Physician Assistant Exam Review Podcast

A breastfeeding mom asks for contraception at her two-week postpartum visit. A patient with gestational diabetes returns six weeks after delivery. A new mother on postpartum day six has a severe headache and blood pressure of 164/112. These cases contain the common wrong answers that sound reasonable but can cost you points on the PANCE. In Episode 175, we cover postpartum contraception and follow...

Fifteen PANCE-style questions, mixed systems, the way the exam mixes them. Pause after each one, say your answer out loud, then check yourself. Keep count. This is Rapid Rounds, a short set of practice questions between the regular episodes of the Physician Assistant Exam Review Podcast. About 16 minutes. What's in this one: A firefighter with a pulse ox of 99% who isn't fine The toddler who won't...

A white count of 20,000 the day after delivery. A temperature of 38 in the first 24 hours. Cramping every time she breastfeeds. Each one looks like trouble, and each one is normal. In this episode of the Physician Assistant Exam Review Podcast, we cover the six weeks after delivery when nothing is going wrong, who shouldn't breastfeed, and how to tell engorgement from mastitis. Five priming questi...

The water breaks at 30 weeks with no infection: you buy time. At 34 weeks: you deliver. A breech baby at 37 weeks gets turned, and twins get delivered on a schedule set by how many placentas they share. In this episode of the Physician Assistant Exam Review Podcast, we cover the setups that change the delivery plan before labor even starts, and the one number that decides each one. Five priming qu...

The water breaks and the heart rate drops. The head delivers and pulls back. A scarred uterus loses station. Three of today's four emergencies announce themselves the same way, and what separates them is what happened right before. This episode covers fetal distress, umbilical cord prolapse, shoulder dystocia, and operative delivery, boiled down to what the PANCE actually tests.

A Bishop score of 8 or higher means skip the ripening and go straight to oxytocin. Misoprostol and a prior uterine scar don't mix. And the APGAR never decides when resuscitation starts. In this episode of the Physician Assistant Exam Review Podcast, we finish labor: how to start it when it won't start, how to restart it when it stalls, and everything from the epidural to the baby's first assessmen...

In this episode of the Physician Assistant Exam Review Podcast, we walk through gestational diabetes and hypertensive disorders of pregnancy the way they actually show up on exams: key risk factors, universal screening windows, the 1‑hour vs 3‑hour glucose tests, and must‑know numbers for preeclampsia, eclampsia, HELLP, and magnesium toxicity. You'll hear "exam keys" for what to write on your wall...

If you keep mixing up placenta previa and abruption under pressure, you're not alone. In this episode of the Physician Assistant Exam Review Podcast, we break down four high‑yield pregnancy complications in a way you can actually remember on exam day: • Placenta previa   • Placental abruption   • Cervical insufficiency   • Rh incompatibility You'll learn: • The painless vs painful bleeding pattern...

In episode 167 of the Physician Assistant Exam Review Podcast, we dive into early pregnancy complications – a tough but essential topic for PA school, EORs, and the PANCE. We cover: Ectopic pregnancy: risk factors, classic presentation, key diagnostics (beta‑HCG + transvaginal ultrasound), and when to choose methotrexate versus surgery. Abortion classifications: threatened, inevitable, incomplete,...

Last night's workshop was so poweful I wanted to share it with you.  We cover the 6 aras where you can either lose or pick up points on your exam you can watch the replay here if you'd like that better. < < Click here for the replay >> ​

Isabella failed her first PANCE attempt by 9 points after cruising through PA school, doing well on her EOC, and grinding through PANCE Prep Pearls and question banks. On her second attempt, she walked into the Pearson center calm, focused, and prepared with a game plan. She didn't just pass. She jumped from a 341 to a 474. In this conversation we walk through: Failing an EOR and then the PANCE, a...

Preconception and prenatal care feels like pure memorization: Folic acid doses Visit schedules Quad screen patterns RhoGAM timing A pile of week ranges that all blur together In this episode, Brian strips it down to what actually shows up on your EORs and the PANCE, and how to connect the facts so they stick. Inside the episode: How to think about prenatal care the way the boards test it, not the...

