What's new
Updates and improvements
Everything we've shipped to BoardPal, newest first.
Sep 15 to 21 · 21 updates
21Sep · Mon
START triage diagram fixed, plus fixes from your reports
FixedImprovedNew- Fixed
The START triage diagram now says yes where it said no, and shows that a casualty who breathes once the airway is opened is tagged red. more ▾less ▴
A student spotted a mistake in the START triage diagram on the Critical Care & Emergency cram sheet, and she was right. The arrow leading on from the question of whether the casualty is breathing said no where it should have said yes: a casualty who is breathing moves on to the breathing-rate check. While checking it we found a second gap in the same step. A casualty who is not breathing but starts to breathe once you open the airway is tagged red, immediate, and the diagram did not show that. It now has its own red branch, and the written START steps on the next page say the same. Nothing was re-paginated, so every highlight and note you have made on this sheet is exactly where you left it.
- Fixed
A wound irrigation question no longer marks a protective gown as wrong for a procedure expected to splash. more ▾less ▴
A question about wound irrigation asked what the nurse should wear besides gloves, and marked a fluid-resistant gown as the wrong choice. A student pointed out that a splash can reach the body and clothes too, and she was right: standard precautions call for a gown whenever a splash is expected, as well as protection for the eyes, nose and mouth. Another question in our own bank already taught exactly that. The question now says the nurse has already put on gloves and a gown, and asks what else is needed before starting. The correct answer did not move, so your past attempts and topic scores are unaffected.
- Improved
A GTPAL explanation now says plainly that an ongoing pregnancy counts only toward gravida, never toward L. more ▾less ▴
A student asked whether a pregnancy still in progress counts as a living child in GTPAL. It does not: an ongoing pregnancy counts only toward gravida, and the L counts only children who have already been born and are alive. The explanation on that question said the first half but not the second, so we added it.
- New
A new flashcard asks you to recall the three classic features of endometriosis. more ▾less ▴
The Reproductive Systems & Menstrual Cycle flashcard deck has a new card that asks you to recall the classic triad of endometriosis: progressive secondary dysmenorrhea, deep dyspareunia and infertility. The deck already asked you to name the condition from the triad; a student suggested practising it the other way round as well.
Magnesium sulfate figure fixed and 5 reported questions
Fixed- Fixed
A student caught our magnesium sulfate sheets giving the infusion-toxicity number where the before-every-dose number belongs. Corrected on three sheets, with your highlights untouched. more ▾less ▴
A student wrote in to question one line on the Labs, Fluids & Electrolytes sheet, and he was right. Under the box headed "check BEFORE every dose", three of our cram sheets gave the respiratory rate as at least 12 a minute. That is the figure that tells you a magnesium infusion has begun to depress breathing and must be stopped. The figure for the check you make before giving a dose is higher: the manufacturer's prescribing information puts it at about 16 breaths a minute or more, alongside a knee-jerk reflex you can still elicit and adequate urine output. The two are different questions and our sheets had run them together. We corrected it on Labs, Fluids & Electrolytes, Antepartum and Intrapartum, on five pages in all, and we retitled the magnesium toxicity illustration on the Antepartum sheet so it no longer describes itself as the before-every-dose check. Both numbers now appear, each labelled with the moment it belongs to. Nothing was re-paginated, so every highlight and note you have made on these sheets is exactly where you left it.
- Fixed
Five reported questions repaired, including one tuberculosis question that had two defensible answers. No correct answer moved. more ▾less ▴
Five questions were repaired after students reported them. A tuberculosis question had two statements that both needed correcting, so there was no single right answer; the option about rifampicin turning urine and tears reddish-orange now says what is actually true, which is that the color is expected and harmless and no reason to hold the drug. A question about pain relief after gallbladder surgery asked about a "return visit" that the scenario never described, and now says plainly that the nurse comes back to the bedside. A question about a client on warfarin had a sentence that left it unclear whether the client or the nurse held a belief, and has been rewritten as two plain sentences. An explanation about negligence and what a nurse could have foreseen was rewritten in much plainer language. And an explanation of Freud's parts of the personality now sets out the order they form in and the job each one does, instead of repeating the answer choices back. No correct answer moved on any of them, so your past attempts and topic scores are unaffected.
