First Aid for the USMLE Step 1 is a long-running review book published by McGraw Hill. Students typically use it as a fact outline to organize and revisit what they learn from videos and questions. This page explains how it is used; confirm the current edition and contents with the publisher.
What it is for
- A review outline, not a first-pass textbook. It is built to condense material you have already met.
- A place to collect annotations. Many students add notes from question explanations to the matching page.
- A common reference point. Other resources often tie their content to it. For example, McGraw Hill states that Boards and Beyond lists First Aid page numbers in its videos.
Using it well
- Match the edition to your exam year, and check that the content still fits the official content outline.
- Use it with a question bank such as UWorld: do questions, then fill gaps in the book.
- Do not memorize it alone. USMLE items are clinical vignettes, so practice applying facts, not only recalling them.
- Treat it as one resource among several. See study resources compared.
Our study books page lists other books grouped by Step; see the USMLE Step 1 guide for the exam itself. First Aid's publisher and USMLE WEB are not affiliated with each other, and book contents change from one edition to the next.