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Ok. So hopefully you guys should be able to hear and see me now. Um We're just gonna make a start. I think some people said that we will be joined a bit later because of the middle registration. But um thanks for coming along, er welcome to the AMSA phase one B exam essentials talk. So I'm Nixon, I'm one of the AMS academic officers and currently a third year medic, which means that I was technically in your shoes last year and I've kind of designed this talk as a what I wish I was told when I was in second year format. So hopefully you guys find it useful. Um And yeah, you know, so thanks for coming along on a Sunday evening. Um I'll with that in mind, I'll try and keep this talk as short as possible. I know it's been scheduled to last an hour, but it really shouldn't last that long and we should hopefully begin. We'll finish well before six. So um before we begin, I do have to begin with a quick disclaimer. It's a shame to start this, but it's better for me to be honest with you guys. Um and that disclaimer is that although I've tried my very best to make this information as accurate as possible, I can't promise that it will be 100% correct by the time it reaches your exam please by 2024. Um And the main reason for this is the Faculty of Medicine does reserve the right to change your exam structures and formats throughout the year. Um And that's completely out of everyone's control. The most recent example of this is like when I was in first year, the anatomy exam was 100% vs AQ. So no multiple choice questions. Very scary. Uh But the year after, so that's your first year. They switched anatomy exam to 50%. S BQ, 50% S DSA Q. So what this means is that things can change and if they do factor, we'll let you know, this may run up some of the stuff I say useless, but most of the things should hopefully apply. And I've tried to keep it as up to date as possible. So, um yeah, whilst I present, I think my slides up presenting. I'm just gonna quickly try and present again. Um There you go. So hopefully you guys can see my slides. Now, um a little bit of a bug there. What we're going to cover today is we're going to cover a bit about your written exams. So your three written exams you have are your uh BRS, your anatomy spotter and your um LMP exam. Er, you've got the new exam, the practical exam, the CPA this year. So I'll talk a lot of detail about that. Just cos I'm, I'm aware that TCO didn't tell you that much about it in the first place and other si and placement, sign off. Not too much detail about that. Um, since you guys are second year already, you know, we're all done on passing first year. I won't be covering anything like studying techniques as such. Cos I think you guys have probably got that unlock already. Instead I'm going to focus on giving you guys the cool information about your exams as well as some tricks and tips and tricks to help you prepare for them effectively. Now, this information in terms of its source is largely based off a bunch of emails that I've sent to the module leads to confirm the information. Um and largely based on my cohort experience when we sat these exams a couple of months ago. Um So yeah, it hopefully should be really up to date. I'll try to cover the more important exams first. So that's all your written ones. Um So that if anyone has to leave or anything, you don't end up missing too much. Um And I should add that if anyone has any questions or anything at all, feel free to just write them in the chat and I'll try to answer them as I go. Um or you can leave them for the, and we'll do the Q and A. But yeah, please do ask questions if you have anything. Um, uh, if, if you can't, if you've got any questions about anything at all throughout. So, er, beginning with kind of the most important one, the BRS one, it's a huge three hour exam and your marks are split. So, yeah, 25%. SBA Q, 25% vs AQ and a 50% S AQ. So quick reminder for you guys, SBA Q is your multiple choice V SS AQ is your four answers and your SA QS are your unlimited written answers uh where you can kind of knock yourself out. Um The key points here, 1.1 I put their folks on this lecture slide content. And what I mean by that is that pretty much anything that comes up in your lecture slides is fair game that can come up in your BRS exam unless your lecturer explicitly says that it work. Uh This is actually really useful for revision because Imperial doesn't give you a checklist for what you need to learn. So if you ever lost about what to revise, just look at your lecture slides and revise from them since that is literally what your exam questions will be based on. And as an additional point to this, a lot of the lecture slides contain really useful diagrams that can literally come up in your exam questions that er in the future. So for example, there's only so many different ways they can represent the H PCA H PG axis in endocrinology. And that can literally come up in a very, very similar diagram in your exam. Um So that's something that, that did happen for our year. But I'm not allowed to say like what the diagram was obviously um 0.2 focus on higher content. And what I mean by that is really you should try to spend most of your time learning useful high your like broad concepts rather than trying to learn small, lower your details. So for example, I don't think you guys have done rest yet, but how you would be learning that pretty much every type of asthma is generally managed by bronchodilators and corticosteroids low yield conversely would be learning the name, the exact name of every third line treatment for like mild, severe and fatal asthma. It's just too much detail. You don't need to go that mu that far. Um just try and get broad concepts in and that would be way more efficient for your time. There's a s er um kind of the building on to that. There's a saying in med school that common things are common and what that's meant by that is you'll likely to be examined on conditions that are very common rather than conditions that are exceptionally rare. So as far as another example, you are far more likely to be asked a lot of questions about diabetes than fewer. Moreover, this means that things that are repeated a lot are probably the ones that are worth revising. So I think you guys