Dr. Apoorva Sehgal has secured Rank 47 in NEET PG 2017 which was held in December 2016. She has done her MBBS from Maulana Azad Medical College, Delhi.
Interview
Q. In what year did you pass out your MBBS (Completion of Internship)?
Ans. December, 2015
Q. What were your MBBS percentage marks (aggregate or final year)?
Ans. 64%
Q. What ranks had you secured in any previous PG medical entrance exams you gave?
Ans. JIPMER rank 13, PGI rank 74, AIIMS rank 106 and previously July DNB rank 205, May PGI rank 173 and NEET 2015 rank 18k.
Q. Could you please tell us something about yourself?
Ans. I’m Apoorva Sehgal from Faridabad. Did my schooling from APJ school and MBBS from Maulana Azad medical college.
Q. What is the secret of your success?
Ans. Hard work, consistency, immense support from family and friends and above all self-belief. To keep oneself motivated is the biggest challenge, being around my family helped me overcome that.
Q. How was your internship?
Ans. Internship in M is quite hectic. I could barely manage a couple of subjects with my internship schedule
Q. When did you seriously start preparing for the entrance exam?
Ans. January 2016
Q. How many hours did you study each day? How long do you think students need to prepare for cracking PG medical entrance exams?
Ans. For someone like me, 10-12 hours of focussed preparation for 8-10 months is what it takes to crack these exams
Q. Which books did you read for the theory part?
Ans. Theory books are to be read during MBBS. During pg preparation, I only used the standard textbooks for reference. Most important ones being Grays, Robbins, KDT and Parks
Q. Which books did you read for the MCQs? Which MCQ books were the most productive and which were least?
Ans. I found dams notes and Devesh Sir’s notes most high yielding. Amongst the guide books Rebecca ma’am’s book for biochemistry, pharmacology, and pathology by Gobind Garg and Sparsh Gupta, Forensic by Sumit Seth, microbiology by Apurba Sastry were very useful. For the remaining subjects, Arvind Arora was my rescue option.
Q. Which subjects did you focus on?
Ans. Every subject is important. Focus more on subjects which are volatile. I personally focussed more on 1st and 2nd-year subjects along with PSM and short subjects.
Q. What were your study methods? How many revisions did you do for each subject? Did you make any changes in your study methods in your recent attempts?
Ans. I did 2 complete revisions of the entire syllabus which means 3 readings. Besides that, I had a small notepad of all the volatile topics, value based MCQs and facts so I kept revising them every time I took a break. I studied with a friend in the final days, the discussion really helped me. Practicing MCQs is very important, it breaks the monotony and makes you feel confident about your preparation.
Q. Did you do any special preparation for image-based questions?
Ans. I just did the DAMS dvt and Devesh sir’s updates for images.
Q. What was your strategy for the exam day? How many questions did you attempt and why? How many do you think you got correct?
Ans. “Having a good sleep the day before the exam and proper breakfast in the morning is most important. Be calm, MCQs focused and confident.
I attempted all questions in NEET. Can’t say about how many I got correct. For AIIMS I attempted 193 questions which were a decent attempt but I committed many silly mistakes which took a toll on my rank. For JIPMER I attempted 245. ”
Q. Do think there should be a different strategy for preparation of different entrance exams like AIIMS-PG, PGI and DNB CET?
Ans. For PGI subjects like biochem, micro and surgery are more important and solving Manoj Chaudhary really helps. For NEET named signs and value based MCQs should be focussed on. Having said that the basic preparation remains the same for all exams.
Q. Did you join any classes or test series? Was it useful?
Ans. I joined dams tnd in my drop year and foundation course in third year. Extremely useful
Q. Who or what influenced you to take up Medicine?
Ans. “It was my grand parents dream to have a doctor in the family. That was my driving force. I’m
the first and probably the only doctor in my family. ”
Q. In which field do you want to specialize in? Why?
Ans. I’m considering Radiology because it’s an interesting branch with substantial work and at the same time will give me the lifestyle I want.
Q. What seat have you been allotted in counseling? Did you join?
Ans. I joined Dermatology in JIPMER. Worked there for 20 days and then resigned.
Q. What is your advice to future aspirants?
Ans. Just be confident and motivated. Have faith in your abilities and keep going no matter what.
Q. Indian PG entrances are highly competitive, so to crack them students end up in appearing for multiple PG exams with some of them having the same exam with different slots and papers, please extend your views on this and their pros and cons of appearing in multiple PG entrances.
Ans. Giving multiple exams does increase your likelihood of cracking an exam but beyond a point it’s exhausting and gets futile. So I think giving all exams is important but different slots for the same exam is useless.
We are ending this interview with our hearty congratulations and best wishes for future to this talented person, Dr. Apoorva Sehgal.
