This workflow is for a psychiatry trainee using PassMRCPsych as their primary Paper B question bank and wanting a disciplined first-pass, review and exit plan. PassMRCPsych genuinely covers Paper B, including a statistics course for the critical-review third and full-length mocks. Its principal limitation is the one shared by every single bank: once you have seen its items, it can no longer measure you. The fix is to reserve an unseen pool from the start.
What PassMRCPsych offers right now (vendor-reported, 20 July 2026)
| Item | Vendor-reported detail |
|---|---|
| Exams covered | Paper A, Paper B, CASC (via a separate SimFlow.ai simulator) and a Statistics course |
| Paper B price | £99 (3 months) or £149 (6 months) |
| Statistics course | £49 (6 months), sold separately |
| Question bank | A large peer-reviewed MCQ bank (vendor cites "5,000+" platform-wide and "the largest in the field"); confirm the Paper-B-specific count on the product page |
| Other content | 19+ hours of audio lessons, revision notes aligned to the 2023 RCPsych syllabus, custom quizzes, and five full-length mocks of 150 questions each |
| Currency | Content updated twice a year; curated by consultants and trainees |
| Adaptive/AI | No general adaptive engine reported; AI is confined to the separate CASC simulator |
Verify all figures on passmrcpsych.com before purchase, and note the number that matters most: whatever the platform-wide total, the useful figure is the count of unseen Paper B items you can hold back for measurement.
The exam anchor: MRCPsych Paper B
Paper B is approximately 150 questions in three hours, computer-based at Pearson VUE, mixing single-best-answer MCQs and extended-matching items in roughly a two-thirds to one-third ratio; confirm the current count on rcpsych.ac.uk. It combines a large clinical block with a critical-review block — research methods, epidemiology and statistics — that makes up around a third of the paper. The CASC is a separate OSCE-style exam; PassMRCPsych addresses it through a distinct AI simulator, and neither that simulator nor any Paper B bank should blur the two in your plan. Distinguish official requirements (set only by the Royal College) from vendor claims about coverage: the syllabus is the standard, and the bank is one route to it.
Assign one job per feature
PassMRCPsych bundles several modalities, so give each a single job to avoid four passive re-reads of the same material. The audio lessons are for first exposure to weak topics, not for revision on repeat. The revision notes are a reference to consult after an error, not to transcribe. The question bank is for retrieval and breadth. The statistics course owns the critical-review third — treat it as the single most important non-clinical investment. The mocks are assessment assets, to be spent deliberately under timed conditions, not casually browsed.
Build a blueprint inventory and protect an unseen pool
Before your first block, lay the RCPsych syllabus out as a matrix: each clinical domain and each critical-review topic as its own row. This is your coverage map, and completion of the bank is not the same as filling it. Then ring-fence a protected pool — for example, hold back the five full-length mocks and a slice of unseen items — so that late in your revision you still have questions the bank has never shown you. Consuming every item early feels thorough but leaves you with nothing to measure against in the final fortnight, which is precisely when you need an honest reading.
First pass: mixed by default, topic-filtered only where weak
Start mixed. Topic-filtered blocks are comfortable but they cue the answer — you know a question in the "psychopharmacology" set is about psychopharmacology, which flatters your recall. Reserve topic filtering for the two or three domains where your blueprint inventory shows genuinely weak foundations; there, a focused first pass with the audio lessons and notes is justified. Everywhere else, mixed blocks from the outset build the retrieval and discrimination the real paper demands.
Review each miss with an error code, not a transcript
Copying an entire explanation into your notes feels like learning and mostly is not. Instead, tag each miss with a short error code — knowledge gap, misread stem, confused two conditions, statistical slip, careless — and write one corrective action. A "confused two conditions" error earns a two-line discrimination note; a "statistical slip" sends you to the relevant statistics-course segment. This turns review into a small number of specific fixes rather than a wall of transcription you will never reread.
Transfer practice before repetition
Before you re-answer a question you got wrong, answer a different item testing the same principle. If you missed a question on lithium monitoring, do a fresh item on therapeutic drug monitoring rather than re-reading the original — repeating the same stem tests recognition, not understanding. iatroX is useful here precisely because it supplies unseen items on the same principle, letting you check transfer rather than memory of a specific question.
When to switch to mixed timed blocks
Switch to fully mixed, timed blocks once each domain in your inventory clears its floor — even if you have not "finished" the bank. Completion is not the trigger; domain-floor coverage is. Most candidates switch too late, grinding new topics when they should be rehearsing performance under the clock. Once you are in the mixed-block phase, your job is pace and stamina, not acquisition.
Exit criteria (not 100% completion)
You are ready to stop when five things are true, and none of them is "I finished the bank": your blueprint inventory has no blank rows; your accuracy on unseen, timed items is stable and above your floor across domains; your pace holds around seventy seconds a question; your critical-review subscore has risen to match your clinical subscore; and your performance on official Royal College sample material calibrates with your bank scores. Hitting 100% completion while any of these is unmet means you have exhausted the bank, not passed the exam.