have like 3 to 4 lectures last and diabetes. So you can guess what's definitely going to be coming up. Um As part of this 0.3 says that marks are allocated pro rata, which, which means that the number of questions and marks allocated for each pr S topic in your exam should be roughly proportional to the number of teaching hours that you get on that pr s topic. So for example, you've got 20 or so endo lectures, whereas you only have five DERM lectures. So you should expect like four times as many endo questions or marks as the Marks. Um And again, just another way to help you allocate your time accordingly accordingly for when you revise the test derm, I know is an example of like a topic that takes a long time to revise um when there's not much like um allocation for it in terms of mark. So don't get bogged down by those topics, focus on the, the endo and the year of the rest and the cardio um cos those are like the main topics in terms of mark allocation um and then 0.4 mos OK. So this one, what I'll say for this one is that they're, they're constantly changing how they assess mocks But from what I've been told by faculty some time along the year, your faculty will release a full BRS mock paper for you to, for you guys to do in your own time. They will not be marking it for you. So you kind of have to organize a time and exam conditions to do yourself and mark it. Um And that's one good mock to do cos that's literally, I think it's either the one that my hook did the co op before that. So that's literally the real deal. Save that for like towards the end because that's when it'll be the most useful outside of this, you'll find plenty of student l mocks throughout the year floating around the group chat. Um And if you message like um ics MSU, a academic officers like Yasmin, she'll have a lot of them too. Um And guys, if you, if you do see these moto around, like just please don't gate keep them or anything, just share them with your friends. Obviously, the student made ones won't be as good as the faculty ones, but they're still all really good practice to do. Um And yeah, just be appropriate with, with them like don't, don't, don't do them all now save them for later. Um And that should be fine. So that's your BRS written um your biggest exam. They want to kind of get out of the way. Um Yeah, I'll go through that general advice towards the end. But the next one I really wanna cover is your anatomy spotter. So thankfully, the sh this one's thankfully significantly shorter, er, the one hour exam that's the anatomy spot. There is 50% sp AQ, 50% BSA Qs on all things anatomy. So, you guys have a lot of experience on this already cos you did the anatomy spotter in first year and that was for, er, eight head neck and spine and for, for a, so it's pretty much gonna be exactly the same format. Um, no S AES or anything like that. I have been told that you guys are doing A PP and lis this year, which are unfortunately some of the hardest topics in anatomy. Um, but you know, DD, don't worry, yy, you do have time. You've got like a good 67 months before your exams. My advice, um which I've written in 0.1 is to really get to grips with learning the basic anatomy concepts first. Er, and that's however you like, you know, with send diagrams, complete, complete anatomy or the vise, just find a really, really good way that works for you to wrap your head around the basic anatomy concepts and naming once you have a really good understanding of those basic anatomy concepts, and then you can move towards 0.2 which is beginning to look at cadaveric images to perfect for the exam. So as I'm sure you're aware from the exam for first, it, your anatomy want to use as images of cadavers rather than diagrams. So it's really, really important to make sure you learn what part the different parts of the body look like on a cadaver. And not just a textbook diagram. Main issue with kind of this is obviously cadavers can look very, very different from a nice textbook diagram. So it takes a lot of adjusting my advice for making this transition is to learn some of the cadaveric images. Like once you've got the basic concepts and learn them specifically from Rome's anatomy textbook. Um And the reason I'm emphasizing this specific textbook is not because I'm sponsored by it or anything, but it's because some of the cadaveric images from your anatomy spot will be directly taken from Roman's anatomy. Minus obviously the labels, but they would literally be the same images from Roman's anatomy. Um So, you know, that's information that Li has said and that's information that's very useful. Um What I should say is it does not mean that all the images in your anat spots will be from Rome's anatomy, just that a fair few will be. And that's why it's just useful to get to grips with it. Um If you're learning cadaveric images, you know, the dr rooms, the probably your best bet, but Roman's anatomy, um it is definitely a really good er resource to use too. Don't lose sleep, trying to learn all of it. You definitely won't, but just kind of make sure you're able to orientate yourself with the cve to uh for my third point um compartmentalized. So it's a bit vague. But what I mean is, you know, as anatomy is an absolute nightmare to learn, but it becomes a lot easier when you start to put things into groups on or compartments. Um This will become way more apparent when you do the up and lower limb topics, cos they will like force you to compartmentalize. But even with a PP, grouping organs and structures into compartments or sections, it will just help you learn them way, way more effectively. For example, you know, if you guys have probably done the for gut, mid gut and hind gut structures. Um and that's really important to learn because you, it basically groups them into all the innovation and vascular supply too. And that just makes it so much easier to remember. Um And the other things that it also comes up quite often as an exam question, like which one of these is like a midgut structures or where is midgut structure pain referred to? So, you know, um compartmentalize wherever you can, it just makes your life a lot, lot easier. Uh And finally, for 0.4 ask lots of questions in the dissect room. I mean, this kind of goes about saying, but it's genuinely the best way to learn anatomy if