The UKCAT test has a lot of questions and not very long to complete them. How can I make sure I get through them all in the time allowed?

Time pressure is one of the hardest aspects of the UKCAT but luckily it is an aspect that you can train for.  Practicing questions under time pressure is very important.  Questions can be obtained from the UKCAT website or by purchasing a study guide online. 

The key word is triage (what they do in hospitals to work out who has the greatest need).  You need to triage the questions, ie, quickly decide if it is a question you a) know; b) think you may be able to work out if you have a few minutes; c) have no idea about.  It is the ones you think you may be able to work out in a few minutes that you need to be wary of as they can easily eat up lots of your time.

For these questions allow yourself 10-15 seconds to think about the question (don’t worry about the exact time but you should start to get a feel for when you have been on a question too long), then give it your best guess and flag the question.  When you have completed all of the questions go back through and review your flagged questions.

Do a few full practices for each section of the test and time yourself.  Try doing the first one as fast as possible then see how long it took (probable over the time limit).  For the second one aim to be faster.  For the third one stop when you get to the time limit.

Practice, practice, practice!!!