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I've been disappointed with the quality of the questions.  In this last batch, I missed four, two of which I disagreed with after review.  This is, in fact, a GOOD thing, because on a more controlled test, there's no way to tell WHAT they marked you off for, or even go back in and, say, compare their rationale to the UpToDate answer on the same topic, and email them about it.

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There is something wrong in taking a test that causes such high anxiety.  I felt it was a test to see what I didn't know not what I did know!  Horrible when the stakes are so high as to lose your job, and income to make a living.  Something is wrong.  Just do away with the damn recerts period.  Seems to have worked really well for NPs!!!

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I want to make sure I understand this, so bear with me while I try to word this correctly 

If my state does NOT require certification, I can chose NOT to take the PANRE, I can still practice. 

YET, if I choose to take the PANRE (even though cert is not required by state), and fail, I can no longer practice. 

Right?

 

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1 hour ago, KpsPac said:

I want to make sure I understand this, so bear with me while I try to word this correctly 

If my state does NOT require certification, I can chose NOT to take the PANRE, I can still practice. 

YET, if I choose to take the PANRE (even though cert is not required by state), and fail, I can no longer practice. 

Right?

 

No.  Not the way I understand it.  If your state does not require it then it doesn't matter if you pass or not.  In for instance CA, they don't require it, but if you do get it, you meet their CME requirement.  That's what I was told by the Ca Medical board.

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I agree with above posters. On each block there are 1-2 I get wrong I disagree with. 1-2 I simply misread. So far, after the first two blocks the pilot claims the overall average from all PAs taking the pilot to be 74%. This is 72% from the first block and 76% from the second. Third block still pending for all. 

Difficulty has not seemed to change from block to block. 

Still nothing on what passing is but if 74% holds and is the 50th percentile for all test takers and NCCPA goal of 90-95% passing I would think the passing grade would be in the 60s overall. Certainly NCCPAs voodoo math will be different than my expectation. 

One thing to note is the average they give does not explain if they have removed no-shows or people who failed to complete the block. Could be driving down the average overall. It also could explain the 4% increase from block 1 to block 2. After two complete blocks hopefully all those choosing not to continue have left and the results can help each of us "measure up" to the average. At the end of block 4 everyone should have a good idea of where they stand compared to average. 

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9 hours ago, TWR said:

There is something wrong in taking a test that causes such high anxiety.  I felt it was a test to see what I didn't know not what I did know!  Horrible when the stakes are so high as to lose your job, and income to make a living.  Something is wrong.  Just do away with the damn recerts period.  Seems to have worked really well for NPs!!!

If you don't pass this pilot, you still have the option to take the PANRE and pass it the next year.  The will extend your certification a year.

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On 8/21/2019 at 12:39 PM, bovineplane said:

I agree with above posters. On each block there are 1-2 I get wrong I disagree with. 1-2 I simply misread. So far, after the first two blocks the pilot claims the overall average from all PAs taking the pilot to be 74%. This is 72% from the first block and 76% from the second. Third block still pending for all. 

Difficulty has not seemed to change from block to block. 

Still nothing on what passing is but if 74% holds and is the 50th percentile for all test takers and NCCPA goal of 90-95% passing I would think the passing grade would be in the 60s overall. Certainly NCCPAs voodoo math will be different than my expectation. 

One thing to note is the average they give does not explain if they have removed no-shows or people who failed to complete the block. Could be driving down the average overall. It also could explain the 4% increase from block 1 to block 2. After two complete blocks hopefully all those choosing not to continue have left and the results can help each of us "measure up" to the average. At the end of block 4 everyone should have a good idea of where they stand compared to average. 

That is odd. When I look at on my NCCPA account it shows the average for the first two blocks as being much higher than what you report of 72% and 76%. One is 82% and other is 87% or so. Average being 83%. I wonder why that is. 

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I just did the 3rd block.  The questions weren't necessarily harder but much longer, definitely had to process more information.   And my time limit was only 2 mins on each of the questions.  I actually didn't get to answer one of the questions because by the time I read the whole thing, then tried to look something up, I was out of time. 🤦‍♀️  I'm curious how everyone else experience is on the 3rd block. 

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6 minutes ago, EMEDPA said:

I kinda feel the same way about the MD/DO FP and EM board exams...

Oh, I'd definitely be down with that as well.  I felt stupid taking the same Intro to Clinical Medicine exams as the MS3's at the end of the first year and seeing us scoring 60-70's while they were hitting 80's-90's.  I think the field is a tad more level now.  Why would that be?  Because they've forgotten a lot of it while we've learned a lot of it from repeated exposure.

Edited by GetMeOuttaThisMess
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On 8/23/2019 at 12:33 PM, PABliss13 said:

That is odd. When I look at on my NCCPA account it shows the average for the first two blocks as being much higher than what you report of 72% and 76%. One is 82% and other is 87% or so. Average being 83%. I wonder why that is. 

Maybe they only provide the average for the same block? Meaning your group of questions and time. Hard to say. Friend of mine taking the pilot has had the same time limits each block and has the same overall averages on his homepage. Hard to say. 

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  • 1 month later...

Just wanted to update. Q4 questions opened yesterday. Completed them. No harder/easier than previous blocks. 5 minute per question. 

The website now has each quarter and an overall tracking which is nice. Helps you see where you rank compared to other PAs each quarter and overall. At the end of Q3 my portal listed 78% as the overall average. As soon as I submitted my Q4 it updated to 80% overall so it seems to track somehow "real time". The average has been increasing each quarter with the highest being Q3 so far at 84% for all PAs. It still does not show the current quarter average while it is ongoing which is odd since the cumulative average seemed to update. 

 

Logged in again today and now cumulative all PA average is listed at 81% so the real time seems to be in place. 

 

Good luck all!!

Edited by bovineplane
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  • 2 weeks later...
  • Administrator

I'm about 2/3rds done with mine, but I'd say they are doing better if they want to get "walking around" knowledge that PAs should all have.  Before, rarely would I answer WITHOUT a cursory double-check.  In general, I've been able to do so about 1/3 to 1/2 of these questions. I've had to quit for now, however, because one of the questions is so egregiously wrong that it literally makes me too mad to perform well and I started missing questions because of just how mad I am that they would ever approve such a question.  I'm going to go email them and politely yell at the stupidity of their chosen answer now.

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  • 3 months later...

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