RACE FOR NEET – 10 STEPS TO SUCCESS IN HIGHER DENTAL EXAM by Dr.Gowri Shankar
HOW TO PREPARE FOR DENTAL EXAMS ? The trips and tricks to prepare for dental educational exams starting from dental graduation to higher degrees.
Step #3 – BOOKS TO STUDY
What are all the books needed for Various Dental entrance preparation?
This is the question that will have many different answers, each time you ask any senior or someone who has tries the exams previously. Do not get confused. From our experience and also from the experience of thousands of candidates, we have compiled a list of books which will be more than adequate for any dental qualifying exam preparation.
Please note that these books are just the basic ones to clear your concepts of the subjects. For every specialized dental qualifying exams there are always some specific books to follow. But that comelaterer. For the starter, you can start with these basic books.
- The basic books for Pg entrance preparation are
- Dentest (clinical and Basics)
- Dental pulse (clinical and Basics)
- Dental matrix
- Dentogist-Bhataia
- For AIIMS and AIPG (India) – the following books are preferred
Ritu Duggal, Prabhakar, Pankaj Dhawan, etc..,
2. Medical related MCQ
Amit Ashish, Mudit Khanna
Question paper type of books-
Ø Dental bytes
- Neeraj wadhwan
Ø Dental explorer
Ø Target MDS book-
Ø Spectrum
- Synopsis like books
- Sandeep Goyal
- Dentaquest modules
There is a varied collection of books depending upon the individual entrances. Some students will be fully engaged in collecting this books but never start reading. So start reading with what you have first.
The reading of Dentest and Pulse covers 95% of your preparation. Remaining all the books whatever may be whether question papers or any other synopsis like material covers only remaining 5%. Many of the toppers have agreed that whether they read or not most of them bought what are all the books available in the market. After entrance preparation, they realized it is nothing to overburden themselves.
By these words, I don’t mean to belittle my fellow authors. This is just an expression of the feedback what we received from the toppers.
Dental Pulse
| Positive | Negative |
| Ø Most followed book and must book which has emerged in recent times like a bullet..Ø First book for PG entrance preparationØ Gives confident after first preparationØ Simple explanations and easy to retain.Ø Sufficient for some state entrancesØ Synopsis is good useful for final minute revision also | Ø Cannot feel the preparation is full after first readingØ Not many things are added in subsequent editions compared to second editionØ Mistakes are there Mistakes are not corrected in latest editionØ Preclinical is not efficient |
Dentest
| Positive | Negative |
| Ø one of the oldest books Considered as BIBLE for PG entrance .Ø Obligatory book for many entrancesØ explanations are very good and Vth edition has emerged of its kind as in recent questions came from this explanationsØ preclincal ( recent 5th edition ) is good.Ø Feels preparation is complete after first readingØ Book is useful for different entrances and board interviews. | · Book is bulky and not feel to start as a first book· Though explanations are given. elaborative explanations are given some times· No point to point exp for some questions· Takes more time to read. It takes minimum 4 months to complete only this books.· Few mistakes are still there.· The explanations given in book does not match with all the other books( This is not the mistake of book of course it’s a misconception of the students) |
- Of all the 100 toppers 96 percent read both the books. This shows the importance of both these books for entrance preparation. Only 10 percent of the toppers have read either only the pulse or Dentest.
- 100% of the toppers of AIPG read selected topics from RITU DUGGAL and MANISH PRABHAKAR books.
- 10% of the AIPG toppers have read Bhatia book.
- Toppers of the AIIMS in addition read Pankaj Dhawan book also.
Regarding the question paper type of books- you decide which entrance you are going to prepare.
If only AIPG- Neeraj Wadhwan is the common book followed by many students.
Recently “Target- MDS” has emerged as favorite books for the students for those preparing AIPG
If for AIIMS and PGI- spectrum and Target MDS books are must
If you are giving all the entrances– DENTAL BYTES is a must
Most of the toppers read only Pulse and Dentest.
So you decide what to read and what not to read and what to start first.
We give the feedback what we received for individual entrances at the end.
Should I Read National Boards Again?
As an author, I should not reveal but to make it clear most of the NDBE question up to 1998 are given in various MDS entrances and they are covered in Pulse and Dentest. We suggest you reading the national boards or decks available after 1998.
**** To our surprise all the toppers of AIPG read full or part of NDBE papers. They agreed that though it boosted their morale they have not specifically helped in the entrances.
So we have to follow them know—if time permits please read this NDBE papers also.
But for students who are particularly planning to appear for foreign dental qualifying exams, it is imperative that they gather the NBDE papers and solve them thoroughly.
There are many official NBDE & NDBE preparatory materials available like Kaplan Test Papers that will give the dentist targeted idea on how to solve the questions.
