Medical student here. I've tried many flashcard programs (StudyBlue, Quizlet, gFlashcard, MentalCase, and more), and Anki is by far the best for my needs.
One thing that puts Anki in an orbital beyond the other programs is the ImageOccusion editor add-on [1]. This lets you screenshot an image, draw rectangles over labels within that image, and then generate a flashcard for each label. This works insanely well for learning anatomy.
I remember about a month ago where I had two hours to learn the names of all the tracts and nuclei inside of the brainstem for a readiness quiz. It took about 10 minutes to create flashcards for them all, and an hour to memorize. I passed the quiz. Days later fellow classmates were still struggling to remember the same information.
It's truly a small world, the guy who wrote that plugin is a med student at my fac, but I'd never heard of it. Thanks for introducing me to an awesome plugin, my anatomy classes would've been a breeze with it.
On a more serious note, I've been seeing some comments asking to share Anki decks. This is fine but you should read this disclaimer first (it's about language learning, but it should apply to other areas as well). http://fluent-forever.com/personal-anki-decks/
In short, Anki works better for reviewing rather than learning things for the first time. So the most efficient way to use it would be building your own deck for a more personal experience.
However, if using shared decks, it's best to only add cards to your review log after you've learned the underlying concepts (so that it doesn't break your review rhythm).
One thing that puts Anki in an orbital beyond the other programs is the ImageOccusion editor add-on [1]. This lets you screenshot an image, draw rectangles over labels within that image, and then generate a flashcard for each label. This works insanely well for learning anatomy.
I remember about a month ago where I had two hours to learn the names of all the tracts and nuclei inside of the brainstem for a readiness quiz. It took about 10 minutes to create flashcards for them all, and an hour to memorize. I passed the quiz. Days later fellow classmates were still struggling to remember the same information.
1 - http://tmbb.bitbucket.org/image-occlusion-2.html