Time Crunch: Weak foundations CBSE/Step 1 Recommendations

**Title: Weak foundations and 6 weeks to prepare for CBSE/COMP—how should I study efficiently?**

Hi everyone,

I’m a fifth-semester student at a Caribbean medical school. Before we are allowed to take Step 1, we have to pass the CBSE/COMP, which is essentially a pre–Step 1 exam with a similar content breakdown and question style.

My exam is on August 21. Our school gives us about half of our final preclinical semester—roughly 6.5 weeks max—to prepare. However, we still have community clinical experiences, OSCEs, and mandatory classes three days per week from 8 a.m. to 3 p.m., many of which do not feel very helpful for exam preparation.

My main concern is that my foundational knowledge is very weak. I have been trying to complete 40–80 UWorld questions per day and review them, but I feel like I am not retaining much because I am missing so much of the underlying content. Sometimes I get a question correct, but my reasoning was wrong, I guessed, or I cannot clearly explain why the answer is correct.

Any recommendations for rebuilding my foundations while still doing enough questions to test and apply what I am learning? Would Bootcamp, Boards and Beyond, or Physeo be the most efficient resource in this situation?

I already plan to use Pathoma, Sketchy Micro and Pharm, Dirty Medicine, and Randy Neil for biostatistics. My biggest problem is that I take too long to learn each topic, so I am struggling to figure out how to cover everything efficiently and memorize without getting stuck in endless content review.

I would really appreciate advice from anyone who started with weak foundations or had a similarly limited dedicated period. What resources and daily structure worked best for you?