It might be asking for which medication is CONTRAINDICATED.

It might be asking for the GOLD STANDARD diagnostic tool. Rarely is the question asking for the actual diagnosis (that would be way too easy)! It might be asking you for the INITIAL STEP in management. With limited time, it is critical to understand what the question is actually asking you. (By the way, these are my best exam-taking strategies for any PA school exam, not just the PACKRAT!) Read the END of the question first. It’s important to know your strengths (and more importantly) your weaknesses so that you can improve before the real deal, make or break, board exam. Of course, the PACKRAT is typically not taken for a grade or anything other than your own personal knowledge but I like to take practice exams as if they were the real thing. Now that you know what to expect, let’s talk about strategies for taking the exam. *The time you have to take your exam is adjustable between 4 and 6 hours depending on your proctor. The breakdown of topics is similar to the PANCE with cardio and pulmo being the “heavy hitters.” I’ll list the actual percentages of each topic below. There is a list of normal lab value reference ranges to the side that you can open at any time. That math breaks down to roughly 1 minute and a few seconds per question. It is a totally computerized exam consisting of 225 multiple choice questions and you have 4 hours* to take it with no built-in breaks. Also, after posting about PACKRAT day on my Instagram story, I received multiple questions about it so I thought it would make for a good blog article!įirst let’s talk about the basic set-up of the exam. There are endless resources and blog articles regarding the PANCE but not much about the PACKRAT. Every program is a little different but at UAB, we take it at the end of didactic year and again at the end of clinical year before taking the boards.īefore taking the exam, I did some googling for information about it but did not find much. My classmates and I are nearing the end of didactic year (WOOHOO) and recently took the PACKRAT exam which is a “practice PANCE” that PA students can take to predict how they will perform when taking the boards.

Packrat exam 2019