A seven-day plan for a busy trainee
For a trainee revising around clinical work, using PassMRCPsych for one defined job and iatroX for unseen transfer practice, with no claim to any proprietary algorithm:
- Day 1: a 40-question mixed PassMRCPsych block; tag every miss with an error code.
- Day 2: one statistics-course segment plus ten critical-review questions — protect this slot, it is the highest-leverage half-hour of the week.
- Day 3: audio lesson on your single weakest clinical domain, then a short topic set to test it.
- Day 4: a 40-question mixed block; compare error codes with Day 1 to see which fixes held.
- Day 5: iatroX unseen block on the principles you missed earlier in the week — transfer practice, not repetition.
- Day 6: rest or light review of your error-code log only.
- Day 7: one timed half-mock under exam conditions; review by error code, not by transcript.
Decision checklist: continue, supplement, switch or stop
- Continue if PassMRCPsych is clearing your weak domains and you still hold a protected unseen pool.
- Supplement with a dedicated unseen-measurement bank (iatroX) if you can no longer tell a real gain from familiarity with seen items, and with extra critical-review practice if statistics remains your floor.
- Switch the emphasis to timed mixed mocks once domain floors are met, rather than opening new topics.
- Stop doing new questions when your exit criteria are met; move to consolidation and official sample calibration.
Frequently asked questions
Is PassMRCPsych enough for MRCPsych Paper B on its own? For many candidates it is a strong single primary resource, because it pairs a large clinical bank with audio teaching, mocks and a dedicated statistics course for the critical-review third. It becomes insufficient in one specific way: once you have worked through its items, it can no longer give you an unseen reading, so pair it with the official Royal College sample material for calibration and with a reserved unseen pool (your own or a second bank) for honest measurement near the exam.
Which MRCPsych Paper B component does PassMRCPsych not reproduce well? Its weakest reproduction is unseen, mixed, timed critical-review reasoning under pressure. The statistics course teaches the concepts well, but teaching is not measurement, and it is easy to feel fluent on familiar worked examples while still faltering on a novel forest plot in the real paper. Separately, PassMRCPsych is not a Paper B substitute for the CASC — its CASC support is a distinct simulator, and the clinical exam should stay out of your Paper B plan.
How many PassMRCPsych questions should I complete per day for MRCPsych Paper B? It depends on your weeks to the exam, but tie the number to protecting an unseen pool rather than to a completion target: 40 to 60 mixed questions a day in the acquisition phase is a sustainable figure for a working trainee, dropping as you move into timed mocks. The daily count matters far less than reviewing every miss by error code and holding back enough unseen items to measure yourself in the final fortnight.
When should I stop using PassMRCPsych and move to mixed mocks? Move to timed mixed mocks once each blueprint domain clears its floor, typically about three to four weeks out, even if the bank is not "finished." Continuing to open new PassMRCPsych topics late in your preparation trades performance rehearsal for the comfort of acquisition. Keep the platform's five full-length mocks and any reserved unseen items for this phase, spending them deliberately under exam conditions rather than casually.
How should I combine PassMRCPsych with iatroX without duplicating practice? Give them non-overlapping jobs under the two-Q-bank rule: PassMRCPsych is your learn-and-first-pass bank with teaching and statistics, and iatroX is your unseen measurement and spaced-retrieval layer. Never re-answer a PassMRCPsych item in iatroX or vice versa; instead, when you miss a PassMRCPsych question, use iatroX for a fresh item on the same principle to test transfer. That keeps one bank as a clean, uncontaminated measuring instrument while the other does the teaching.
Editorial notes and references
Written by Dr Kolawole Tytler, NHS GP and founder of iatroX. Last checked 20 July 2026. Product figures (question counts, prices, access periods and features) are vendor-reported and change frequently; verify each on the provider's own page before you rely on it. Disclosure: iatroX operates a competing MRCPsych Paper B question bank; its role in this article is confined to the job PassMRCPsych does not claim — unseen, blueprint-stratified measurement and transfer practice — not to a claim of superiority. UK medicines facts should be taken from the SmPC/eMC and the Maudsley Prescribing Guidelines. Corrections are welcome via the feedback route on iatrox.com.
References: Royal College of Psychiatrists — preparing for exams and Papers A and B marking scheme (rcpsych.ac.uk); PassMRCPsych Paper B (passmrcpsych.com/mrcpsych-paper-b); iatroX MRCPsych Paper B bank (iatrox.com/mrcpsych-paper-b); the iatroX comparison hub; the two-Q-bank rule framework pillar; and the Your Q-Bank Percentage Is Not Your Exam Score explainer.