you're, yeah, you don't know where to start. Um and my specific point about this is all the supervisors in the anatomy. Dr usually have these really, really cool mnemonics that they use to remember different parts of the anatomy and they're more than happy to share them with you. If you ask them, they're really, really useful. So, like, you know, you've got like your, um, you guys haven't done them yet, but you've got your half of bones and like all the supervisors will teach you like one way or another remembering them. Um So, you know, ask the supervisors, please because they will teach you how to, not just what the, the anatomy is, but they'll teach you how to remember the anatomy. Um, bonus points if you have Lydia, the head of anatomy, hopefully you guys have seen her around. She's the one that actually writes your anatomy spotter. So, you know, please please pay attention to what she says because the things she talk about frequently are the ones that are the most likely to come up in the exam paper. So for example, um, from memory of things you would say are like quote unquote. This is something that I'm less likely to assess you on the exam. Instead I would ex examine you on XYZ and you know what that means, revise XYZ. So, you know, er, ask questions, ask Lydia if Lydia's doing one of her teaching things in the anatomy room, just go pop over and see what it is. Cos it's usually more useful than, um, floating around the dr room. But, yeah, that's the anatomy spotter tricky to get used to. But, you know, once you get your grips to it and I think you guys have, you've done the first year exam, um, it becomes a lot easier. Ok. So, um, that's anatomy. Let's keep going. And for the last of your written papers you've got the two hour LA paper. So this is the one that's not confirmed for exam split because, um, the fact that hasn't gotten back to me yet, but from memory, I believe it's 70% SBA Qs, 30% Sa Qs, um, and 0% Sqs A Qs. However, please do take that with a pinch of salt because I think it's probably not accurate for you and then they were thinking of changing it in the first place. So, yeah, I've highlighted it and read that this, this is all, er, subject to change. What isn't subject to change is that you've probably been told you by now that you can bring 20 sides of a four notes that is 10 double sided sheets of a four into your exam with you. They can be printed notes, they can be written notes and you can do absolutely anything and everything in there. So, you know, go knock yourself out, do what works best for you. Um, I'm not gonna tell you what you should and shouldn't put in your notes um what you can put in your notes for is however, you can either create your own 20 pages of notes as you progress throughout the year. Or alternatively, you can look on the I CSM note back where past students have shared their 20 pages of notes for everyone else to use. And really those past students usually have done really well. So you know, those notes are great notes. It's generally up to personal preference of how you do your 20 pages of notes. But I think a really good approach is kind of mixing a bit of both where you get a past students copy of 20 page notes and then use them whilst adding your own personal annotations on them where appropriate to help you remember specific things, you'll forget there's no right or wrong way of doing this. But I do have to give the caveat that if you do choose to use um a past student's notes from the note bank, please do be aware that the course content for ma can change a bit every year. So there's probably some old I relevant bits that you should get rid of and replace the Yogi's current content um broad, I think the the LM map condition should stay the same. But you know, it's something that it's worth checking for. Cos you, you, you don't wanna waste like space on, on things um that you don't need. Um 0.2 I've put small details can come up. Um ok, so that's really vague. But what I mean by that is the funny thing is since the LMP exam lets you take notes in to the exam hall, they can also test you on really, really tiny details that come on like a single lining in send. Granted, this is quite unlikely. The main consequence of this is that you should try to include as much detail as you can to those 20 pages notes. So you don't miss anything out. And like if you see some people's notes from last year, you'll see they literally crammed every single bit of white space with tiny, tiny writing or something. Um So yeah, you know, make the most of it, you know, er, write that even if it was like writing down a little pneumonic or writing now small diagrams or things, um make sure to include that stuff. And for the final point in L map, I just wanted to quickly talk about the way tutorials are assessed. Cos I feel like this is something that's not told and really useful to know. So what you've probably seen is that LMP is very, very clearly organized into part one, part two and part three, maybe part four, but part one, part two, part three where part two and part three is an in person group tour that builds on part one. So that's the form that I believe that you guys are doing this year as well. The main thing I have to say about these tutorials, these part two and part three tutorials in person is that the stuff that you do in the group activities, like when it says get into a group and do this task that's not accessible in the LM A exam and fly have said it's not accessible because there's nowhere standard but everybody's experience in that group activity. So you know, group activities do them because they help you understand them, but don't lose sleep over trying to like think it's accessible content. What can be accessible from those tutorials uh in the LM A exam is anything that's on the slides from those tutorials. So don't get caught out, even if you don't go to those tutorials, make sure you learn the slides. Um because that content is accessible. And as a matter of fact, I would even go as far to say that they are very, very likely to assess the things that they put on the tutorial slides, barring the group activities. Um Funny thing about this is last year, we had so few people turning the tutorials that it got to the point where some people have essentially begin telling us topics that would be good to