preferred to spend my time on test questions.
You probably already know where you are weak. For me it was peds and meds. I didn't study meds at all and ended up with two med questions on the NCLEX RN for drugs I had never heard of. I did do a reasonable amount of peds questions and reviewed all the rationales.
Main Menu - NCLEX-RN 3500 - Institutional Version this is the website I used for practice. This comes from the school I attended and is highly recommended. I found the questions here were most like the NCLEX and had great rationales.

True. I do know what areas I'm weakest in. I've been out of school for almost a year. and been studying since then. I took the RN Boards the first time in Oct 2012 but didn't pass. I've been studying yet again for my second attempt and 2 review sessions and about 1500 practice test questions later, I think I have an idea of where I'm still weak at. Now, I'm not so sure if I wanna take the HESI now. Esp since i scheduled my NCLEX-RN a week from today.

And thanks for that link. I've had that bookmarked for weeks, but haven't had time to go there since I have access to Kaplan's QBank, the Prioritization/Delegation/Assessment book, PrepU online practice questions, a couple NCLEX question and comprehensive review books, a handful of NCLEX apps with about 500+ free Q each. Just to name a few! Lol.

Thanks for your reply!! (:

St_Claire, ADN, RN · Feb 21, 2013

Whichever source you choose to use make sure you review the rationales from all the questions, not just the ones you missed. Kaplan shared some interesting tips during a live session on their website:

Lab values will be presented as very high or very low from normal ranges.

You are expected to miss about half the questions.

The more SATA questions you see the better you are doing because those are higher level questions that keep you above the line.

If you can get the first 6 right you will stay way above the line.

If you get a question very similar to one you have already answered stop and think a little more before you answer, the test is trying to clarify that you know it so you may have answered incorrectly before.

These tips helped me to settle down and feel more confident. After answering a bank of questions I would go back to just the missed questions and see how far apart they were from the last correct answer. So if I answered 17 incorrectly I would look back at how many I got right prior to that question and how many I got right after it. I was always trying to visualize myself on the line.

itsdebraanne, ASN, RN · Feb 21, 2013

If you can get the first 6 right you will stay way above the line.

Those are good tips but, when you talk about "if you got the first 6 questions right," are you talking about the Kaplan practice tests or the actual RN Boards? Bc how can you know you got the first 6 right on the RN Boards? I remember Kaplan told us to try and get a good streak of right answers on the practice tests. so is that what you mean?

After answering a bank of questions I would go back to just the missed questions and see how far apart they were from the last correct answer. So if I answered 17 incorrectly I would look back at how many I got right prior to that question and how many I got right after it. I was always trying to visualize myself on the line.

I do this too. I had a graph of one of my 50Q tests and tried to make myself feel better lol.

St_Claire, ADN, RN · Feb 21, 2013

Yes that's basically what I mean. When I did practice tests I used ninja focus on the first 10 questions. Then always checked my progress after to see how many were right at the beginning of the test.