A way straight back to your practice set from a cram sheet
New- New
Open a cram sheet from a practice question or flashcard and a Back to practice button takes you straight back to your set. more ▾less ▴
After you answer a practice question, the Read the cram sheet button under the explanation takes you to the sheet for that topic. Until now the sheet had no way back to your questions, so it could feel like your set was gone. Now, when you arrive that way, a gold Back to practice button floats at the bottom left of the sheet. Tap it and you return to the same set, right at your next unanswered question, with every answer you already gave still saved. The same goes for flashcards: open a cram sheet from under a card and you get a Back to flashcards button. If you open a sheet from the Resources page as usual, nothing changes.
Undo a crossed-out option; correct answer marked
FixedImproved- Fixed
Tap a crossed-out option to bring it back. It no longer goes dead after an accidental cross-out. more ▾less ▴
When you cross out an answer option with the small x beside it, that option used to stop responding completely, and the only way to get it back was to tap the same small x again. If you crossed one out by accident, it could look like the question would not let you answer. Now you can simply tap the crossed-out option itself and it comes back. That first tap only brings it back and does not choose it, so a slip never records an answer; tap it once more to select it. This works the same way in practice sessions, mock boards, the diagnostic exam and warm-ups.
- Improved
In explanations that walk through every option, the correct one now carries a check mark and a Correct answer label. more ▾less ▴
Some of our newer explanations go through all four options one by one, A to D, and the correct option sat in that list looking exactly like the wrong ones, which made it read as if the right answer was being called wrong. The correct option in that list now has a check mark and a small Correct answer label. We checked the rule against all 11,930 questions in the bank: it marks exactly one option on each of the 381 explanations written this way, always the true answer, and changes nothing on the rest. From a student who sent us a screenshot.
- Improved
5,790 flashcards that were already scheduled too far away have been moved closer. more ▾less ▴
A follow-up to the flashcard change earlier today: cards that had already been scheduled too far away have been moved closer, to the date the new rule would have given them. That covered 5,790 cards for 228 students. Nothing else about those cards changed, and no card was pushed later. No card in BoardPal now waits more than six months.
Exam-aware flashcards, focus mode and resizable tapes
ImprovedNewFixed- Improved
No flashcard waits longer than half the days left until your exam, so every card comes back before exam day. more ▾less ▴
Flashcards now schedule around your exam date. Until today a card you knew well could be sent 7 or even 11 months away after you tapped Good or Easy, which for most of you is after the board exam, so that card would never have come back before the day you needed it. From now on the longest any card can wait is half the days left until your exam, and that limit is worked out again every time you rate a card. A student whose exam is 150 days away will see a strong card again within about 75 days, then within about 37, and so on, so everything you have learned comes back for a last look before the exam. This is the same rule the people who maintain Anki's scheduler recommend for anyone studying toward a fixed exam date. Nothing else about the scheduling changed: new cards, cards you miss, and cards that are still young behave exactly as before, and the time printed on each button is still the real time that button will set. If you have not set an exam date yet, the longest wait is 90 days. Cards that were already scheduled far out keep their current date until the next time you rate them. From a student who noticed the waits made no sense for someone taking the boards in five or six months.
- New
A Focus button on flashcards and practice hides the menu and heading, and enlarges flashcard text. more ▾less ▴
Focus mode for flashcards and practice questions. Tap the new Focus button (the arrows icon beside Scratch pad) and the menu bar and the page heading disappear, so only your card or your question is on screen. On flashcards the text also gets much larger, which makes it readable from further away, for example with a tablet propped up on a desk. On a computer or an Android device it also switches the browser to full screen. Tap Exit focus to bring everything back. It stays on while you keep going through sets in the same tab, and it never follows you to other pages. From a student studying on a tablet.
