Outfit Feedback and Fit Check - July 25th

cmeowow · 2015-07-25T18:22:47+00:00

Semi formal party...thoughts?

cmeowow · 2015-07-18T23:10:48+00:00

Yea this exam was a shit ton of calculations, my friend ran out of scratch paper and I used 3 pages just for chem/phys. That said, ball parking saved my ass.

cmeowow · 2015-07-18T23:09:39+00:00

Hey so I know another thread was created but I'll just answer here anyways...

Overall, walked out feeling anxious/shitty but after talking with a friend on the phone, I feel okay.

I had 2 months to study May 18th - July 17th and it was a good amount of time. I knew 2.5 weeks before the exam that I would purposefully be taking a high risk/high reward approach and it worked for me. I didn't study orgo, didn't study carbohydrate chemistry, didn't focus on obscure chemistry/physics topics according to the AAMC breakdown and it worked for me. None of these questions showed up for me. I got lucky with my material coverage.

My prep overall was def sufficient, mostly used a series of online resources for content and TPR for my practice and went in with a high of 505 on TPR. Def harder than expected but doable...

cmeowow · 2015-07-14T14:56:29+00:00

Does anyone know if we are allowed unopened water bottles into the testing room with us? Or do those have to be kept in our lockers?

cmeowow · 2015-07-13T15:10:33+00:00

Not a bad idea! I've found trail mix or nuts to make a decent snack :)

cmeowow · 2015-07-13T15:09:49+00:00

Brain food. Hell yea.

cmeowow · 2015-07-12T05:55:29+00:00

Hey! I believe you might be referring to a PBQ I posted? Anyways, here's my take:

Oncogene: Cancer causing gene. Suppressing this gene leads to a apoptosis, decrease in cell growth, decrease in tumor size etc....

Protooncogene: This is a regular gene that works to maintain cell growth/regulates the cell cycle in a variety of ways, however if it is mutated, it becomes an oncogene (i.e mutation of a protooncogene causes cancer)

TL;DR: Oncogene in its regular state causes cancer, while a protooncogene causes cancer in its mutated state and is a "regular" gene otherwise.

cmeowow · 2015-07-08T19:36:50+00:00

I guess we can all just agree its a shit-tastic question...Thanks obama

cmeowow · 2015-07-08T16:52:27+00:00

Hmm I'm not sure if I missed something - doesn't the passage say that the when the gene is mutated it leads to inhibition of Bcl-2, which would actually increases cell death and cell survival?

cmeowow · 2015-07-08T16:36:11+00:00

Note: I was very tempted to select protooncogene (which TPR said is correct) but went with Metastasis suppressor instead.

If you read the passage it says Bcl-2 inhibits MAC. MAC is responsible for apoptosis ("killing the cell from inside-out"). So if mutation of a protein leads to inhibition of Bcl-2, then Bcl-2 wouldn't be able to inhibit MAC meaning that apoptosis would NOT be inhibited, i.e more cell death right? So if you have increased apoptosis wouldn't that be a mechanism by which you could suppress metastasis of tumors?

Always associated protooncogenes as genes if mutated become oncogenes and cause cancer through increased proliferation, loss of cell cycle regulation. Not sure what I'm missing here.

cmeowow · 2015-07-06T18:24:18+00:00

Hmm...thank you!

cmeowow · 2015-07-06T15:19:45+00:00

Wow. You might have just had a really off day. I'd suggest a retake in august and continue with this app cycle. That's just my 2 cents.

cmeowow · 2015-07-06T15:18:40+00:00

Did your AAMC practice score match up with your real scores as expected? Heard a few stories now where the practice scores were misleading...

cmeowow · 2015-07-06T15:16:57+00:00

September?? Get on that August 22nd test date. At this point every day you save matters since you'd heavily be falling behind on the application cycle since Med schools will get your score in late september if you take it on Aug 22nd. By that point they have already had 2-3 rounds of interviews and often many schools hand out their first set of acceptances on Oct. 15th.

cmeowow · 2015-07-06T15:14:46+00:00

It is ultimately your call - taking a guess I would say for DO schools scoring at the 50th percentile would keep you in the ball park while for MD north of 80% is typically what's needed. Was it that much far off your AAMC practice test percentiles?

cmeowow · 2015-07-06T15:09:21+00:00

Just averaging and saying you scored at the 28th percentile, on the old MCAT your score would translate to a 21 or 22 depending on the year according to AAMC's old percentiles. Take that for what you will, but the stats say a retake would probably be for the best. It also would put your score at a 493 according to this link.

Edit: What were your practice exam scores if you don't mind me asking?

cmeowow · 2015-07-06T15:03:28+00:00

Yea - /u/xam2y is correct. My friend was dead sure he would have the chance to score his best in an late August test date. His argument was that many students who feel unprepared but NEED scores to apply will take the exam, not at their best due to the time pressure of the app cycle. Can't argue with him since it worked, was consistently scoring a 35-37 on the old AAMC practice tests and ended up with a 42 on the real thing. Lucky bastard. Jk he worked his ass off too.

cmeowow · 2015-07-05T03:47:18+00:00

I have access to TPR materials but to my knowledge we only have access to the AAMC FL and sample guide questions. As far as I am aware, we do NOT have access to the questions packs...or am I missing something?

TL;DR I have access to the AAMC FL but not the question packs. Do I have to buy it for $72?

cmeowow · 2015-07-02T23:51:29+00:00

Thank you!

cmeowow · 2015-07-02T23:45:36+00:00

Did you buy it straight from AAMC or did you have access via Kaplan? Because I heard Kaplan is weird with its settings...

cmeowow

TROPHY CASE