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What to Make Cards On

Keep it clinical

Malleus is a clinical medicine deck. Cards must be primarily of clinical relevance — content is targeted at clinical years, final-year exams, and internship. Detailed preclinical content (e.g. the enzymes of the Krebs cycle) will be rejected, even if it's high yield for preclinical students. Unsure? Get in touch.

Exception

When making cards from a dedicated resource (e.g. Talley & O'Connor's Clinical Examination), cards beyond the usual scope are acceptable on request — tag them with the Beyond_medical_school yield tag.

Stay in scope

We loosely base the deck's depth on the PassMedicine 'High-Yield' database — the level appropriate for a final-year medical student or intern. This stops the deck filling up with niche, specialty-college-level content. We've copied the PassMedicine topic list into this Google document so you don't need a subscription to check it.

Check it doesn't already exist

Before writing, search for existing cards three ways:

Test understanding, not memorisation

Write cards that test concepts, not isolated facts. Use clinical scenarios where possible, and follow two principles:

  • Minimum information — each card tests the smallest essential unit of knowledge. One fact per card.
  • Minimum cue — the question gives just enough information to trigger the answer, and no more. This is what makes recall transfer to the wards and exams.

Tip

Use the Extra field to briefly explain complex ideas, hold lower-yield detail that doesn't justify its own card, and link further resources (e.g. YouTube videos).