- Improved
Tap a recall tape, then drag a corner handle to resize it so it covers only what you want hidden. more ▾less ▴
Recall tapes on cram sheets can now be resized. Tap a tape to peek under it and two round handles appear on its corners: drag one until the tape covers exactly the words you want hidden and nothing on the line above or below. Undo works on a resize too. A quick swipe across a line also makes a slightly thinner tape than before, so it is less likely to cover the neighbouring lines in the first place. From a student who found tapes covering more than they meant to.
- Fixed
Text on a study plan calendar entry no longer runs outside its box. more ▾less ▴
On the study plan calendar, a mock board entry that shows a small Day 1 done check could let that text run past the edge of its box in the week view. The text now wraps inside the box at every screen size. We also built a checker that opens 18 pages of the app at phone, tablet and computer widths and measures whether any text sits outside the box drawn around it; it found nothing else, and it will be run again before future updates.
- Fixed
20Sep · Sun
133 practice questions rewritten to read more like the board exam
ImprovedFixed- Improved
133 practice questions rewritten across 24 topics: shorter scenes, four believable options, and explanations that give you the principle. more ▾less ▴
133 practice questions have been rewritten across 24 topics: the eye and critical care neurology, mental health nursing, respiratory care, and acute neurologic conditions such as raised pressure in the head, stroke, seizures and spinal cord injury. These were questions our own review had marked as wordy, or as asking something another question in the bank already asked. Three things changed in each one. The scene is shorter, so you spend your time thinking instead of reading (the middle question went from 344 characters to 214, and 130 of the 133 came out shorter). All four options are now written to look possible, so you cannot arrive at the answer by crossing off the obviously silly ones. And the explanation gives you the principle that decides the question, not only the facts of that one case. Where a question repeated a point another question already covered, we moved it onto something the bank was not teaching yet rather than removing it. Nothing was deleted and no correct answer moved, so your past attempts and your topic scores still line up.
- Fixed
Two facts corrected in question explanations, then swept across the whole library to be sure they appeared nowhere else. more ▾less ▴
Two facts were corrected while we were working through those questions. An explanation about the temporary weakness that can follow a focal seizure said the weak limb is on the same side of the body as the part of the brain the seizure started in. It is the opposite side, and it now says so. Separately, an option about a fluid used to bring down pressure in the head said it causes no diuresis at all; it causes less than the other option does, which is not the same thing, and it has been corrected. We then swept the whole library for both claims to be sure they had not been copied anywhere else: the first appeared once in 15,362 questions and in none of the flashcards, case situations or cram sheet pages.
- Improved
19Sep · Sat
The students quoted on the home page are nurses now
Improved- Improved
All five students quoted on the home page passed the August 2026 board exam. more ▾less ▴
The five students whose words sit on the home page and the upgrade page took the August 2026 board exam while they were reviewing with BoardPal. PRC released the results on September 18 and all five of them passed, so their cards now read Passed instead of taker. Congratulations to Lheanne, Marie Joy, Ebrahim, Zairelyn and Raizelle, and to every one of you who found your name on the list.
Choose how many questions when you add a practice topic
NewFixed- New
Pick 10, 20, 30, 50 or 100 questions, or type your own number, when you add a practice topic to your plan. more ▾less ▴
When you tap the + on a day of your study plan and add a practice topic, you can now pick the size of that session: tap 10, 20, 30, 50 or 100, or type any number from 5 to 100 in the Other box. It used to be 20 every time. The sheet also shows how many questions the topic has, and a size bigger than that is switched off, so the plan never asks for questions that are not there. Sessions you already added stay as they are. From a student who wanted longer sets on the topics they most need to practice.
- New
158 new practice questions across 58 topics, finishing our sweep for points the bank did not yet test. more ▾less ▴
158 new practice questions are live across 58 topics: 43 on psychiatric and high-acuity nursing, 42 on medical-surgical care, 31 on neurologic and endocrine conditions, 22 on maternal and child health, and 20 on community health, nursing law and research. Each one asks about a point no question in the bank tested yet, was checked against a published source, and was read by independent reviewers before it went in. This finishes the sweep: every gap we found in our review of what the review centers drill now has a question.
