As I prepare to take the NCLEX in a couple months, I went searching online for NCLEX CAT adaptive style test. I stumbled upon this site by accident and what a lovely mistake that accident was. I took the free try CAT on the home page of the website and loved how the questions were worded and the overall format of the website. At that moment I knew I was going to register for this amazing product. As I explored around the website and checked out the daily NCLEX questions on the Facebook page I knew this was going to be a good thing. Before this program I was killing myself going through old medical surgical nursing textbooks and finding every NCLEX question possible, but there was only one problem these questions was all pre-programmed nothing was adaptive truly like the NCLEX is, with that along it makes all the other website truly inferior to this one. The website truly looks good, format is easy on computer and on mobile, I’d like to see more practice questions, but that’s one of the reasons I’m writing this is to unlock a free premium membership as we know nursing school wallets are tight with very little money to spare.

Things I was doing before this website, was a lot of dry reading in a textbook.

Kaplan Strategies book – I suggest to read this when you need a run through of the topics and after comprehensive review. Because this book will help you prepare how to answer questions and eliminate choices to get to the correct answer.

Hurst - This is by far the funniest and coolest book I have read about nursing. If my books in college especially med surg were written like it in college, I bet lessons would have not been so hard to understand. I believe Aunt Marlene did a great job in explaining Pharmacology in a nutshell.

Saunders - for comprehensive review, this is the book to read and understand by heart. It explained each disease process in simple and in a concise manner. Of course it is not that compete as it could be, but whenever I had more questions about a topic, I try to look for other books for details.

PDA – great for practicing and knowing what to expect in NCLEX. Questions here were formulated the way NCLEX questions are given. Raw, simple but definitely tricky.

Kaplan review – I wasn’t able to finish watching the videos because I felt I could learn more in reading Saunders than watching the videos. The videos, aside from being so long, felt like everything was mooshed together. I mostly used the qbank and qtrainers to gauge myself in areas I needed to improve with. The questions were definitely harder in Kaplan.

I started to answer 25 questions a day for 2 weeks and progressed to 75 questions a day on my 3rd week before I started feeling like these really aren’t adaptive and so I went on the lookout for an adaptive style NCLEX questions and I found this site, and I’m so glad that I did. This site will be one I go and tell all my friends about.

You, What’s your story?

Happy Nurse Week!!!

The NCLEX was quite challenging for me. Tons of infection control, medication questions that I didn’t know, a lot of select all that apply and priority questions~ who should the nurse see first as well as delegation questions. I did 261 questions for the entire six hour duration. I was completely fatigued during the exam. The diagnostic I received a week later indicated all areas as near the passing level.

In preparing for the exam the second time around, I am doing more practice questions using Facebook, CD’s, and NCLEX review books. I am trying to learn more about the medications (plus watching TV to know the ‘new medications’). I also formed a study group, we meet for 3 times a week and discuss and share information. Also, I do lots of reading, reading and more reading. I also Pray daily and ask God for guidance and strength; Philippians 4:13 reminds us that ‘I can do all things through Christ which strengthen me’. I’m also reminded of God’s promise to us in Jeremiah 29:11, ‘For I know the plans I have for you declares the Lord, plans to prosper you and not harm you, to give you hope and a FUTURE’…. and that is my motto

UPDATE: April 4, 2012

If you want to have a FREE PREMIUM ACCOUNT here @nclexonline.com, feel free to submit your experience about your first NCLEX Exam and what have been your preparations so far to finally succeed. Use our contact form at the bottom with a subject “PASS NCLEX”. Re-takers only.

How’s your Christmas? Ours was a blast. We enjoyed every single time with our family and friends this past week BUT that didn’t stop us from working hard to deliver the Computer Adaptive Tests for NCLEX-PN.

Yes! You heard us right. It is available now and you can go ahead and check it over on our premium content page. Don’t forget to tell us what’s your thoughts about it

Also, this will also be the last day of our $10 premium membership (it’s a bargain actually). There will be a price increase for 2012 and if you are really planning to join our exclusive membership for some time already then this will be the perfect time to do it. You can also use this premium membership as a gift to your friend or family member who plans to take the NCLEX. Just provide them the login details!

http://www.nclexonline.com/membership-options/register/premium-membership/

Until next time. Enjoy your weekend everybody and may you have a blessed new year!

“If at first you don’t succeed, redefine success”

What’s the difference?

If you know the answers to the questions 100% of the time on the NCLEX, you don’t need a formula. But, if you don’t know the answers to the questions, the formula will help you to find them.

To ace essay questions on the NCLEX exam, the formula is in the structure. If you have the structure right, finding the right facts and arguments to slot into place will be a breeze.

Here’s how to create a structure that you can use to ace any essay question on the NCLEX test.

Acing NCLEX Essay Questions

1. Look at as many past NCLEX exams as you can lay your hands on; most people look at one old NCLEX exam or set of practice questions before a test. You want to find about five (or even more if you can). When you look at a lot of old NCLEX questions, you’ll start to see a pattern. If you can’t get ur hands on an old exam, you can get one from an online NCLEX source like Teaching Solutions (see url below). It should be a well-researched study guide that teaches you test content and has practice question that are similar to ones on the actual NCLEX exam.

There’s always a pattern to the questions in the NCLEX. If there were no pattern, the examiners wouldn’t be able to compare results from one year to the next. That’s why they call it a standardized test.

When essay questions have a pattern, so do the answers.  This content is for members only.