revise from the tutorial slides and they actually did come up. So, you know, I'm not promising they'll do the same for you guys um this year. But you know, the tutorial slides probably the most use you'll get out of the tutorials is from the tutorial slides. Um, any sort of diagrams points you see, you know, include them in your notes as well. Don't, don't neglect the tutorials is what I'm trying to say. And I put down there at 10 where possible. I mean, obviously, you know, you should be attending all your lessons cos like Q QR code and stuff like that. But um just cos it's a good chance to answer ask questions, especially when you've got unit one of your epidemiology can be really confusing. So if you get like doctor Pinder um or like uh one of the statisticians as your tutors, they can explain all the, all those things like compiling really, really well. So, you know, if you're stuck, you know, they're there, you can ask them questions, that's the main benefit of attending. Um So let's keep going then that's all the written assessments. Actually, you happen to know you've only got through this year. Um And that's where it stops. I've got down some couple of results here that really use for your exams. I'm gonna try and gloss over them quickly. Just cos I think by now you guys probably have like what resources you know, are really useful osmosis. You most probably are aware of online platform, lots of really useful videos, explaining concepts. It's very, very useful if you ever have a lecture and you don't understand something from that lecture and you'd like further context for its application. Um Plus the diagrams are really nice. So it's really good for visual learners. Um I CSM Note Bank, I hope you guys are aware of this by now, but it's like the Holy Grail of notes. You get lots of notions, Andy Notes from past students that I've usually done really quite well in the past, in the previous years. So they're good for saving time in making your own notes. Everyone has access to that and if they ask for a password, I think it's Phoenix 97. All in lower case. So, yeah, use that too. Um, me lectures. So you've probably seen me posting in your big I and group about lectures for specific BRS topics, uh, being led by older BRS, uh, being led by older medical students. My advice is that you have spare time prior to go to them. They essentially cover like 4 to 5 lectures worth of content in an hour. So they're super efficient, super high yield for your revision. Um, I know med runs a lot of these tutorial but there are lots of other societies running them too, you know, like I II think there's a lot of anatomy ones. Um, so you don't have to go to all of them, just go to the ones that you think are relevant and if you need any support things. So, like, personally, I feel like, um, er, in, in the cardio arrest topic it's worth going to some of the, some sort of there just cos of the structural heart disease and stuff that's, it's not necessarily taught very clearly. Um, next Roan's anatomy I talked about this already. So I think I'll just skip past this. But as a heads up, you can find free copies of Rhone's Anatomy online if you look hard enough, um, if not just email me afterwards and I'll, I might, I, I'll send you a copy, um, next Complete Anatomy. Um, that's the funny app you get on your ipad for some of the, um, Ince pages. I mean, I know a lot of people aren't a fan of it but I think it has its uses and it's really useful vis for visualizing anatomical structures in 3D space, especially for your ABP section. Um, it's really useful to just have a look on there again. It does take some time to get used to, but it's really useful because some of your Ince pages, er, will use complete anatomy screen CASS. Um, then you've got teach me anatomy great website contains concise explanations for different body parts. Um, and very, very useful for explaining the A PP topic as well. Um, because it's got lots of diagrams at it. So you, you hear me referring to a PTA lot, it's just cos that's probably the hardest topic um for anatomy. So, um, don't, don't, don't stress if, if, if, if it's one that you're struggling on that tends to lens is difficult but not as difficult as a PT, I'm gonna finally mock exam. So again, I've already talked about this bit, so I just skip past this for now for the sake of time. Um You can use any of these resources. Yeah, there's way more out there as well. Alternatively, you can use none of them if you'd like. The main thing is that you find something that works for you and you're consistent with it. As long as you're consistent with what you do, you'll be perfectly fine with the exam. So, yeah, that's why I put there, use there what's best for you. Uh And that's all the written er, results. So I'm just gonna quickly check for questions. So no questions so far we keep going then. Um Right, so now on to your CPA practical, um your clinical practical assessment, this slide particularly, feel free to throw in any questions if you have any at all. I'm just curious. Have you guys been told much about your CPA? Um Just let me know in the chat, er, I'll have a look later but um if you haven't, this will hopefully be useful. So traditionally, the format for the CPA is that your, your practical assesment by your CPA, is that you'll do an eight station circuit in the span of 1 to 2 hours. Um And these eight stations include five examination stations, two communication stationss and one rest station. So that's all done in quote unquote one exam setting. Um So because of that, what that means is that it's quite a long exam. Uh, even though it's not like two or three hours, like your BRS and your, your app, it's quite a tiring exam to do. So, you know, it's, it's one just as a heads up to go through each station in particular. So your five examination stations are uh cardiovascular respiratory abdominal neuro and musculoskeletal. Um These are called examination stations because you expect to do physical examinations on real patients. Um The general format for all of these examination stations are that there are two main parts. This first bit is the practical section uh down here where you will be asked to demonstrate how you ae you would assess specific aspects of the examination on a real patient. So for example, in a nearer upper limb exam