- New
A new question on choosing a walking aid after a stroke, written after we checked two sources that seemed to disagree. more ▾less ▴
One more question, on choosing a walking aid for a client with one-sided weakness after a stroke. Two of our reference lists seemed to disagree about it, so we went back to the published sources before writing anything: they turned out to be answering different questions. The question asks you for the reason behind the choice, not just the name of the device.
- New
Nine more practice questions on points such as Macewen sign, the two-rescuer infant CPR ratio and a rash on allopurinol. more ▾less ▴
Nine more practice questions, on points we had first set aside as too detailed and then decided belong in the bank: bleeding as the first check after a circumcision, Macewen sign in hydrocephalus, the calming effect of methylphenidate in ADHD, where the hands go when a woman in late pregnancy is choking, the CPR ratio for two rescuers and an infant, remotivation therapy, the Johari window, pain relief in ulcerative colitis, and what to do about a rash on allopurinol. Each was checked against a published source and read by independent reviewers before it went in.
- Fixed
Choking first aid updated to the 2025 guideline in one mock question and the Sick Child A cram sheet. more ▾less ▴
Choking first aid now follows the 2025 guideline everywhere. For a conscious child or adult who cannot speak or cough, current guidance alternates five back blows with five abdominal thrusts; older teaching used abdominal thrusts alone. One mock board question offered back blows as a wrong answer, so we replaced that option, and the answer stays abdominal thrusts. The Sick Child A cram sheet now gives the child sequence as five back blows then five abdominal thrusts on pages 11, 12 and 21, with the older answer noted beside it. Infants are unchanged: five back blows, then five chest thrusts. Your marks on the sheet stay where they are.
- Fixed
BoardPal now opens on older iPads and iPhones running iOS or iPadOS 15.4 or later. more ▾less ▴
BoardPal now opens on older iPads and iPhones that cannot update past iOS or iPadOS 15, such as the iPad mini 4 and the iPad Air 2. On those devices the login page used to come up completely blank, in every browser. If you gave up on an older tablet, update it to the newest software it offers (15.4 or later) and log in again with the same email and password. The notice shown on browsers that really are too old also stopped suggesting Chrome or Firefox on an iPad, because that never helps there. From a student who could not log in on an iPad mini 4.
- Improved
18Sep · Fri
Start this deck over is now really on every deck page
NewFixed- New
21 new practice questions across labor and delivery, laboratory values, medication safety, mental health and pregnancy. more ▾less ▴
21 new practice questions are live: 5 on labor and delivery, 3 each on laboratory values, medication safety and mental health nursing, 4 across communicable and non-communicable disease, and 3 on pregnancy. Each one asks about a point the bank did not cover yet, was checked against a published source, and was read by two independent reviewers before it went in.
- New
102 more new practice questions across 38 topics, led by health assessment, prioritization, psychiatric nursing and cardiac care. more ▾less ▴
102 more new practice questions are live, spread across 38 topics. The biggest additions are health assessment and vital signs, prioritizing care, schizophrenia and other psychoses, growth and development theories, acute coronary syndrome, and leadership and management, with smaller sets on diabetes, maternal and child health programs, family planning, communicable disease, nutrition and pediatrics. These fill points our own bank had never tested. Every one was checked against a published source, read by independent reviewers, and rechecked after each edit. A few candidates were dropped along the way because a question already covered the same point, and one was left out because we could not verify it well enough to key an answer.
- Fixed
Start this deck over now works on every deck page. more ▾less ▴
Rated a run of flashcards wrong by accident? Open the deck and tap Start this deck over. It sits on the all-caught-up screen and as a small link under a running session, and a second tap that names the number of cards confirms it. Every card in that deck comes back as new, while your review history, streak, and daily counts stay exactly as they were. We announced this button in July, but the change never reached the site, so anyone who looked for it could not find it. It is live now, and we are sorry for the wait.
