Short answer: Most people do well with 10 to 20 new cards a day, and a daily review that takes 15 to 30 minutes. Review due cards first, add new cards only after, and cut new cards when your queue grows. Consistency over weeks matters more than a heavy first week.
The arithmetic of a deck
Each new card returns many times. If you add 20 new cards a day for a month, you will have 600 cards, and each of them returns on the schedule you set. A typical card might be seen six to ten times before it is stable. So the daily review count grows with the deck, which surprises people in week three.
A rough planning rule, not a study result: the daily review time ends up around two to three times the time you spend on new cards. If you add 15 new cards a day and it takes you about 5 minutes, expect a daily total of 20 to 30 minutes once the deck has matured.
A sensible range
For someone working full time with 60 to 90 minutes of study on a good day, 10 to 15 new cards is a comfortable start. For someone with more time, 20 to 30 is possible. Fewer than 10 is also fine if your deck is small and focused. Past 30 new cards a day, quality usually drops because you are skimming.
The scheduler in Meddex flashcards caps how many new cards it adds to a session, which keeps the review queue from growing too quickly.
Order of work in a session
Do due cards first. They are the ones most at risk of being forgotten, and they pay back fastest. Then, if you have energy left, add new cards. If you do it the other way round, you will keep adding and never clear the backlog.
Stop when your concentration fades. Ten alert minutes beat thirty tired ones. If you find yourself tapping through without thinking, close the app and come back later.
How big should the deck be?
There is no single correct deck size. Think in terms of weeks. If your exam is ten weeks away and you can add 15 cards a day on five days a week, you will build about 750 cards. That is plenty for the facts that really need cards: drugs and doses, antidotes, normal values, isolation precautions, scoring criteria and a set of mnemonics.
If your list is growing past that, check whether you are making cards for things better handled by questions. A good guide is the syllabus by subject and your own results: make cards for what you keep missing.
Shift work, travel and tired days
Plan the low days in advance. On a night shift run or a travel day, set the target to review only. You can review 20 cards in the time it takes to queue for coffee. After a very heavy shift, skip new cards and do five minutes of reviews, so the habit survives.
Missing three days is not a crisis. Come back, clear the oldest due cards in a capped 20 minutes, and carry on. Cards you miss after a long gap return to a short interval, and the system sorts itself out.
As the exam gets close
In the last two weeks, stop adding broad new topics. Add cards only for facts that you got wrong in recent mocks. In the last week the aim is review, not expansion. In the final day or two, many candidates prefer a short, selective list of the cards they still miss. Meddex has a mode called Final Hour for this, aimed at the last hours before the exam; the post on last-hour revision covers what to include.
Three sample plans by time available
These examples are starting points. Change them after two weeks.
Fifteen minutes a day, which suits a heavy shift week: eight new cards a day on four days, reviews only on the other days. After a month the deck will be around 130 cards, and a typical review should take under ten minutes.
Thirty minutes a day, which suits a standard working week: twelve to fifteen new cards on five days a week, plus reviews every day. After ten weeks this gives roughly 600 to 750 cards, and by then daily review is likely to be 20 to 25 minutes.
Sixty minutes a day, for a candidate on leave: twenty to thirty new cards a day, but keep an eye on quality. If your correct-rate falls below about two-thirds on new cards, you are going too fast, and the next fortnight’s reviews will be painful.
Signs you are adding too many
Look for these warning signs in the first month.
- Your due queue grows two days in a row.
- You find yourself tapping through cards without trying to recall.
- You dread opening the app.
- More than a third of your reviews are wrong on a given day.
- You have stopped doing questions to make time for cards.
Cards are not the whole plan
Cards cover facts. The exam is mostly scenario questions that apply those facts, so cards should take a minority of your study time, perhaps a quarter. If cards are eating half your time, you are probably carding things that need understanding. Use the question bank for application, and let questions tell you what to card.
Two mistakes in the first fortnight
The first is front-loading. In an enthusiastic first week, some people add 60 cards a day. The reviews begin to land by day three and the queue is enormous by day ten. The fix is simple: cap new cards at a level you could keep up for a month, even when you feel like doing more.
The second is stopping after a bad week. You have a heavy rota, you miss six days, the queue looks scary, and you give up. Instead, treat the return as a restart. Clear the oldest cards for fifteen minutes a day, add no new ones for a few days and trust the schedule. Cards that you have not seen for a while are exactly the ones that benefit most from being reviewed.
A weekly check that takes five minutes
Every Sunday, note three numbers: how many cards you reviewed that week, what share you got right, and how many new cards you added. If the share right is falling while your new cards stay high, cut new cards by a third next week. If the share right is above 90 percent for two weeks and you have time, add a few more new cards, or make your cards harder by asking for more detail. Write the numbers in a notebook. After a month you will see how your pace relates to your retention, which is more useful than any general rule.
Catching up after a gap
After a week away, resist the urge to clear everything in one evening. Set a fixed twenty minutes, review the oldest due cards first and stop when the time is up. Tomorrow, repeat. Most of the backlog clears in three to five days this way. If it does not, delete cards you no longer need and be more careful with new ones.
The short version
Start with ten to fifteen new cards, do due cards first, cut new cards when the queue grows, keep sessions short and check your numbers weekly. Adjust to your own life.
Check whether it is working
After two weeks, look at how many cards you got right on the second and third review. If most are right, your cards are well written and your pace is fine. If many are wrong, either the cards are too long, or you are adding too many at once. Slow down, then rewrite the worst ten cards using the card-writing rules.
Frequently asked questions
This article is general educational guidance, not official advice. Exam rules, fees and timelines are set by the Dubai Health Authority and the test provider and can change, so always confirm the latest details on their official channels.
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