Recent CORE.. trying not to stress TOO much this next month

[Recentlycored]

Curious to see how badly one felt they did and still passed.

I studied hard, but obviously tripped up on several questions. Polling with others after each session gave some of us a clue as to how many we had issues with and subsequently got "wrong". My tally seems to be an estimated 20-30 per block (6 blocks, total 650 questions or so).

Anyone do a similar process? How did you end up doing given your own estimations? Information here might put myself and some of my friends at ease for the wait.

Thanks!

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[MadRadLad]

Everyone feels like they did poorly is what I've been told. Most people I know who took it this year thought it was pretty tough. I don't know what the numbers are either but Board Vitals a few years ago said 95.5% of people who bought their qbank passed with an average score of 74% on the bank. Hope that helps.

 

[Recentlycored]

Everyone feels like they did poorly is what I've been told. Most people I know who took it this year thought it was pretty tough. I don't know what the numbers are either but Board Vitals a few years ago said 95.5% of people who bought their qbank passed with an average score of 74% on the bank. Hope that helps.

Thank you for the reply. Yeah I've seen that Stat floating around. I think I'm psyching myself out, cause although I hit that % on board vitals, I feel like I got questions wrong on the real test I wouldn't have otherwise when practicing.

Maybe that's the same for everyone

 

[MadRadLad]

Everyone does...test taking is a skill like anything else and some people are better under pressure than others. It's a long test too so many people will get tired and make dumb mistakes. All of that probably evens out in the end. I wish the ABR was more transparent about how the exam is scored though.

 

[Member 8095721]

Feeling absolutely horrible as well, 2/3 days through core week 2. I'm guessing a ton or just can't grasp details of things I definitely should know. Feel inevitable that a failure is coming. Anyone have any contextualization for all this? Will future employers/etc know if you've failed the exam once? Can you lose a fellowship/will the fellowship know if I can either retake and pass in November or the next years's June 2023 exam?
hit the percent on board vitals, but honestly feel deceived by that question bank and the ABR practice exam questions

 

[Recentlycored]

Feeling absolutely horrible as well, 2/3 days through core week 2. I'm guessing a ton or just can't grasp details of things I definitely should know. Feel inevitable that a failure is coming. Anyone have any contextualization for all this? Will future employers/etc know if you've failed the exam once? Can you lose a fellowship/will the fellowship know if I can either retake and pass in November or the next years's June 2023 exam?
hit the percent on board vitals, but honestly feel deceived by that question bank and the ABR practice exam questions

I felt I was guessing on several as well. Sadly idk if that means we were near failure threshold. I've tried to see if anyone in the past has a rough idea of how many they got wrong per block and what they scored, but no dice.

As for fellowships, my program seems to not care about passing the core right away. Some sections have even accepted residents who have failed multiple times.

Wishing you luck on day 3

 

[GoPelicans]

Well that sucked

 

[guytakingboards]

Feeling absolutely horrible as well, 2/3 days through core week 2. I'm guessing a ton or just can't grasp details of things I definitely should know. Feel inevitable that a failure is coming. Anyone have any contextualization for all this? Will future employers/etc know if you've failed the exam once? Can you lose a fellowship/will the fellowship know if I can either retake and pass in November or the next years's June 2023 exam?
hit the percent on board vitals, but honestly feel deceived by that question bank and the ABR practice exam questions

I imagine no one will care.

Re: fellowship - having passed the Core or not has no bearing on your ability to be a fellow. Programs would be absolutely nuts to go a fellow down (a big freaking deal) cuz because one of their incoming fellows hadn't passed the Core yet. At no point was I asked by my program if I had passed the core.

Re: jobs - jobs don't even worry about board certification until 3-5 years after you've finished training because of the current certification process. As long as you pass the Core at some point (and later pass the far easier certifying exam), you will be a board certified radiologist without any conditions. There are plenty of people who have failed the old boards or current Core exam once who are now board certified radiologists. It's almost as if knowledge of that initial failure is completely wiped away once you pass the test and become certified.

 

[Recentlycored]

Now the month countdown begins..