uh examination, the examiner will look at you and say, can you demonstrate to me how you would assess the biceps reflex in the right arm? And what you would do is you'd get the tendon hammer whack the biceps tendon and you'd get the tendon reflex and you'd get one more for that, for example, and it's just a list of doing loads and loads and loads of those instructions, instruction, follow, instruction, follow. And that's your practical section for your CPA the theory section or the question section is the second bit and this bit, you'll be asked to answer a few questions based on the examination you've done. So let's stick with neuro for now, in the practical session, they ask you to do the biceps right? In the question section, they might then ask you a question saying, what type of reflexes would you expect to see um in uppermost neurone lesions? So I don't think you guys have done neuro yet, but it would be hyperreflexia. Um So yeah, it's a mixture of both Practicals and communications, but I should say Practicals forms like 18 90% of the marks questions are only like 10 20%. So definitely, definitely, definitely nail the practical skills, the clinical skills as a priority. The really important thing about these examination stations is that the the examiner will tell you what to do in a step by step process. You will not be expected to do everything by yourself continuously like you see in those geeky medics ay videos. Um Those are ay not CPA S, those are for third years. So you guys are safe for another year. That's what I'll be doing in my year. So don't, don't panic about getting the order right? Obviously, try and learn piper because it'll help you for your next year as well. But in terms of what you're expected to do anything that you're supposed to do, the examiner will tell you to do it, you know, it's not, you're not gonna be less than an island. It's quite friendly in terms of that. So those are examination stations. I should also add that your neuro you've probably seen is broken down to cranial nerves, upper limb and lower limb on the day. It just depends what, which, which one you get. Um, like, for example, on my, in my day, I only got assessed on upper limbs, not cranial and lower limbs, but expect to be assessed on all the other ones completely. Um And I should also say that in these examinations, you won't be assessing, you won't be assessing everything they might say, like assess, let's stick with neuro for like the upper limb exam. They might say assess sensation of the right arm reflex on your left arm, tone on your right arm, power of the shoulder, on your left arm, it will be like pick and mix. It won't be like everything. Um in terms of your two communication stations, one of them will be taking a history taking station. And as the name suggests, you'll be taking a history from a real life patient. The main thing to take into account for this history taking station is to make sure that you please do a focused social history as part of it because I believe the main thing that they're assessing second year is the social history aspect. Obviously do your, your, your play history, present play and so on. But like they really want you to flush out the social history bit. Um And they'll give you more instructions uh about what they'd like you to flush out as you, as you get closer to today. Um I wouldn't like to teach you necessarily how to do the commu history taking because the clinical skills team, so the, the communications team teach you very well with the slides. And, you know, if you just copy and paste what they say in the slide, you'll be absolutely fine. But I can say in terms of how to prepare for this station history taking, if I'm being honest, when you guys are on placement, like just practice taking histories from real patients. Um It can be really hard at first because real patients are way harder to take histories from than actor patients, like paid actors you get in the exam. Um So, so it's a lot trickier in real life like in hospital settings, but I promise if you can do it in a hospital setting, you can do it in an exam setting. Um And the more you do, the easier it gets. So talk to patients where you can, that's like your best practice. And honestly, uh patients are usually like in their beds for like the whole day. So being able to talk to someone like a medical student, that's something nice for them. They look forward to that. So, yeah, unless they tell you to go away in which, you know, don't, don't take it personally his that's history taking. So the other communication station is the News Two Sbar station. So uh I'm not sure if you guys have been taught News two and Sbar. Yet, I think you may have been aware of News two and not Sbar. Basically, this is another communication station where they'll give you like a piece of paper to read, contains a bunch of patient information and you'll be asked to fill out this thing called News two chart, um where you assess six vital signs for a patient and you give them a score based on how bad those vital signs are. So, if I've got like a temperature of 39 you'd give me a score of three for that and so on. Um All of this may seem really fast now, but it'll make more sense. Once you see a News Two chart, once you've done in these two chart, you'll be expected to give an of a handover to a senior colleague. Um And basically, again, you'll get more teaching on this when you're on placement. But the in terms of practicing, you should try and practice on placement. Um The because the format for sbar is really quite rigid, so you can actually just get away of writing a script and rehearsing it again and again and again, when you practice on placement. Um So, you know, these two things um obviously do do do prepare for them. But I think in terms of like historically, students tend to do quite well in history taking in these two communications naturally. And it's the examination clinical skills that they just need a bit of work on because um you know, you've not done clinical skills in section one at, at that much. Um So I've talked a bit about the format already. Um for the, the point I think it goes about saying, but practice your clinical skills little and often. So this means practicing with real people, like your friends, your tutors CPA teachers where you can because