The CPJE: My opinion

Monday October 19th 2009 The CPJE contains, according to the content outline which you can read on pages 10 and 11 of the full outline here, or specifically here , there are 90 questions, of which 15 are "test" questions that aren't scored, but included for potential use in future exam use, and the other 75 questions are divided equally between: 1. Provide Medication to Patients 2. Monitor and Manage Patient Outcomes 3. Manage Operations They have example questions here and some more example questions here for you to familiarize yourself with the exam style and content. I cannot say this any more clearly, but there is good reason to look very carefully at these example questions! Now, for all the websites, books, downloads, links, hints and suggestions I may have received and can suggest to you, NOTHING is as close to the real exam as I found those example questions were. What I THOUGHT the exam was going to feel like, was something like the example questions I went through at the back of the Weissman Law book. I have written elsewhere how to obtain that book, so I wont repeat it, but that book is AWESOME, EXCELLENT and TOTALLY REQUIRED READING. I had two other sources of info for the LAW side of the CPJE, I had a book called: Pharmacy and Federal Drug Law review, by Kosegarten and Pisano ISBN:0-07-144560-9 Which did a good attempt, but was really about FEDERAL laws more than Californian specific laws (which are very often very different). It came with a CD which, when I finally got round to putting in my computer the day before the CPJE to test myself with, didn't work because my computer runs on Vista and that CD only works on Windows 7 or something. Typical. I also had Pharmacy Law: Textbook and Review by Debra Feinberg which was too long for me to read in the time I had left, but had about 450 law questions at that back that were probably worth the time spent flicking through. But nothing beats Weissman for the law. I LEARNT the law from that book. I read every page of it, I answered every question carefully at the back, and I was SHOCKED at how many times I got the wrong answer! That book is incredible. It asks questions in the sneakiest, cleverest, nastiest way, either to trick you outright, or to teach you how they might ask the questions in the actual CPJE. That totally kicked me up the backside when I was going through the Q and A section. There is nothing like it, and I thoroughly recommend everyone who takes the CPJE to learn this book like its the most important book in the world. It sort of is! However I also knew that the law probably only amounted to about a third of the exam questions, and I had very little time left to study (I only gave myself 5 days of study between the Naplex and the CPJE and honestly it took 4 days to go through Weissman with a fine tooth comb). So I had sort of given up trying to learn anything else in a logical manner, and just flicked through random areas of study every so often, depending on what thoughts jumped in to my head. So I gradually got increasingly nervous between taking the Naplex and building up to taking the CPJE, as the Naplex had been such a disgustingly difficult test, and I didn't want to come out of the CPJE exam feeling as bad as I had after the first test, although to some extent I was trying to prepare myself for that emotional drain. I had spoken with lots of pharmacist colleagues about the CPJE who had all said the same thing about the CPJE - "It was a very tricky exam." And having looked at those questions (well, answers) in the Weissman book I got in to a bit of a downward spiral of nerves. So it was the evening before the exam, and I finally decided enough was enough at 2am. I collected all my papers needed for the exam (Drivers License, Passport and SSN), put the address in my Sat Nav and set my alarm for 7am (this time the exam was at 9am and about 15 minutes drive away). I woke up at 7am absolutely exhausted. Clearly 2am was far too late the night before an exam. DONT STAY UP SO LATE PEOPLE!! Anyway, I had plenty of time, so I got dressed and picked my bits and pieces together and drove to the gas station to buy a coffee and then, with my heart starting to pound, I drove off to take the dreaded exam. This venue was far easier to find (although again I recommend you take a cell phone and their phone number just in case you have problems) and I arrived in the room at just after 8.30am. It took until after 9.30am to get through all the people in the room, one by one, as this venue was far less efficient than the naplex venue had been for some reason. The only marginal benefit to me was that it had given me time to drink my coffee, which helped wake me up a bit, although the nervous adrenaline had helped of course! So finally it was my turn to enter the exam area and get the repeat lecture from the proctor, go through the practice on the computer, and then hit that "start test" button. In this exam I wasn't offered a calculator, and it wasn't really needed. There were perhaps 3-4 questions, if that, that required some maths, but the computer calculator was sufficient for those few, simple questions (unlike the Naplex which had dozens of maths questions, and some of which were a bit complex). Also, in this exam I received two pencils and a piece of paper to write on, instead of the plastic board and erasable pen which I had for the Naplex - pencil and paper being a much better option. So here's the test, three, two, one... Actually, I had again for this test decided to write down a list of how many I thought I got right for sure, how many I though I had probably got right, and hhow many I had no idea about and had literally guessed. More of that in a minute. Two, one, zero... The questions on the Naplex had been varied, complex, difficult and scary. These questions, as I went through them, were all worded in a straightforward manner, with almost no attempt to trick you in to giving the wrong answer, and were a delight to work through. That's not to say I did well or not, but this exam in terms of style, was lovely! That Weissman bloke, and most of my fellow pharmacists, had scared me in to thinking that every question was going to be a minefield of trickery and underhanded backstabbing evil. It wasn't. It was great :-) Of the 90 questions, I recorded on my little sheet as follows; Probably Right - Possibly Right - Guessed = 42 - 22- 26 If I were to try and estimate what that might work out as a percentage, I'd hazard a guess I got about 65% may be? Is that a pass mark? I have no idea, but I felt like I had done OK. The vast majority of the law questions I knew without thinking about, a few were off subject from what I had learnt, but only required simple logic to answer (I hope). there were quite a few, lets call them in-practice type questions, which again I think could be answered by logic. And almost all the rest of the exam were questions about specific drugs - what were they for, what was their side-effect, how should the patient use them, dosage strength, frequency, interactions, contra-indications and other stuff along the lines of what the example questions had been like. Now, they certainly weren't all easy. There were far too many drugs I had never heard of, or had heard of but had never noticed whether they should be taken at bed, or with food, or might cause drowsiness or not. But most questions, if I didn't know the answer, could be reduced to one of two possibles, and I just have to hope I hit the right option more often than not. And that's it really. Well, actually one more thing I found worthy of sharing - don't bother asking for a re-score! Read here for why its not worth it. And that really is it. I was shattered after that test, but it was a far more positive experience. I have no idea if I passed or not, but it was not the horrid sick depressive awful exam that the Naplex was for me. I finished with 3 minutes to spare only on this test, and there were a load of questions I knew the answer to without thinking about which saved me a lot of time, so you do want to sort of keep atleast half an eye on the watch towards the end of the exam. On that note I forgot to mention again you can bring cellphones, and wallets and so forth in to the building, as they will give you a place to store them whilst you sit the test - just make sure you turn your phone OFF completely, and not just to vibrate as it will still beep if someone leaves a voicemail, and they may take action for that. I should have the result of this test within 30 days, unless they are running an audit, and I shall finish this blog off with the results of my Naplex and CPJE before I move on. Good luck to you all, and I hope you have found this useful, Farmacyst Books You HAVE to have read: ABSOLUTELY MUST MUST MUST MUST READ: And you ABSOLUTELY MUST READ WEISSMAN LAW GUIDE (see previous blog for details on how to purchase) Books worth thinking about getting: