Behind The Knife: The Surgery Podcast

Oral Board Simulator: Your Secret Weapon to DOMINATING the Exam

Oct 30, 2025
Guest
Matthew Swenson
Matthew Swenson, a general surgeon and Air Force veteran, discusses his groundbreaking oral board simulator, designed to revolutionize exam preparation. He shares how massive community feedback has fine-tuned technical features, improving user experience. The simulator now boasts a more accurate readiness score and 20 diverse examiner voices, simulating real test scenarios. Exciting new features—like the Coach, OpGuide, and Wingman—equip users with tailored support, making training more interactive and effective. Swenson emphasizes the importance of comprehensive clinical thinking in board exams.
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INSIGHT

Fine-Tuning Fixed Examiner Oddities

  • The simulator improved by fine-tuning the LLM using user feedback to make examiner behavior more realistic.
  • Extensive instruction expansion required model specialization to follow complex examiner scripts reliably.
ADVICE

Measure Readiness By Breadth, Not Just Score

  • Track both your performance and coverage across the 362 testable topics to gauge true readiness.
  • Do many varied tests, not just repeat high scores on a few topics, to raise your readiness score.
ADVICE

Train With Diverse Examiner Voices

  • Practice with multiple examiner voices to prepare for different speaking styles on test day.
  • Use the simulator's 20 voice variants to expose yourself to fast, slow, and accented examiners.
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