this is the best way to get ready for the exam. Um As long as you practice consistently, I'm going to be honest, you can actually get over with beginning your CPA revision quite late into the year. So like term two and stuff, a lot of people in my cohort um did it in like a a few weeks before the the exam and actually they did perfectly fine but you know, try not to leave it that late. Do do do do your CPA revision just do it often and you can do it, you know, don't be stress about doing it now, obviously earlier, it's better cos you get more practice, but it's not the end of the world as you don't. Er and the reason for that is the final point, which is potentially the most important point marks are awarded leniently. So for your CPA exam, ge generally speaking, the marks are awarded leniently. So the and the example I can give of that is when you're asked to demonstrate a biceps reflex by the examiner, you can be, you will be awarded a mark. Even if you don't elicit the recent flex from me. The examiners only want to see evidence that you know how to test for the biceps reflex. So they'll give you the mark for the attempt, not the outcome. And that's the general principle for CPA, you might not get what you want to. But as long as you show that, you know what you're doing and that, you know how to assess for something they'll give you the mark. So, w why I'm saying this is important is because um it's your first practical exam, you know, it might seem scary you're doing practical exam, second year, but the examiners are generally on your side here. So try not to lose sleep over it. Like if I'm being honest, very, very few people don't pass their CPA. So, um I know you've got your clinical skills session and stuff, but, you know, just uh you, you'll be fine is what I'm trying to say, saying that I do have the stress that you should still try and practice with real people and do it often because whilst examiners are lenient, it's very, very obvious to, to an examiner if you haven't practiced your um your, your clinical skills. So if you try whacking someone's biceps tendon and you haven't practiced it before. It'll look really obvious and you'll look a bit silly. So, er, that's all I have to say. But the CPA section, five examination sections, two communications sections, er, and one rest station, honestly speaking, it's not as bad as in terms of praying for it as your written exams. So don't lose sleep over it. There's lots of resources available. So I shorter list than, than written exams thankfully, but in terms of CPA resources, GKI medics is amazing. They're fantastic. So you will hopefully have seen the geeky medics videos in your um clinical skills labs. Um They have like videos for every single examination that teaches how you how to do the clinical skills. Again, I have to say the big caveat is those videos are designed for third year osk rather than second year CP eight. So, you know, to clarify in CPA, you do not need to do everything continuously in one fluid motion. And in CPA S, there's a lot of osk skills that you don't need to do. So, for example, I know in the resp exam they do cric external distance and radio, radial delay. That's not something you'll be expected to, to do in your um your CPA exam. Um And I'll skip down actually here cos I might, yy, you're probably wondering. So what do we need to know for a CPA exam? Um I put down CPA checklist. So I believe one in send um, in one of your anatomy part threes or part twos, there are clinical checklists for all the clinical skills that you need to learn for each examination station. Um If you can't find it, email faculty or email doctor T um for the checklist, cos they will probably have a copy of it. These checklists are super useful when you're learning and when you're revising your clinical skills, cos you can literally just go down the checklist and say, ah take them off as you go like a tracker to make sure you've not left any skills out. And this is kind of like the main way. This is like one of the only things in the year where you actually know what you have to learn. Um So yeah, CPA checklist, keep a look out for that. Um A and don't hesitate to ask if you don't have that yet, but jumping back up uh CPA tutors. So um I'm not sure if you guys have been sent out the link yet, but the student union organizes a very, very good CPA tutor scheme where like a group of up to four second year students are assigned to up to two third year students to teach them CPA skills. This is really useful and I would advise signing up to this already if you haven't because it guarantees that you'll be able to practice your clinical skills on a real person. Obviously, the scheme varies a bit, but the third year tutors are really, usually, really friendly. Um, and they're usually help, happy to help you get familiar with the CPA. So it's a, it's a good chance for you to ask questions, um, and ask what the exam was like and stuff like that. Um, so, you know, join a CPA scheme, you don't have to practice that often with them as long as you can just meet up once or twice in like a term. Um and go through all the clinical exams, especially like when the, what, what we did in our year was that we just meet up our, our, our CPA teachers like the week before our CPA went through all the exams and then that was fine. So, yeah, CPA T is highly recommend that um if you haven't signed up already, if you don't, it's not the end of the world, you can still just look for third years that you guys know um and, and contact them to ask to help the CPA. Um So like I'm applying to be a CPA tutor, but if you guys want help a CPA, I'll probably be running like a CPA tutorial series um as well. So actually I might as well talk about that. So, yeah, I will be running a CPA tutorial series on all the different examinations and communications um that will come out sometime later, but I'll, I'll try and give you guys enough notice about that if you are interested. Um Shameless plug over, I'll keep going. Now, um Med Ed CPA guide. So you guys have probably noticed. I'm, I'm plugging med Ed a lot here. They are fantastic. They have really, really good resources and there exists a Med Ed CPA guide floating around somewhere and it's very, very useful because it covers pretty much everything in the CPA, everything you need