study guides and actual nclex questions????

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I know lot of people have mentioned various books like saunders, kaplan, mosby, lippincott, ncsbn website etc.... i am personally using saunders, kaplan and ncsbn. For those who have already taken NCLEX, which reference do you think closely reflect the actual nclex questions???:uhoh3:

The way i imagine nclex questions to be, are totally different from any of the questions in these references, is that true??

Would appreciate any replys, since i am so confused with all the resources.

Thank you

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Specializes in Cardiac.

I bought a Kaplan review book and hated it. My questions on the NCLEX were nothing like that book at all! I just didn't like it's explanations. I felt like it was trying to be too hard so that you would feel like you needed the review course!

The questions I would say looked like the Saunders book. However, the questions are easy. It's the answers that are unlike anything you've probably seen. They are all so vague and you can rationalize a right or wrong answer out of most of them.

Do Saunders and read the rationals. Even though it wont be the same as the NCLEX, it will fine tune your critical thinking skills.

FYI, I didn't have a single straight forward content based question. They were scenerios, what would you do's, how would you intervene....etc.

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I used the exact same study guides that you did - ncsbn (3 week course), saunders, and kaplan. In my opinion, ncsbn questions seemed to be the most similar to NCLEX than the others. Kaplan is just plain difficult (but still a great study tool), and saunders is very easy, but is a good review of content (if that's what you need).

I used these 3 study guides only, and passed in 75 questions. Good luck to you!

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Thank you for your replies. Today i finished last of the kaplan question Trainer no 7 and got only 61%. So I know i need to prepare lot more.. Do you mind sharing how much you got in your last kaplan QT?

I think i will continue doing more questions since my application and analysis were only 59% and 63 % respectively..

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Specializes in Neuro ICU, Neuro/Trauma stepdown.

i feel like the study guide questions are too short and to the point and i'm imagining the NCLEX questions will be longer, scenario type questions...is this accurate?

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Specializes in OB, lactation.

I think the questions were more like Kaplan than Saunders - but harder!! I agree that Saunders is better for content review but Kaplan's questions, particularly priority questions, were definitely closer to the real thing in my opinion.

i feel like the study guide questions are too short and to the point and i'm imagining the NCLEX questions will be longer, scenario type questions...is this accurate?

As someone above mentioned, it seems to me like the answers were more different (more difficult to chose from) than the questions. The length of the questions/scenarios does not jump out at me as being notably different from the review ones.

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Specializes in geriatric nursing.

im using NCLEX-RN Complete Online for International Nurses last march.. then when I got into this forum last month, I bought and finished the saunders Q&A book with the cd.. before, i was scoring around 63-65% on the question trainer.. my exam will be on saturday.. my anxiety level is getting high as the day passed by. so yesterday i decided to answer the kaplan question trainer set 4-7 again..and now im getting around 70% and up..i hope and i pray that i will get a good result after 2days...goodluck to my fellow test takers.. pray and have faith.. god bless..

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Kathykaye, you will do fine....you have studied and done your best... now just try to stay calm ... do let us know how you did...GOOD LUCK!!!!!!!!

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Specializes in geriatric nursing.
Kathykaye, you will do fine....you have studied and done your best... now just try to stay calm ... do let us know how you did...GOOD LUCK!!!!!!!!

thanks for the encouragement.. i'll keep posted...:uhoh3: god bless..

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I have gone throu saunders, kaplan online quest and the ncsbn quest.. still i know i need to solve lot more questions.

I have roughly 12 days left for nclex and would like any other suggestions on which books to solve questions from which are more like nclex questions...

any suggestions on the kaplan book avail at bookstores, are the questions same as the ones online?

how about mosbys or lippincotts? or any other???

Thank you

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I have spoken to many nurses that have said that mosby is really good. They say that Mosby have more advanced, nursing process type of questions with an increase level of difficulty as opposed to lippincott. I myself am studying to take the NCLEX and just feel so overwhelmed with the amount of resources that I have. I just think if you do at lease 3000 questions before your scheduled exam that you will pass. Good luck!!!!

sign Hatian26.

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i feel like the study guide questions are too short and to the point and i'm imagining the NCLEX questions will be longer, scenario type questions...is this accurate?

No. Items with long stems (the question part) are not written anymore. If there is a long stem item that is being reviewed, it usually gets shortened. In the exams of days gone by, you'd get a scenario and then have to answer several questions about the scenario. With CAT it's not possible to do that anymore.

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