Core Revision
DRCOG Core Wisdom
Notes on the habits and the exam craft that separate a comfortable pass from a near miss. Not more facts — the reflexes that make the facts you already have score.
The DRCOG rewards a small number of behaviours far out of proportion to the time they take to learn. The first four are the ones we would give a colleague sitting in a fortnight: one reflex, one framework, one piece of exam craft, and one change to how you revise. Five more follow: two on the syllabus, two on reading the paper, and one on the rules that changed this year.
“Always do the pregnancy test”
Any woman of reproductive age with abdominal or pelvic pain gets a pregnancy test. Not if the history suggests it, not if she thinks she might be — always. The examiners use it as a discriminator, which makes it the most reliable mark-winner on the paper.
Read the note →Know the UK MEC categories cold
Contraception is the most predictable scoring area in the exam, because the UK Medical Eligibility Criteria give the examiners a framework to write against. Learn categories 1 to 4 properly and a whole family of questions becomes answerable.
Read the note →One 3-hour SBA paper — pace is everything
120 single best answers in three hours. No EMQs, no viva, no OSCE. That shape should change how you revise: breadth beats depth, because each topic gets only a handful of items and no one will ask you three questions about the same thing.
Read the note →Think in pathways, not diagnoses
Most candidates revise diagnoses. The DRCOG asks about actions — admit now, refer on the suspected cancer pathway, refer routinely, investigate, treat empirically, reassure and safety-net. Revise each topic by finishing the sentence “and therefore I would…”
Read the note →How to use these four
- Read all four in one sitting. They take under ten minutes together and they change how the rest of your revision lands.
- Take the reflex into clinic. Article one is a habit, not a fact — it sticks once you start spotting it in every practice stem you answer.
- Pair article two with the UK MEC decoder in Core Tools, then drill Module 1 in the question bank until the categories are automatic.
- Use article three to plan your mock. Sit a full 120-question paper against the clock in the consolidation week of your Core Calendar, not the night before.
- Re-read article four after every practice set. When you get one wrong, ask whether you missed the diagnosis or missed the action. They need different fixes.
More for the paper
Two longer pieces on the syllabus — the antenatal red flags the paper builds questions around, and what each of the seven modules asks of a GP — then two on how to read a stem and its options, and one on the guidance that moved in the last year.
Antenatal red flags: the ones the paper builds questions around
The DRCOG tests the GP’s part of antenatal care: the symptom that matters at this gestation, and the first action. A short list covers a lot of questions.
Read the note →Seven modules, one paper: what each one asks of a GP
Each of the seven DRCOG modules has a characteristic question and a characteristic first action. Know them all and no module catches you cold.
Read the note →Ninety seconds a question: how to read a DRCOG stem
Read the lead-in first, find the one detail that would change what a GP does next, answer, and move. The candidates who run out of time are the ones reading every stem twice.
Read the note →“Most appropriate next step”: the action words the paper uses
Next-step options are a ladder from reassure to 999. Find the detail that sets the rung and choose the rung — not the most thorough-sounding option.
Read the note →When the rule has just changed: five updates the paper can now ask about
Anti-D under 12 weeks, UKMEC 2025, folic acid and BMI, CA125 from 40, and NG257. The old version of each is now a distractor — and the paper knows it.
Read the note →Core Revision is an independent revision resource and is not affiliated with or endorsed by the RCOG.
The rest of the DRCOG toolkit
Every part of the DRCOG track, one click away. Work across them rather than through them — the guide explains it, the tools drill the decision, the bank tests it and the Compass tells you what is left.