to pass in about 40 pages. It is particularly useful for learning the theory for those questions that you get asked at the end of the examination stations. Um And if you would like a copy, I recommend getting in touch with the meta team or asking on your whole year group chat because really it's, it, it's really useful to use and you can use it as like um a textbook to, to, to, to learn. Um If you don't have get a copy of it, feel free to just email me cos I should have a copy I can send over to you guys as well. Um And you guys can use that as you like. But yeah, those are like kind of the key resources I wanna talk about because you know, there's lots of stuff out there to help. It's a bit, it's really easy to get drowned up thinking, what on earth do I learn? Um stick to any of those? You should be fine. Um And last thing I want to talk about for CPA is the mock. So throughout the year, you will have two CPA mocks er providing you sign up to them. So one mock is run by the Faculty of Medicine and I believe this one you're automatically assigned to. Um So, you know, just that will happen in like February or March, you'll be given an automatic mop by the Faculty of Medicine. The second mock is run centrally by student union by societies like meds. So Muslim medics and a SA. So for this se one, I think you guys will be given a link and you do have to apply yourself, but the links not come out yet. Don't worry, you've got plenty of time. Um You'll, the link will come out to apply later and closer to the date of the mock. I think it's worth applying to both of those mock exams because they're two very, very different mock exams. So the faculty mock is a lot shorter and does not cover the eight full eight. It does not cover the full eight stations from for our year. For example, they covered one examination station um and they covered one communication station. So the communication station, we've got a paid actor but they examined the examination station we had to do with a, a CPR research store, which was er, very interesting. So the faculty one is great because you get proper marking from actual examiners, but you only get like a couple of stations for it. It's not the filet stations. Alternatively, the SU mock does have the full eight station. So it's a full one hour 30 kind of thing. It gives you the full um CPA mock experience. So that's the good thing about it. The not so good thing is that your patient is not a paid actor. Your patient will be a partner from your year. So you'll be doing the su this su mocks in pairs, one of you will be the examiner and then one of you will be the patient and then you swap around the other. Not so good thing about the se mocks is that despite being a full eight stations, they're marked by older year students, not official examiners, there's an official marking and stuff like that. But what I mean by that is that you won't get like proper exam marking if that makes sense. So, you know, there's pros and cons to both of them. I think if you do both of them, you'll be um fine. The main thing with these mocks is not to try, I mean, obviously try your best. But the main thing with these mocks is to kind of get an idea of how the, the CPA runs. So that when you do the CPA on the actual day, it's not a big jump. Um But yeah, that, that's what I have to say for mocks as a heads up. If you guys are interested, I think your mocks are in like, er, February or March. So you've got plenty of time, um, plenty of time to prepare for them. So that's all I have to say about a CPA. Um, now we move on to like, the, not as important exams. I shouldn't say that but like, um, you've got the other exams in New Years that are hopefully more chill to you guys. So CSI is exactly the same as first year. You know, you've got your four I RT RA exams covering or you've got no side, you've got eight cases and all those cases. You've got four Ira T rats and then two ta s um, you hopefully are familiar with this so I won't gloss. I, I'll gloss over this bit but what I do want to talk about is the way scores are weighted. So you guys are probably aware that there's a 50% path mark for, for, um, CSI. But in terms of the score weighting, er, despite it being like a group task, your I RT score will always be worth way more than your T rat and T AP score. So please do still revise for your individual section because you've had lots of people who are like, they don't do as well on the I RT rat and they do really well on AT&T rat and then they find out that their weighted score is really quite lower than they expected. Um, it's still a 50% pass mark. So, you know, try not to lose sleep over it. But um don't get caught out at the same time if you, if you're not doing like the independent I wrap bit as well. So the next point I've got is most parts are ordered for part two. So I think you guys, you still have the part one, part two and part three for your CSI. So part two, the two hour lecture bit in the middle is like 16 of the 20 marks in A I RT rat. Um And then th that's most where most of the marks are concentrated. Don't get me wrong. Part one part three will still be worth two marks, four, mark up 2 to 4 marks each. But um they're not worth lo losing sleepover, obviously try and do them if you can. But if you really strap the time, focus on the part twos. Um Then for the last bit, I put history based questions, dates, interpretation questions, history ba based questions. These are patient vignettes that you basically just wanna look for red flags, keywords and data interpretation questions. Lots of them come up in CSI. But the general principle is for all your CSI data interpretation questions, if it's less, if it's P is less than 0.05 that is statistically significant. Don't worry about any o other sorts of statistical analysis. You need to do all the statistical analysis stuff goes out the window as long as it's p less than 0.05 that's statistically significant. You can leave it there. Um, obviously when you do it on Microsoft, that's a bit more nuanced. But this is like a, a line that will save you a lot of stress when you've got your, um, CSI, I rats, rats. Um, and yeah, that's CSI. I mean, again, trying to do it, like, take it as a chill thing cos it's, it's, it's a nice, it's a nice fun group activity. Um And you don't really get these. Uh