Skip any task on your study plan
New- New
Tap any plan task and choose Skip. It fades, stops counting, and one tap puts it back. more ▾less ▴
Tap any task on your Schedule page or on Home's Today's Plan and choose Skip this task. It stays on the calendar, faded, and stops counting toward your progress, the slipped-tasks nudge, the day's estimated time, and your study reminder. Tap it again to put it back. Skipped tasks stay skipped when your plan rebuilds after a change of dates, sections, daily time or focus, and a skipped topic still comes back later as a short Revisit set. Mock board days and the daily flashcards can be skipped too. From a student following a review center schedule alongside BoardPal.
- New
17Sep · Thu
Start a mock board over, and clear your Vault in one tap
New- New
Start a half-finished mock board over, with your study plan following. more ▾less ▴
Stopped a mock board part-way and want a clean run? Open the board and tap Start this board over, just under its sections. The sections you already submitted are set aside, all five come back fresh with a full clock, and if the board is on your study plan, both of its days return to the plan. Because you have already seen part of that paper, the new run counts as a retake, so it does not enter the leaderboard as a first attempt. One of you asked for this after rebuilding her plan for a later exam date and finding her old half-finished board carried into it.
- New
Clear your whole Vault in one tap. more ▾less ▴
The Vault now has a Clear my Vault link at the bottom of its start card. It empties the whole pile in one go, the same as tapping I've got this on every question, and anything you miss again comes straight back. Your history, streak, and topic scores are untouched.
46 new practice questions on high-yield points the bank was missing
New- New
46 new practice questions on high-yield points the bank was missing. more ▾less ▴
46 new practice questions cover points review materials drill that no question in the bank asked yet. They span perioperative care, cancers, adrenal and ADH disorders, dementia, elimination, circulation, breathing patterns, anxiety, other psychiatric disorders and crisis intervention. Each was checked against a medical source and read by two independent reviewers before it went live.
Three more practice questions on points the bank had stopped asking
NewFixed- New
3 new practice questions: dialysis, HIV testing, and the Anti-Rape Law. more ▾less ▴
Three new practice questions bring back points that left the bank with the retired questions: why peritoneal dialysis suits a client whose blood pressure drops during hemodialysis, what follows a reactive HIV screening test, and which law made rape a crime against persons. Each was checked against a primary source and read by two independent reviewers before it went live.
- Fixed
11 flashcards corrected after a source check. more ▾less ▴
Eleven flashcards were corrected after each was checked against a primary source twice: neuroblastoma diarrhea is caused by VIP, not catecholamines; clotting is more common in HHNS than in DKA rather than unique to it; tamsulosin matters even if the client has stopped taking it; and eight smaller wording fixes. Your review schedule on these cards is unchanged.
Practice bank trimmed to what the boards actually test
ImprovedNew- Improved
752 over-detailed or repeated practice questions retired. more ▾less ▴
752 practice questions were retired after the whole bank was read against board-level review material: questions that went deeper than the exam does (fine-print percentages, specialist maneuvers, lab-interpretation modifiers) and near-duplicates of a question you already had. Your past answers and scores on them are unchanged. If one of them was in your bookmarks, it leaves that folder.
- New
41 new high-yield practice questions across ten topics. more ▾less ▴
41 new practice questions cover high-yield points the bank never asked, across ten topics: laboratory values, nursing laws, universal health care, disaster nursing, health records, labor complications, electrolytes, acid-base balance, raised intracranial pressure, and shock. Each was checked against a primary source and read by two independent reviewers before it went live.
- Improved
205 flashcards re-linked to a live practice question. more ▾less ▴
205 flashcards that pointed at a retired question now link to a live practice question that states the same fact, so the card's question link keeps working. 48 cards teach a point no live question states yet; they keep their old link until a new question is written.
