 So when should you start using URLD for a step one? It's exactly what we'll talk about in this video. Let's get into it. All right guys, welcome to another episode in the TMJ show and the MD journey. We're here. We help people just like you succeed on their medical journey with less stress. My name is Lux. I'm an internal medicine resident. I've been making videos just like this for people just like you for about the last two to three plus years. So if you're watching this on YouTube and you're new to this channel, consider hitting that subscribe button as well as that notification bell to be notified when we put out two videos per week just like this one. And if you're listening to the TMJ show on the podcast, make sure you subscribe on your favorite either iTunes, Google or Spotify. But today I wanted to talk about a very common step one topic, which is when should you start using URLD? URLD is obviously a very popular question thing for step one related questions. And everyone wants to know like, how do I use it? When should I start? What are the best ways to study and review? If you want answers to all those questions, I'll link down below to ultimate guide that we have on our website as one of our blog posts. I'm sure it'll help answer most of the questions that you probably have for URLD. Today, we're going to talk about specifically when you should start using it. And my answer may vary from your preferences, but I always recommend that you use URLD specifically during your dedicated and try not to use it elsewhere in your preclinical curriculum. And usually when I've given that advice in the past, I have had students who say, well, I can't use it as a second year or maybe can I use it several months in advance to just get ready for step one? And, you know, I'll give you my advice in a second, but one thing I will say is that the way you study for step one during your dedicated prep, that four to six weeks, whatever your institution gives you, ideally, is completely different in terms of intensity than those two years of medical school you have to start preparing for step one. There's just a different level of focus, a different level of repetition and intensity. So if you want to use URLD, you know, earlier than your dedicated, that's your choice. Now I'd recommend, you know, if you are going to do it and you try not to do it any more than four weeks in advance if you're dedicated. So if you're dedicated to starting in July, then maybe you can go ahead and start using it in June to give yourself a four week boost to get familiar with the style of questions, the difficulty of questions, and then you can go ahead and get into your dedicated. That I think is okay. What some students will ask me to do is whether they can go ahead and start using URLD as a first year med student or a second year med student. And I don't think there's that much utility because I feel like at that point you start to have memorized questions. And because URLD is such an effective tool and it's probably the most similar to the actual USMLE exam, you don't want to use up all those questions because then when you're prepping during your dedicated, one, you don't have another question source that's just as good. So you're not studying with the most adequate information. And two, you know, if you go ahead and try to use URLD again, it's not as effective a second time, especially if you're used to memorizing what the answers are or the questions are. So that's why I try to stray away from using URLD earlier on. And if you want other options, you know, I'll link down below, I'll put it right here, a video where I recommend the top question banks that you can use for your step one prep. And some of my favorite question bank sources to use as a first and second year med student are resources like USMLERX, which is made by the creators of First Aid to really give you a nice high yield and foundational sense of what you need to know for step one, but also other resources that come with questions built into their resource, things like Physio, which is great for first and second year med students. Or if you are a visual learner, then things like Pikmon, both of those links are affiliate links that we do get a little bit of a commission and kickback if you choose to go through them. And if you don't feel comfortable going to those links, I still recommend the products that I just recommend going through Google and typing in their URLs to find out more about them. The bottom line, guys, to best use your URL, I really recommend to try to keep those high yield, high quality questions for as close to your exam date as possible. So whether that's six weeks, you know, 10 weeks out, that's up to you. You pick your preference, but especially if you are somebody who tends to memorize questions and can go through a question bank and just not get as much utility like I was, I would stay away from using it your first and second year. So hopefully that helps answer a lot of your questions. So that's pretty much it for this video, guys. If you have more questions regarding step one, go ahead and comment down below. If you want more help on step one, you can check out our step one playlist. They'll also be linked down below with all of the videos we've made already. And then if you guys want more tips and you want three specific kind of tips and strategies that I learned during my own step one prep, you guys can check out our masterclass, which is a free 30 minute session. I really break down three essential strategies and concepts you need to know to really make that 250 plus score on your step one exam. So hopefully you guys can check that out and I'll link that down below in the description. But that's pretty much it. Remember before you leave off the video that you make sure you support the channel and the video by hitting that like button and also consider subscribing and hitting that notification bell. New videos coming at you every Wednesday and every Sunday with topics just like this one. So make sure you go ahead and subscribe. That's pretty much it for today, guys. Thank you so much for joining. Hopefully I can a little help to you on your journey. Thanks for being a part of mine. See you guys in the next one. Peace.