OVERVIEW
Preparation for medical Licensing Examination like USMLE, MCAT, and NCLEX is a challenging and difficult task. Nowadays, we’re on the internet era and everything we need to learn is just by one click on our Laptop or a slight touch on tablets. This is very convenient but also complicated for learners. Having so much material to learn and tons of useful resources available, so many of us, test-takers are wasting our valuable time simply deciding which resources is the most reliable to study.
Start with Lecturio!
Lecturio was founded in 2008 in Leipzig, Germany, and now had a diverse international team operating around the globe. They are specializing in making online video portal with whose mission statement is “To make high-quality online education available to as many people as possible, and spread specialized knowledge around the world.”
While they are most well-known for their informative and educational video lecture component, Lecturio also generates a question bank, quizzing, and smart studying resources to their leaners. Lecturio boasts use by over 600 medical schools and 100,000,000 minutes of video watched by its users.
In addition, Lecturio is a fully comprehensive medical curriculum and medical boards review resource that covers all pre-medical, pre-clinical and clinical material required for the USMLE Step 1, COMLEX Level 1, USMLE Step 2 CK, and COMLEX Level 2 (as well as MCAT and NCLEX for pre-med and nursing exams).
While many resources only one source of information (video lecture materials, flashcards, or stand-alone question banks), Lecturio is consider as a better combination of all these resources in an integrative form with almost seamless transitions between each to ensure users are learning the material, reinforcing what they’ve learned, and practicing applying those concepts on any types of boards-style questions.
With very convincing numbers: 100+ hours of video, 2000+ boards style questions, and countless flashcards in their spaced repetition program, there are nearly no resources having the ability to compete with Lecturio’s one-stop-shop board preparation approach.
You might be thinking ” well, the number 100+ hours of video and 2000+ questions !!! that’s going to make me overwhelmed.” Don’t worry too much about it, Lecturio allows you to customize your using plan or pick up a pre-made plan (as of this review, there are 99-day and 33-day ”crash- courses” available) where Lecturio will select your videos, questions, and flashcards to optimize your learning necessary materials on the schedule you set for your goals.
When it comes to customizability, Lecturio is a comprehensive approach that would be an excellent option for those seeking out a full, unified approach the USMLE prep.
Impressive Numbers
100,000,000
Number of video minutes watched by Lecturio users.
246
Average score of Lecturio users on USMLE Step 1.
600
Number of medical schools with Lecturio users around the world.
What’s Included
On-demand video lectures (including notes, transcripts, and downloadable slides for each lecture)
Written review articles (can be paired with most sets of videos)
2000+ QBank questions for USMLE Step 1
Spaced-repetition quiz/flashcard program
Guides to approaching medical school
Study schedules for the USMLE (33-day and 99-day “crash courses”)
Bookmatcher (Enter a book and page number and Lecturio will link to a Lecturio video covering that topic a BRILLIANT resource) And more!
PRICING
You can have a free account option, there will be a limit to access to the QBank and only a fraction of the lectures. It’s great if you want to try it out, but not enough to get you to your goal score.
That’s why Lecturio makes offers to you to opt for: a monthly subscription for $49.99, with price breaks if you pay for 3 months ($34.99/month) or 12 months ($24.99) of the service upfront.
MAIN FEATURES
VIDEOS
Videos of Lecturio was featured by faculties who exceptionally lectures in their area of expertise.
You may think that you can find those similar videos in other on-demand resources. Yes, you can totally find those out. The convincing element to make you choose Lecturio is that their videos are easy to search and can be grouped and sorted by organ system or subject, making looking for videos for quick review much easier and simpler.
On the other hand, the videos are also much shortner than other resources. This helps you to avoid having to stay focused on a lecture for 30 minutes or longer. The study has pointed out that 30 minutes or less is ideal for focusing.
Transcripts and the lecture’s slides are also included in the videos for the case you would like to take notes directly on pictures as they are explained.
What truly makes Lecturio videos excellent is that they create “the active” within “the passive”. The best part is the spaced-repetition questions assigned at the end of each video.
Following each individual video, you’ll be asked a series of quick, “flash card” quiz questions to help reinforce what you just learned.
Your learning is completely in the process that is set at the beginning.
