This is for early-career dentists preparing for MFDS Part 1 who own, or are considering, Pastest's dentistry bank and want to build real recall rather than a memory of the questions. It addresses the single-best-answer written examination. The principal limitation is one of scope: Pastest's dentistry bank is shared across Finals, MFDS, MJDF and ORE, so you must actively map it to the MFDS Part 1 blueprint and protect a pool of unseen items, or completion will quietly become recognition.
What Pastest offers for MFDS Part 1 right now
Pastest sells one dentistry product that spans several exams rather than an MFDS Part 1-only bank. The figures below are vendor-reported and last checked 20 July 2026; confirm the current count and price on pastest.com before you buy.
| Feature | What we found (20 July 2026, vendor-reported) |
|---|---|
| Question volume | 1,000+ questions; 700+ SBA explanations |
| Exam scope | Shared dentistry bank: Finals, MFDS, MJDF and ORE—not MFDS Part 1-exclusive |
| Access/pricing | 12 months £99.99; 6 months £79.99; 3 months £69.99; 48-hour free trial |
| Analytics | Real-time progress and performance insights |
| AI | "Tutor mode": on-demand AI support while answering |
| Extras | Digital textbook, audio content, mobile app |
The honest note first: because the bank is shared across dental exams, its headline total is not an MFDS Part 1 count. Some items will be Finals-level, some ORE-oriented, some squarely MFDS. That is not a flaw—breadth is useful—but it means you cannot treat "finished the bank" as "covered the blueprint". iatroX serves the same written-knowledge layer and can act as your independent unseen measurement bank; the two work best with clearly separated jobs. As with any UK dental revision, medicines facts should come from the SmPC/eMC and dental prescribing guidance such as SDCEP—never an informal drug-formulary shorthand.
The MFDS Part 1 exam anchor
MFDS Part 1 is a computer-based single-best-answer paper testing the knowledge and applied clinical reasoning that underpin direct patient care. The Royal College of Surgeons of Edinburgh lists the current format as 180 single-best-answer questions over 3 hours in a single online paper (verified on services.rcsed.ac.uk, 20 July 2026); because MFDS is offered by more than one faculty, confirm the count and duration for your own diet on rcseng.ac.uk, rcsed.ac.uk or rcpsg.ac.uk. The syllabus spans the clinical dental sciences—oral medicine and pathology, restorative dentistry, oral surgery, paediatric dentistry, periodontology, pharmacology and therapeutics, and law, ethics and evidence. Map your Pastest practice onto those domains rather than onto the bank's own topic list.
Build a blueprint inventory and protect an unseen pool
Start by turning the syllabus into a one-page inventory: every domain as a row, with a target proportion of your practice beside it. Then, before you begin grinding, ring-fence a protected pool of questions you will not touch until the final fortnight—your unseen timed-mock reserve. If you answer every item as you go, you will have nothing left to measure yourself on when it matters. Because Pastest's bank is shared across exams, tag or filter for the MFDS-relevant material as you build the inventory, and note which domains the bank covers thinly so you can fill them elsewhere.
First pass: mixed by default, topic-filtered only where weak
Resist the urge to work through the bank topic by topic from the start. Topic-filtered blocks cue you to the answer—if every question is about periodontology, you stop having to recognise that a case is periodontal. Start mixed, so each item forces a fresh diagnostic decision. Reserve topic-filtered blocks for the genuine foundations where you are weak and need to build before you can be tested. The moment a weak domain reaches a basic floor, fold it back into the mixed pool.
Review each miss with an error code, not a transcript
Do not copy the whole explanation into your notes; that is transcription, not learning. For each miss, assign a short error code and one corrective action. Codes might be: knowledge gap (didn't know the fact), reasoning error (knew the facts, misweighted them), misread (missed a stem detail), or recall-only (recognised the question, not the concept). One action follows each: a fact to space-repeat, a rule to re-derive, a stem-reading habit to drill. This keeps review fast and turns misses into behaviours rather than paragraphs.
Use transfer practice before repeating an item
When you get something wrong, do not immediately re-answer the same question—you will only learn its shape. Instead, find or generate a new item that tests the same principle in a different presentation, and answer that first. Only later, and spaced out, should the original resurface. Transfer practice is what converts a bank into durable recall; repetition of the identical stem converts it into recognition that evaporates when the wording changes in the real exam.
Switch to mixed timed blocks when domain floors are met
You do not need to finish the bank before you start testing under exam conditions. Once each domain has cleared its basic floor, move to mixed, timed blocks even if large parts of the bank remain unanswered—drawn from your protected unseen pool or from a second bank. Completion is not the goal; calibrated, timed performance across the blueprint is. A trainee who has answered 60% of the bank but performs steadily on timed mixed mocks is in better shape than one who has "finished" by drilling filtered blocks.