Decide What the Question is Dealing With:

1. Which part of the Nursing Process: Assessment; Analysis; Planning; Implementation or Evaluation?
2. Next, Decide the Order of Priority

First you must decide what part of the nursing process the question is connected with:

• ANALYSIS–is the process of identifying potential and actual health problems. Most identify pertinent assessment information and assimilate it into the nursing diagnosis. Prioritize the needs that have been identified during analysis.

Some common words that are associated with ANALYSIS questions:

• diagnose; contrast; compare; analyze; order; prioritize; define; classify; categorize; synthesize; sort; arrange;

• ASSESSMENT–consists of a collection of data. Baseline information for pre and post procedures is included. Also included the recognition of pertinent signs and symptoms of health problems both present and potential. Verification of data and confirmation of findings are also included. Assess a situation before doing an intervention.

Some common words that are associated with ASSESSMENT questions:

• observe; gather; collect; differentiate; assess; recognize; detect; distinguish; identify; display; indicate; describe;

• PLANNING–Involves formulating goals and outcomes. It also involves various members of the health care team and the patient’s family. All outcome criteria must be able to be evaluated with a specific time frame. Be sure to establish priorities and modify according to question.

Some common words that are associated with PLANNING questions:

• rearrange; reconstruct; determine; outcomes; formulate; include; expected; designate; plan; generate; short/long term goal; develop;

• IMPLEMENTATION–Addresses the actual/direct care of a patient. Direct care entails pre, intra and postoperative management, preforming procedures, treatments, activities of daily living. Also includes the coordination of care and referral on discharge. It involves documentation and therapeutic response to intervention and patient teaching for health promotion and helping the patient maintain proper health.

Some common words that are associated with IMPLEMENTATION questions:

• document; explain; give; inform; administer; implement; encourage; advise; provide; perform;

• EVALUATION–Determines if the interventions were effective. Were goals met? Was the care delivered properly? Are modification plans needed. Addresses the effectiveness of patient teaching and understands and determines in proper care was offered. Evaluation can involve documentation, reporting issues, evaluates care given and determine the appropriateness of delegating to others. Most significantly, it finds out the response of the patient to care and the extent to which the goals we met.

Some common words that are associated with EVALUATION questions:

• monitor; expand; evaluate; synthesize; determine; consider; question; repeat; outcomes; demonstrate; reestablish;

After determining what part of the nursing process the question is concerned with, next focus your attention on determining the category of priority:

Safe and effective care environment is always first. Patient safety is related to the proper preparation and delivery of nursing techniques and procedures as part of the nursing practice. It relates to every aspect of the delivery of care.

Physiologic integrity is the ability to provide competent care Information that may be described as traditionally medical- surgical and pediatric nursing falls into this category. Specific questions in this area can be related to many direct-care aspects of nursing practice. The importance of this area is highlighted because it is one in which planning, implementation and evaluation of care needs can easily be identified and tested. Physiologic integrity is always a slight lower priority than safety unless it involves airway, breathing and circulation. “ABC’s” always comes first!

Psychosocial integrity tests the knowledge about a patients response to a disease or disorder. An understanding of stress, anxiety and ways to cope are essential. This is a lower priority the physiological integrity.

Health maintenance deals with health promotion, health teaching, disease prevention and assessment of risk factors for health problems. Normal growth and development is a major theme in this category. This however, is a low priority.

In Summary, when choosing the right answer for you NCLEX exam question:

1) ask yourself, “what part of the nursing process is this question dealing with: analysis, assessment, planning, implantation or evaluation? and

2) Remember to prioritize your choices: safety always being first, second is physiological integrity, third; psychosocial integrity and health maintenance always has the lowest priority when choosing an answer.

Some Other Tips:

• avoid choices with the answers “all” “always” “never” or “none”. Nothing is ever a definite in Science.
• look for answers that are different. If three answers say the same thing but in different words, choose the answer that is different.
• when given choices that are pharmacologically based or non pharmacologically based, choose the non pharmacological intervention. It is more often then not, the correct answer.

It has been a while since we last communicated and personally I want to thank you all for the positive response that you’re given to our site NCLEX Online. Truly those comments you made are very heart-warming and it pushes us to deliver more quality content for our website.

I just want to shout out a few updates we made recently and some of these includes a number of NCLEX Exam as well as NCLEX related TIPS.

• Management of Care – MC Practice Test 1
• Safety and Infection Control – SIC Practice Test 1
• Basic Care and Comfort – BCC Practice Test 1
• Reduction of Risk Potential – RRP Practice Test 1
• and a few more…

Also we made a preview of what our NCLEX SATA Test bank would look like for premium members which will be available soon. Please take your time to take a look at it and share us what you think.

And as a final note, we will greatly appreciate if you could answer this small survey for us in lieu with our premium content. Click here to view the survey.

Thank you for visiting the site and we hope to see you again soon.

It’s been a long time actually and you might be wondering why you are receiving this email. Just to refresh your memory, some time in the past couple of months, you managed to see the upcoming website for NCLEX that we are about to open and guess what? After 6 months of preparation, brainstorming and countless days of work, It’s now LIVE!

You can now visit http://www.nclexonline.com and start taking NCLEX Exam and quizzes. It’s totally free to join and is accessible 24/7.

This will revolutionize the way on how we take simulation and interactive test taking for nursing. It’s still pretty much on beta but everything including NEW NCLEX EXAM is being put up all together as we speak.

We hope to see you and please do give us some feedback. It will be greatly appreciated.