PANRE Study Plan
The PANRE is a recertification exam, so this plan assumes a working clinical base and focuses on refreshing breadth, catching drift from current guidelines, and shoring up systems outside your day-to-day practice. Practice-heavy and flexible — compress or stretch the weeks to fit your schedule around work.
How to use this plan
- Lead with the systems you see least in practice — that's usually where recertifying PAs lose the most points.
- Daily: ~30–50 practice questions around your work schedule, read every explanation, and log what you miss.
- Use questions to surface guideline drift — first-line therapies and screening intervals change, so trust the current explanation over memory.
- Finish each week with a short timed, mixed block, and use analytics to keep steering time toward weak systems.
The 4-week refresh schedule
Week 1 · Cardiovascular + Pulmonary
Refresh guideline-driven care: hypertension targets and first-line agents, heart failure therapy, arrhythmias; asthma/COPD step-up, pneumonia, and PE workup.
Week 2 · GI + Renal/GU + Endocrine
GI bleed, IBD, hepatobiliary; AKI vs CKD, electrolytes, acid–base; diabetes, thyroid, and adrenal disorders with current first-line treatment.
Week 3 · MSK + Neuro + Derm + EENT
The acute joint, fractures, low back pain; stroke, seizures, headache; common rashes and skin-cancer recognition; high-yield eye/ENT complaints.
Week 4 · Psych + ID + Repro + weak systems
DSM-5 criteria and psychopharmacology; sepsis, antibiotics, STIs; contraception and prevention. Then circle back to your two weakest systems from analytics and simulate with timed, mixed blocks.
Common mistakes to avoid
- Studying the systems you already practice daily while neglecting the ones you rarely see.
- Trusting memory on first-line therapy and screening intervals instead of confirming current guidelines.
- Reading review books passively rather than testing yourself with questions.
- Skipping timed, mixed practice until the final days.
- Underestimating breadth — the PANRE spans the whole blueprint, not just your specialty.
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Start studying free → Browse the outlinesEducational use only. This outline is a study aid for PA students and is not medical advice or a substitute for clinical judgment. FirstPassPA is an independent study tool and is not affiliated with, endorsed by, or sponsored by NCCPA. PANCE® and PANRE® are registered trademarks of the National Commission on Certification of Physician Assistants.