2nd Year Books

[ekimsurfer]

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What are you guys using? Any third years want to offer up some advice? I know every school is different, but I'm just trying to get some other opinions. Amazon can only go so far.

Here are a few of my dilemma's:

Should I buy big Robbins? I'm pretty sure I will since it's the BIBLE blah blah blah...I'm doing Goljan also which is another 600pgs plus the audio.
How about Robbins Review? Robbins Atlas?
Cecil's vs Harrison's for Medicine (pathophys reference)
Pharm...should I get Big Katzung or just the Review?
How about Lippincott Pharm?
Psychiatry? I think Kaplan and Sadock sucks and am tempted to BRS it for the year with the Behavioral Science BRS (as I did for 1st year...haha)
Infectious Diseases? We are supposed to get some $200 Gorbach ID book but I'm thinking Clinical Microbio MRS and the Lange Medical Microbio/Immuno book I have should be sufficient...anyone have the Gorbach ID book?

Thanks for the help and good luck to everyone.

 

[njbmd]

You should generally purchase what your school uses as primary texts if you purchase any at all. Having tons of books around just takes away from focusing on the main sources of material that your particular school uses for exam questions. You can always go to your library and consult other texts when you need them which saves money and time.

I hardly purchased any textbooks for second year with my main focus being on first our course syllabi and lecture material/handouts. Any required reading, I used the reserve library text books (minimal for us). When Step I time came around, I used one atlas and did computer question blocks.

In short, there was no particular "must purchase" text that I encountered. I also didn't waste time consulting outside resources when my school provided us with extremely complete syllabi and lecture handouts. Second year is about being as efficient as possible.

 

[TerpMD]

What are you guys using? Any third years want to offer up some advice? I know every school is different, but I'm just trying to get some other opinions. Amazon can only go so far.

Here are a few of my dilemma's:

Should I buy big Robbins? I'm pretty sure I will since it's the BIBLE blah blah blah...I'm doing Goljan also which is another 600pgs plus the audio.
How about Robbins Review? Robbins Atlas?
Cecil's vs Harrison's for Medicine (pathophys reference)
Pharm...should I get Big Katzung or just the Review?
How about Lippincott Pharm?
Psychiatry? I think Kaplan and Sadock sucks and am tempted to BRS it for the year with the Behavioral Science BRS (as I did for 1st year...haha)
Infectious Diseases? We are supposed to get some $200 Gorbach ID book but I'm thinking Clinical Microbio MRS and the Lange Medical Microbio/Immuno book I have should be sufficient...anyone have the Gorbach ID book?

Thanks for the help and good luck to everyone.

Def a no on Big Robbins. No one has time to read that. Robbins Review might be useful if you like questions. I used in throughout the year and again for boards.
Purchased Cecils- waste of money. Still trying to sell it!
Bought big katzung-also waste of money. I would stick with the review.
I personally wouldn't bother with a psych book unless you want one for boards.
Clinical micro MRS is enough for micro and the lange chapter on immuno is supposedly great. I had the text for my class from undergrad and also never used it.

I'm a book person but I have found in my first two years that I should have bought review books and skipped the texts. Just my thoughts 🙂

 

[Doctor J]

Def a no on Big Robbins. No one has time to read that.

I'm going to disagree with this. You have all year to read Big Robbins, and if you do so you will have a very solid foundation for Step 1.

You can find an older edition online for really cheap. Each chapter might take you 2-3 hours to read. If you can devote two hours/week to reading it you'll have time to read it twice by the time boards roll around. And it will show in your score.

 

[drdr2010]

Path
-Big Robbins: obviously didn't have time to read a lot of it, but they used images straight out of here on our class exams, and sometimes i just read the clinical boxes and looked at the images for important topics
-Goljan Rapid Review path: useful for class as well as the boards. I also listened to his audio while running/driving/cleaning
-Robbins Q book: these questions are hard! but i think prepared me well for the path shelf exam and step 1
-BRS path: I didn't really like this as well as RR Path, but a lot of my classmates used it for the shelf and step 1

Pharm
- I didn't use any books really. I bought baby Katzung and never used it. I have a BRS pharm which I used to look up drugs our class notes didn't cover well, but generally just used the prof's notes. I borrowed someone's Lipincott's to use during the pharmacokinetics/dynamics section but didn't use it all for drugs. For step 1, I just used first aid.

Psychiatry
- Our required text was First Aid for the Psychiatry Clerkship. I liked it and it definitely helped for step 1 too.

Pathophys
- I used McPhee's Introduction to Clinical Medicine. Its an easy read and gives a nice overview of diseases. A refreshing change from the density of books like Robbins!

Clinical Micro
- CMMRS: You need this! Read it and know it during the school year and studying for Step 1 will be considerably less miserable.

 

[vtucci]

To OP, why are you taking psych in 2nd year?

-Big Robbins: great reference, hard to get through for class
-Goljan Rapid Review path: Gold standard
-Robbins Q book aka Robbins review of path- tough questions but prepares for shelf
-Webpath- great histopath slides online
-BRS path: too basic.

Pharm
-Lippincott's is number one for review texts
-Pharm Recall also good.

Psychiatry
- First Aid for the Psychiatry Clerkship- agree a good place to start but if they are giving you the psych shelf (like we had in 3rd year), look at the DSM-IV or Tombs.

Clinical Micro
-Lange Medical Micro is not a bad reference
-CMMRS: Most of my class liked this but I did not use it. I am not a big fan of the series.
-Micro Recall: I enjoyed this book for review
-MicroDejareview: I used this book as well.

Immuno:
High Yield Immuno is tops.

 

[angry energy]

holy hell you people need to chill.
>250 Step 1 score.

2nd year books:
First Aid to Step 1 - start reading it early, as you go through 2nd yr classes
BRS Path - another key book for step 1 review, go along with your classes
CMMRS - didnt use it much. i liked my own mnemonics better. i'm a very vulgar person, and this book just didnt cut it.

the big-ass robbins i used infrequently; it made more sense to go to the library one sunday a month and read what i needed to in there. a waste.

Robbins Review mightve been smarter, and i mightve done that, but i dont really regret much; i did fine.

your syllabus should have almost everything you need. BRS Path and First Aid is for your step 1. big books are when ur confused as all hell. it shouldnt happen all that often. dont blitzkreig textbooks now.