Exit criteria
You are ready when five things hold, and none of them is "100% complete": coverage across every syllabus domain to at least a floor; steady first-attempt accuracy on unseen, timed, mixed blocks; pacing that leaves you finishing the paper comfortably; retention, shown by spaced misses staying corrected; and calibration against official material, so your self-assessment matches how you actually score. Chasing full completion after these are met adds recognition, not readiness.
A seven-day plan for early-career dentists
Give Pastest one job—structured practice with its explanations and tutor mode—and iatroX one job—independent, unseen measurement. No proprietary-algorithm claims are needed; the loop is test, code the misses, space them, and re-measure on fresh items.
- Day 1: Mixed 30-item Pastest block; code every miss; queue two weak domains.
- Day 2: Topic-filtered repair on the weakest domain only; then 15 mixed items to re-integrate.
- Day 3: Fresh, timed 30-item MFDS Part 1 block in iatroX as an unseen check; record first-attempt accuracy.
- Day 4: Transfer practice on Day 1–3 misses—new items on the same principles, not the originals.
- Day 5: Mixed timed Pastest block at exam pace; log pacing and any recurrent error code.
- Day 6: Second unseen iatroX block on a different domain mix; compare error types, not wording.
- Day 7: Spaced review of the week's misses; update the blueprint inventory; set next week's floors.
Decision checklist: continue, supplement, switch or stop
- Continue with Pastest if coverage is filling in and your error codes are shifting from knowledge gaps toward the occasional reasoning slip.
- Supplement with an independent unseen bank once your Pastest percentages are high but resting on repeats—familiarity flatters a shared bank you have half-memorised.
- Switch to mixed timed mocks as your primary measure once filtered-block accuracy plateaus and pacing, not knowledge, becomes the limiting factor.
- Stop buying more volume when the binding constraint is coverage of thin domains or calibration, not a shortage of questions.
Bottom line
Pastest's dentistry bank is a strong, well-explained resource for MFDS Part 1, but it is shared across dental exams, so the discipline is yours: map it to the blueprint, protect an unseen pool, review by error code, and practise transfer rather than repetition. Use iatroX for the independent, unseen, timed check that tells you whether your recall survives new wording—not the bank you have already seen.
Frequently asked questions
Is Pastest enough for MFDS Part 1 on its own? It can carry most of the written preparation, given its 1,000+ dentistry questions and explanations (vendor-reported, 20 July 2026), but two cautions apply: the bank is shared across Finals, MFDS, MJDF and ORE, so you must map it to the MFDS Part 1 blueprint yourself, and you should keep a second source of unseen questions near the exam so familiarity does not inflate your scores.
Which MFDS Part 1 component does Pastest not reproduce well? MFDS Part 1 is a single written SBA paper, so there is no separate clinical component to miss—but the relevant gap is that a shared bank may under-cover some MFDS-specific domains, particularly UK law, ethics and evidence-based dentistry. Check those domains against official material rather than assuming the bank's breadth covers them.
How many Pastest questions should I complete per day for MFDS Part 1? There is no fixed number; disciplined review beats volume. Many candidates sustain around 30–40 well-reviewed questions on a working day, with at least one timed mixed block each week. If you cannot properly code and space your misses, you are answering too many—cut the count and deepen the review.
When should I stop using Pastest and move to mixed mocks? When each domain has cleared its floor and your gains are coming from repeats rather than new items. At that point a timed, mixed, unseen mock is the more informative test; keep Pastest for targeted repair of the specific gaps each mock reveals rather than for more filtered drilling.
How should I combine Pastest with iatroX without duplicating practice? Separate their jobs. Use Pastest for structured practice, its explanations and tutor mode; use iatroX for a fresh, unseen, timed block that independently measures first-attempt recall. Compare the error type across the two—knowledge, reasoning or misreading—rather than re-answering the same questions in both, which only rehearses recognition.
Editorial notes and references
Written by Dr Kolawole Tytler, NHS GP and founder of iatroX. Last checked 20 July 2026. Platform figures (question counts, features, pricing) are vendor-reported and change without notice—verify the live details on pastest.com, and confirm the MFDS Part 1 format for your faculty on rcsed.ac.uk, rcseng.ac.uk or rcpsg.ac.uk. Disclosure: iatroX operates a UK question bank that competes with Pastest for the MFDS Part 1 written layer; this article confines iatroX's role to independent unseen measurement of the SBA knowledge component. Corrections are welcome via the feedback route on iatrox.com.
References: Royal College of Surgeons of Edinburgh MFDS Part 1 exam details and the RCS England / RCPSG MFDS regulations and syllabus (rcsed.ac.uk; rcseng.ac.uk; rcpsg.ac.uk); Pastest dentistry product page (pastest.com); iatroX, Your Q-Bank Percentage Is Not Your Exam Score; iatroX, the two-Q-bank rule; the iatroX comparison hub.