- New
16Sep · Wed
Answers stay sealed until you have answered
Fixed- Fixed
Reviews reveal an answer only for a question you actually answered. more ▾less ▴
A saved "finished" record for a diagnostic or a practice set could be made to list questions you had never answered, and the review screen would then show the correct answer and the explanation for them. Two things changed. A practice review now reveals an answer only for a question you actually answered, and the records behind both reviews can no longer be written from outside the app. Your own finished sets and diagnostics read exactly as before. One visible difference: if you skip a question in an exam-mode practice set, its review no longer shows you the correct answer, because you never answered it. Tutor mode is unchanged, since you answer every question there.
Consent for minors now follows Philippine law
Fixed- Fixed
Flashcards and a question on minors' consent now follow Philippine law. more ▾less ▴
Two flashcards and one practice question taught that a married or self-supporting minor may consent to her own care. That is not Philippine law today. In the Philippines a person consents for herself on reaching 18 (RA 6809), and a marriage under 18 is void, so a parent or legal guardian consents for a younger patient while she gives her own agreement. The flashcards and the question's explanation now teach the Philippine rule, which the cram sheets already used. The question's answer key did not change.
Bookmarks never show an answer early
Fixed- Fixed
Bookmarks now only hold questions whose answer you have already seen. more ▾less ▴
A question can now only be bookmarked once its answer has been shown to you: a question you answered, or any item from a diagnostic, practice set or mock board section you finished. Resources > Bookmarks follows the same rule, so it never shows the answer to a question you have not reached yet. The Bookmark button works the same as before on every review screen.
More flashcards now link to their cram sheet
Fixed- Fixed
38 more topics now link straight to their cram sheet. more ▾less ▴
After you flip a flashcard or answer a practice question, the "Go deeper" row links to the cram sheet that covers that topic. On 38 topics it said "Cram sheet coming soon" even though the sheet was already out, including sick child, psychiatric disorders, respiratory, spinal cord, musculoskeletal, reproductive health, health laws, community health, school and workplace health, community mental health, health education and research. Those topics now open their cram sheet.
Practice your bookmarked questions as a set
New- New
Tap Practice on a Bookmarks folder to answer its questions as a set. more ▾less ▴
Open any subject folder in Resources > Bookmarks and tap Practice to answer that folder's bookmarked questions as a practice set, with the explanation after each answer. Your answers count the same as any other practice: your stats update and a miss goes to your Vault. A set holds up to your newest 100 bookmarks in the folder. Mock board items stay readable in Bookmarks but are left out of the set, because they need their case. On a free account the set uses your free questions for the day.
Bookmarks sorted into subject folders, with search
Improved- Improved
Bookmarks now sit in subject folders, with an All questions list and a search box. more ▾less ▴
Resources > Bookmarks now keeps your saved questions in one folder per subject, the same way the Flashcards page shows its decks. Each folder shows how many questions and topics are inside, and opening one lists its questions under their topic names. Tap All questions at the top for one list with the newest first, or type in the search box to find a saved question by a word from it, its choices, its topic or your note. If all your bookmarks are in one subject, that folder opens by itself. Suggested by a student.
Clearer explanations on questions that ask you to spot the mistake
ImprovedFixed- Improved
Questions that ask you to spot the mistake no longer label true statements as wrong. more ▾less ▴
On 1,072 practice questions that ask you to pick the statement or action that is wrong (which one needs correction, shows a need for further teaching, is incorrect or not appropriate, reflects a misunderstanding, is the exception, is least appropriate, or is the one to avoid), the explanation used to put statements that were actually true under the heading "Why the other options are wrong". The headings now read "Why C is the answer" and "Why the other options are not the answer". If you show explanations under each choice, the buttons now say "Why this is the answer" and "Why this is not the answer" on every question, so a true statement is never labelled wrong. No answers changed.
- Fixed
Four reported questions and one flashcard corrected, answers unchanged. more ▾less ▴
Four practice questions and one flashcard reported by students were corrected: a moral development question whose wording matched how review centers describe a higher stage, an ethics question that was hard to read, a question on a child's tooth-care habits that asked the wrong thing, a recovery-room suctioning explanation, and a scope of practice flashcard that gave its answer away. No answers changed.
- Fixed