Once you complete questions, they get added to a cumulative quiz and are reassigned on scheduled days, so you are continuously tested and re-tested on the material you’ve just seen that day, yesterday, even a week ago, or a month ago.
By using Spaced repetition reinforcement technique which is proven as an effective and powerful to learn and retain information and have it integrated directly into the video platform. All of this is an excellent feature at Lecturio!
QBANK
By using a similar user interface of Prometric Centers that administer the USMLE Step 1 and Step 2CK exams, Lecturio is very successful in allowing users to practice questions in the same way they will present on the real test.
There is a few slightly different from questions written by the NBME and the question-wording in the Bank. But this is common among all QBanks, users still can handle this, because then they understand the real knowledge from the videos then from the question in the bank not just copy the answer to the totally same question in real test.
With the wide-ranging difficulty, QBank includes questions that require integrating across organ systems and subjects, as well as questions requiring essentially rote memorization of answers, and the content summarizes that of the NBME questions in the good level.
Although the question explanations are not as clear as in some other QBank, Lecturio includes links back to the appropriate video covering the question, making it easy to review and make it even more clear and imaginative to users.
Finally, When combined with the spaced-repetition test following the video, reviewing these QBank questions will completely reinforce all the key concepts covered in the question.
SPACED REPETITION
Lecturio has been very successful on the spaced repetition program, allowing users to continually review the material they find the hardest until it becomes second nature.
The questions are simple and precise enough that they could be approached nearly like flashcards and reviewed quickly to solidify information day after day.
By setting up to assign these questions as you review material, there is rarely a need to seek a particular quiz to do on your own. However, it is simple to navigate to a particular subject and do questions related to that subject without watching a video if you so desire.
As a part of the review schedule, repeat questions are assigned each day, making sure that as long as you follow up these questions, you’ll keep all the information you previously learned clear and ready to support the answer questions when they come up.
INTEGRATION
There are many features that are loved in Lecturio, but personally, I think the best part is the integration between the lectures/notes, QBank, and spaced repetition quizzes. It helps recall and reinforces knowledge much more effectively.
If you have any deficiencies in question content, topic explanations, or having to suffer through a “boring lecturer” will be handled by integrating all of these learning techniques for each topic you review.
Simply speaking, you’ll have everything you need for your medical goals by receiving at least 1 of 3 approaches (lecture, questions, spaced repetition).
That’s not something you can generally guarantee piecing together other resources. That’s great.
Pros and Cons
As mentioned above, each component of Lecturio could be a decent resource in isolation, but the nearly seamless integration of them all makes each one better, and the overall service a great tool.
Lecturio is comprehensive and customizable to an extent, so it can be used with nearly any timeline, and in preparation for most of the major medical exams.
The content together covers everything in the detail necessary to be successful.
The biggest drawbacks of Lecturio are because it relies on integration, none of the components can really be used effectively in isolation, which means you’ll likely be devoting nearly all your time to Lecturio, which have very little left time if you wanted to use other resources.
Again, this is really only a “con” if you have something else you’re required to devote your time to do. The only other con is the discussion of test-taking strategies leading up to test day and on test day. The strategies discussed don’t necessarily apply to all tests (namely, they do not apply to take the USMLE Step 1 in the USA). Take this lecture with a grain of salt and always verify with your test center what their protocols and rules are.(According to the Crush The usmle exam)
WHO IS THIS BEST FOR?
Lecturio is a great resource for some groups.
First, any test taker who is looking to start from scratch (from a testing perspective), like IMG’s who have decided to take the USMLE a few years after completing a medical program at school. You can study and review on your own schedule, and rest assured you are learning all the information needed to pass the exam.
Second, Lecturio can act as a replacement resource for allopathic or osteopathic medical students during any part of the didactic years (say, if you have a school lecturer who isn’t teaching you what you need to know in detail or is unclear).
Third, Lecturio can also best be used by students who are setting aside dedicated time to study for the boards in parallel with their curriculum. Spacing out lectures and questions over 8-9 months will help information stick better as you continually see it, and that time frame is manageable for completing all coursework and Lecturio content.
While these are groups that could ideally benefit the most from Lecturio, to be honest, anyone can use Lecturio during their preparation and it will help improve their score as well as enhance their knowledge. If you decide to use it, be forewarned: you will be sucked into the beauty of their integrative system and you may wonder why you didn’t try it sooner!