 

[Recentlycored]

Feeling absolutely horrible as well, 2/3 days through core week 2. I'm guessing a ton or just can't grasp details of things I definitely should know. Feel inevitable that a failure is coming. Anyone have any contextualization for all this? Will future employers/etc know if you've failed the exam once? Can you lose a fellowship/will the fellowship know if I can either retake and pass in November or the next years's June 2023 exam?
hit the percent on board vitals, but honestly feel deceived by that question bank and the ABR practice exam questions

A couple more days, right?

 

[LittleFoot]

A couple more days, right?

Could be today around noon eastern. I think it’s usually Wednesday

 

[illinichief89]

The wait is killing me

 

[Recentlycored]

Constantly refreshing the score progress page. Sitting at "phase 5: validation"

 

[premed127]

Could be today around noon eastern. I think it’s usually Wednesday

Are we thinking tomorrow or next week now? 😬

 

[LittleFoot]

Are we thinking tomorrow or next week now? 😬

Hopefully tomorrow. I feel like the validation phase 5 should be the shortest of them all.

 

[GoPelicans]

Results are posted for those still wondering

 

[Recentlycored]

Passed. Thank the lord. You guys?

 

[Member 8095721]

Passed. Wow. Still anxious and waiting for an email to let me know they mixed up my results lol

 

[cyberchicken001]

Not that it matters, but anyone have an idea of what the median score is?

 

[Finite Incantatem]

Passed. Such a relief. Honestly feel this could have gone either way, such a weird experience. Congrats to all that passed. And in case you didn't, sending you the best energy! This test doesn't define you as a radiologist.

 

[MadRadLad]

Test was absolutely unreasonable in terms of actually gauging the value of a good radiologist in my opinion. So much minutae especially regarding nuclear medicine that is rarely ever relevant or can be referenced with ease. I can't imagine the CORE being useful at all in terms of who is actually a capable radiologist or not. I've known some very good rads who had failed in the past, it was confusing to me back then, but now I can totally see why. Can't believe the ABR can charge so much for such a poorly written test.

 

[Gadofosveset]

From my perspective I see a very good correlation between residents who fail the core exam and poor future performance.

A conflating factor are malignant programs that don’t teach their residents well enough or give them no time to study for the exam. In those cases, otherwise capable residents can get buried.

Not sure I think the MCQ format is the best format, but have thought about this a lot and hard to think of a better test format that doesn’t introduce bias, more expense, scheduling rigidity, etc. Would be interesting to hear opinions on how the format could be improved.

Just graduating from a program does not ensure
any level of ability. That I know for a fact. I have encountered graduating residents (unfortunately more than one) with R2 level ability who graduated and who have immaculate LoRs, but guess what… they failed their core. Training programs have every incentive to keep moving people along regardless of their ability. As someone on the other side, I see the value of external validation.

 

[Gadofosveset]

Congrats to everyone who passed, BTW. It’s an achievement to be proud of!

And if you didn’t pass, identify what held you back and just take it again. As long as you pass it eventually, a Core failure won’t hold you back.

 

[Recentlycored]

The website is saying this one was a 94.5% pass rate. Holy smokes

 

[GoPelicans]

The website is saying this one was a 94.5% pass rate. Holy smokoes

I think our cohort (new R4's) applied during one of the most competitive years to be a radiology applicant. Many programs that traditionally take many IMG's filled with American grads for our year. Maybe the high pass rate reflects a group of people who are just veyr intelligent and qualified.

 

[guytakingboards]

I think our cohort (new R4's) applied during one of the most competitive years to be a radiology applicant. Many programs that traditionally take many IMG's filled with American grads for our year. Maybe the high pass rate reflects a group of people who are just veyr intelligent and qualified.

seems reasonable. I remember the cohort we recruited in mid-2010's was considered the most down year nationally in recent history. Coincidentally that class nationally had the high Core failure rate in the history of the exam. The inverse should be true too.

 

[GadRads]

I think our cohort (new R4's) applied during one of the most competitive years to be a radiology applicant. Many programs that traditionally take many IMG's filled with American grads for our year. Maybe the high pass rate reflects a group of people who are just veyr intelligent and qualified.

After taking a look at the historical pass rates (ABR) and mean USMLE scores for each cohort, I am not convinced that your hypothesis necessarily holds. I don’t believe the core exam is as standardized as the ABR claims.