What is a passing HESI score?

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My program requires us to take the HESI exit exam to pass the program, and we need an 850 to pass. What percent of questions do I need to get right to get a 160? Does anyone have any tips?

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Hi! It depends because each question is weighed differently...but if this helps I've gotten 40-50 q's wrong and have scored in the 800's. Ironically, my hesi score was higher (>850) for the one I got 50+ wrong than the one with 40+ wrong. If math is a weakness, do some practice questions with that because those are weighed heavily...also doing NCLEX practice questions and reading the rationales for both your right and wrong answers is also very helpful. Others also swear by Evolve and their case studies...good luck!

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You need greater than an 850. Keep in mind, the questions are scored like boards. More difficult questions are counted higher that is why you can end up with scores over 1000.

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Specializes in Med/Surg, OB/GYN, Informatics, Simulation.

Also keep in mind that there's 5-10 practice questions that aren't counted. You won't know which questions those are so they'll come up as right or wrong but they won't be included in your score. I got 10 wrong on one of my HESI and ended up with an equivalent score of 96%.

In my experience you can only study so much for the HESI a lot of the questions are critical thinking so they aren't always straightforward. You need to know your stuff and how to apply the knowledge into clinical practice.

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