Anybody got textbook advice? I want to get my books ascheaply and early as possible.
Hmmmm... textbooks, textbooks, textbooks...
If you are a big textbook reader than you will probably want more than others. But honestly there are a good number of books you can skip out on buying, mostly because you will
mainly be studying from lecture notes & the class syllabi. So in no particular order...
PHYSICAL DIAGNOSIS (aka PDK): The PDX notes are more than enough of what you will need, so you don't need to buy any of those textbooks. If you know those notes COLD than you will have more than enough knowledge to pass. The notes are pretty much a textbook themselves! Buy a lot of big 2" or more, 3-ringed binders! And try not to ever miss that class, really informative.
ANATOMY: don't go without a Netter's Atlas; that's the most important thing. For those of you who like detailed descriptions, you could check out Gray's Anatomy for Students; it's really good and has a lot of helpful tables. Be sure to check out the University of Michigan anatomy website for clinically based practice questions. As a matter of fact, a lot of those questions are sometimes the basis for the ideas of actual test questions here! MAKE SURE TO DO THOSE!
http://www.med.umich.edu/lrc/coursepages/m1/anatomy2010/html/courseinfo/mich_quiz_index.html
EBM: Didn't buy text book; really good notes and lecture material.
FUNDAMENTALS OF HUMAN BEHAVIOR: Also didn't buy this text book; really good notes and lecture material.
HISTO: The recommended histo book is really good just for the pictures, and the material for tests I learned was mostly straight from the lecture notes.
PHYSIOLOGY: You won't need the super fat main textbook, but definitely go for the Purple Costanzo book. That was probably my most used textbook of the year. Super nice in conjunction with your notes.
BIOCHEM: Definitely don't buy the main textbook, but do buy the recommended Lipncott's Illustrated reviews book... that one was SUPER helpful for clearing up pathways and whatnot. Really good illustrations.
NERUO: You will want the neuro books, ESPECIALLY the neuro atlas. It's really old school looking, but very good. Also I would say NEVER, I repeat NEVER, miss Dr. Cole's class. He is probably my favorite lecturer, and he highlights brain structures and whatnot in class that you won't find in his power points, and that are super hard to learn on your own.
EMBRYO: I didn't buy it and did well. Dr. Kirby's notes are good and he gives really good lectures.
GENETICS: This one is still a bit muddy. The genetics program here is still VERY young (our class was actually the first to experience it) and it has changed dramatically for the class below us, so I'm sure I couldn't say anything helpful about it. I studied from the HY Genetics summary book, and I bought the main textbook too, as Dr. Gold told us specific pages to study. Then again, the textbook is different this year, so I have no idea how that is going to work. Sorry!
That's all I can think of that should be on your list (or at least what was on my list, it might have changed). Now, what's not on the list that you might find helpful are the Board review books. There are a lot of different brands, BRS, HY, RR, etc, and you may want to do some research when you pick one, but they are super helpful when it comes to giving practice questions for high yield material. I have BRS anatomy, BRS physio, BRS embyro, HY genetics, RR Biochem, HY neuroscience, HY behavioral science (though I didn't use that one much).... aaannnd that's about it I think. You might not need any of those or you might want different brands. Do some SDN or google searches, check out Amazon reviews, etc to find out what would work best for you. Don't worry about First Aid this year... You can start worrying about boards during second year! Focus on getting a good foundation and then First Aid will come easier and more naturally next year.
Oh yea and one more thing! For those of you who would rather not print every last set of lecture notes, they are all available online. You have to pay the school to have stuff printed off for you, not to mention all the reviews or study sheets you may make for yourself. If you have a tablet like an iPad or a Xoom or whatever, you can download all your stuff to it (or I sync with DropBox from my Macbook) and you can use that instead of having massive amounts of paper. I find it more convenient and my iPad basically payed for itself after I stopped paying for syllabi and printer ink! The one downside I guess, is that for those of you who enjoy the comforts and familiarity of studying from paper, you would obviously lose that with a tablet. If you do go this route, just remember: a tablet should replace your stacks of binders and notes, NOT a laptop. You wouldn't want to type the papers you do in med school on a tablet screen now would you? Or I guess you could always go to the library...
Anyways, now for my usual disclaimer: please take this info with a grain of salt. This is just what I did based on my learning style and what I was told by students before me. Your textbook list may have changed or the curriculum may have evolved a bit, so take all that into account also. Compared to undergrad, med school is way more flexible with how you do textbooks, and honestly the federal loans they give you are more than enough to cover costs (if you are dong those anyways). So yea... This post was a really long read haha, hope it helped even a little!