Pelvic organ prolapse is one of those topics most PA students gloss over in school and then get burned by on exams. In this episode, Brian pulls from 15 years in urogynecology to make uterine prolapse, cystocele, and rectocele simple, visual, and memorable. Instead of memorizing dense definitions, you'll learn to picture the anatomy , understand what's actually happening, and recognize how these c...

Pelvic pain and pelvic masses show up all over your exams. The challenge is not memorizing four separate chapters, it is knowing what to do with the patient in front of you: watch, work up, or get them to the OR. In this episode, we walk through four high‑yield causes of pelvic pain and masses in reproductive‑age women: endometriosis, uterine fibroids (leiomyoma), ovarian cysts, and ovarian torsio...

Episode 162: Vaginal Discharge, Cervical Disease, Sexual Health, and Pelvic Infections on Exams Vaginal discharge questions are "three-line trap" questions: a short stem with just enough detail to mix up BV, candidiasis, and trich. Add cervicitis, PID, cervical cancer screening, Bartholin masses, and inclusive sexual history… and a lot of smart PA students still miss points they don't need to miss...

If you're listening on or before March 25 , doors for the April 33 Days to Pass the PANCE cohort close tonight at 11:59 p.m. Pacific. This episode is different from my usual "tips & tricks" shows. It's a short, straight‑talk walkthrough to help you decide yes or no about joining this cohort so you're not guessing from the outside. In this episode, we cover: Who 33 Days is actually for (and who it...

Failing the PANCE with a 326 after doing "all the right things" is brutal. Taylee walked that road. She graduated from the University of Washington, used all the big-name resources (Smarty PANCE, Kaplan, PANCE Prep Pearls, podcasts, Ninja Nerd), and still failed her first attempt. After taking a month off to breathe, she decided that simply adding more content wasn't going to fix the problem. In t...

From "uncertain, unconfident, and scared" to "confident, assertive, and ready" Madison started 33 Days at the end of didactic year feeling like a lot of PA students do: One exam he's on cloud nine, the next is a 70 and he's thinking, "I'm done for. Maybe I should just quit." Identity completely tied to scores. Anything less than an A felt like proof he wasn't good enough. On top of that, he wasn't...

When a question mentions abnormal bleeding, most people start hunting for the diagnosis. On exams, that's how you miss points. In this episode, we walk through a simple mental checklist for menstrual disorders so you can slow down, see the pattern, and pick the right next step. You'll learn how to: Start every abnormal bleeding question by ruling out pregnancy Sort amenorrhea, oligomenorrhea, meno...

n this episode of the Physician Assistant Exam Review Podcast, we use breast complaints to do two things at once: sharpen your clinical pattern recognition and force you to upgrade how you organize your studying. We walk through the core breast topics that keep showing up on exams: mastitis vs breast abscess, fibroadenoma vs fibrocystic changes, galactorrhea, gynecomastia, and malignant breast neo...

In this episode of the Physician Assistant Exam Review Podcast, we tackle skin integrity from two angles: what you need to recognize on exams, and how to reorganize your studying so you can finally see (and fix) your gaps. We walk through burns, lacerations, pressure injuries, urticaria, pilonidal disease, and the big three skin cancers: basal cell carcinoma, squamous cell carcinoma, and melanoma....

In this episode of the Physician Assistant Exam Review Podcast, we walk through the "Do I worry?" side of derm: how to quickly sort benign vs concerning skin lesions using pattern recognition, not panic. Instead of memorizing every lesion in isolation, you'll learn to organize them into buckets you'll actually see on exams and in clinic: Keratotic lesions: Actinic keratosis vs seborrheic keratosis...

In this episode of the Physician Assistant Exam Review Podcast, we walk through five derm vignettes that show up on high‑stakes exams: melasma, alopecia areata vs telogen effluvium, onychomycosis, paronychia/felon, vitiligo, acanthosis nigricans, and stasis dermatitis. Instead of memorizing another list, you'll learn how to recognize the patterns in the question stem, how to organize these conditi...

In this episode of the Physician Assistant Exam Review Podcast, we tackle one of derm's most intimidating corners: desquamation and vesiculobullous disorders. You'll learn how to quickly separate erythema multiforme, Stevens–Johnson syndrome, and toxic epidermal necrolysis by asking three simple questions: sick or well, mucosa or not, and how much body surface area is involved. Then we contrast bu...