Oh no, technically you do get CSI in 30 as well. So I'm not gonna say you don't and then last bit placement sign off. So you guys are probably where you have one extended GP placement and then 22 week off for placements in second year. My only advice for your sign offs is please sign them off as early as you can. Um So you don't have to end up chasing sign offs. Um I have to practice while I'm preaching and do that for my third year placements as well. But the earlier you get your things signed off, the less stress you'll be under to finish them. Um And this second point is really important actually check who can sign you off. So I'm not sure what sign offs you guys have, but things like taking a history can be signed off by an F one. You don't need your, your consultant to sign you off for that, um, double check because that was true for my, I'm not sure if it's true for your yet, but usually you want to get your F ones to sign off as many things as you can because F ones and F twos, they are what they have, um, way more time than consult to do stuff like signing you off for things and they're much, usually much nicer cos they, you know, they graduated recently, they were in your shoes. Er, once. So my advice for signing offs is go to F ones and FT S first, especially in the afternoon when they're doing more jobs. And then if not go to your registers, if not go to consultants, I think your end up placing for me, it has to be consultants anyway. Um, so have a look at that. Some nurses in HC A S, er, I don't think you guys do that many clinical skills but stuff like taking bloods can actually be signed off by either your clinical skills team or by nurses as well since they're qualified to do that. So, you know, if you can't find an F one or ready to sign you off, then you can look for a nurse to sign you off as well. But again, key disclaimer, just make sure you, you check your form and, and check that it's ok before you do that. Um, and then last thing is attendance now. This is a bit of a weird thing. Er, I know, like there's a lot of this idea that you, you shouldn't, you don't have to tell placement. Um, my advice is just to make sure you check if there's anything you need to do to sign in. So, like, for example, Chel West uses a QR code and then Norfolk uses like manual sign in signatures on paper. So just make sure you're doing those signing things um appropriately enough. So you don't get like called out for a 10 or anything. And as long as you balance that you're pretty, you're pretty, you have a pretty free timetable for your um placements. Um Yeah, and that's why I say place there's not much more I need to really say about this besides the fact that it's not, you're not expected to do anything in particular um for, for these placements. Uh apart from GP, you're expect to do like a project, but, you know, you'll get more information about that. Um When the time comes my recommendation for that is to just look very closely at the Exemplar project and then base it off that. Um And in general advice, um I will gloss over this very quickly, er, because I don't think this, you, I mean, you guys probably know most of this stuff already um manage your time carefully. You know, you've got the, you've got the time on practic, the exam program um, and for, for your BRS exam, I'll say this is really important because, er, since it's 25% SBA Qs, 25% Sa Qs and 50% Sa Qs, it's really easy to get caught out. You can be like 40 out of 80 questions done, but you've only gotten 30% of the marks and that really throws you off because all the SS A Qs are loaded at the end. So just don't rely on questions answered and questions are m make sure you actually go through those questions, flagging and crossing tools. Um Use them where you can like, you know, you catch style tools because they will save you a lot of time. V SA GSI put this in caps for her limit. Please do stick to that because there's still a shocking amount of people who are dropping marks both in my Yeah, my cohort and your cohort and the cohort below us. Um Dropping marks cos they're putting like five words in or they're using dashes and that still counts as an extra word. So, you know, be be be aware of that, it tells you how many words you've got. So just be careful um learn to type quickly on ipads, that's really niche. But you know, you do exams on ipads when you've got Sa Qs and there's no limit to what you can write. The only thing limiting you there is your, how quickly you can type. So um If you want to be like really good at typing quickly for your Sa Qs, knock yourself out, just get used to typing on the ipad for anatomy. I put B specific. This isn't that relevant to A PP but for limbs, this is so, so important. Um What I mean by be specific is state your right and left state your media and natural. If they show you a picture of a clad with a right clavicle, make sure you say right clavicle and not just clavicle because if you aren't specific, you will lose marks for it. And especially with the limbs topic. Um, there's lots of rights, there's lots of lefts and you need to make sure you're very, very comfortable. I first of all identifying them and then writing down right and left. Um, so that's what I'll say for, for anatomy. And then the last thing I put you have time. So guys, I'm gonna be with you. You've got like 56 months to your exam. So, you know, don't, please don't stress out about the exams. Now. It's good. You're thinking about them, good, preparing for them stuff. And med school does go very quickly. So it, it's good. You, you, you started preparing for them. Um, but I've made this talk mainly. So you guys know what to kind of like look out for in preparation for exams. I don't want to like, scare you about the fact your exams are coming or anything. Um, you know, be, be sensible with like how you're doing lecture stuff and as long as you're not falling too far behind you or anything, you'll do fine on, on all your exams. Um, and that's what I had to say about that. So I think that's everything. Yeah, that's everything. So, you know, thanks again for listening today guys. Hopefully that wasn't too long for a talk. I'm gonna stick around for a few minutes to answer any questions that pop up. So feel free to ask anything about the exams or about phase one. B more generous.