Any good books for MS3/4 to read during free time for fun?

[himomitsme]

Does anyone have any good books to read throughout MS3/4 for psych during downtime?

Just looking for interesting books, maybe learn about psychotherapy, disorders etc...

just something to help broaden my knowledge for psych, maybe help with basic knowledge when talking with residents/attendings/interview trail.

Any reccomendations welcome!

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[soundnin]

Reddit - Dive into anything

www.reddit.com

there is a section on books.

 

[himomitsme]

Reddit - Dive into anything

www.reddit.com

there is a section on books.

Thank you

 

[kopftonmd]

Perhaps not so pertinent and helpful, but some Jung or Freud (something like The Interpretation of Dreams) could be interesting to you. More for a historical perspective on how mental processes were approached in the past rather than treatment now. But I think it's kinda cool to learn about at least haha.

 

[NickNaylor]

If you have any interest in trauma, The Body Keeps the Score is an interesting and fairly lightweight read. It's written for the general public but is relatively scientific in its approach.

 

[Stagg737]

If you're looking for light/pleasure reading agree with Nick about The Body Keeps the Score. More related to neuro, but Oliver Sacks also has some interesting reads, the most popular being "The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat". For more of a fictional perspective, "The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time" is a very easy read and is written from the perspective of an autistic adolescent. Not really scientific, but very interesting in terms of understanding the thought process and has been given some credibility by both medical professionals and individuals in the ASD community. I'll also second the suggestion of reading some historical books from some of the more influential psychiatrists/psychologists (Freud, Jung, Kraepelin, etc).

More related directly to psychiatry, I'm currently reading "Uncommon Psychiatric Syndromes" which talks about some zebra diagnoses and cultural phenomena. Very interesting for those interested in the more bizarre side of our field. I'd also recommend reading or at least skimming the original DSM and DSM-II. They're both pretty short (~130 pages) and easy to read while giving a look into how diagnoses evolved and how much the field has changed in the last 60-70 years.

If you really want to look into more clinically relevant stuff and get a head start on residency reading. Maudsley's prescribing guide is a good start or Stahl's Essential Psychopharm if you're more into the molecular/neurochemical aspect of things.

For psychotherapy, Beck(s) and Linehan are the way to go for CBT/DBT. Judith Beck's most recent edition of CBT: Basics and Beyond was just released this month. For psychodynamic therapy Cabaniss was recommended to me by our more therapy-focused attendings, though I haven't started reading it yet. Additionally, Gabbard has a book that summarizes the most common therapeutic modalities (supportive, psychodynamic, CBT, a few others) pretty well. May be a good place to start if you're really interested in doing psychotherapy but don't want to go down a rabbit hole for a specific modality.

Note, I have not read most of those psychotherapy books, but they have been recommended to me by our psychology staff and/or therapy-oriented psychiatrists I've talked to. Others may have better suggestions, which I'd also be interested in hearing.

 

[clausewitz2]

If you have any interest in trauma, The Body Keeps the Score is an interesting and fairly lightweight read. It's written for the general public but is relatively scientific in its approach.

van der Kolk is indeed an interesting read but that book is, uhh...an interestingly strained interpretation of the available evidence base.

 

[EmilKraepelin55]

I am reading through “The boy who was raised by a dog” by Bruce Perry. It’s a very interesting read if you are interested in the effect trauma has on children and adolescents.

 

[clausewitz2]

If you are the kind of person who digs understanding the context and background on why things have developed the way they have in the field, Edward Shorter's "What Psychiatry Left Out of the DSM-V" and David Healy's "The Antidepressant Era" or "The Creation of Psychopharmacology" are readable and excellent.

 

[Merovinge]

Cognitive bias and behavioral economics actually have some cross-over with psychiatry, surprisingly I find times that my weird obsession with these areas is helpful in both adult and child psych. I will add that discussing Thinking, Slow and Fast before the work won the Nobel Prize scored me more brownie points with the best attending at my program then any answer I ever had on rounds.

This is to say that many areas of reading are actually helpful outside of work specifically designed to be psychiatry which is one of the best parts of the field. I'd read a few books from the list above but being a regular person and reading other areas is a very reasonable approach with any downtime you might have.

 

[the5thelement]

The House of God ( Samuel Shem )

 

[Lexanoob]

One of my previous attendings in medical school recommended to me Psychoanalytic Diagnosis by Nancy McWilliams. It's pretty accessible and the writer is pretty empathetic and great at writing! The title sounds dry but I found it super interesting and a bit compelling. It's a great way to learn about personality structures from a psychoanalytic lens. Highly recommend if you're interested in learning more about psychotherapy!

One other practical book that you can apply in medical school in MS3/4 is Thanks for the Feedback by Douglas Stone and Sheila Heen. It's quite practical but it also has kind of a therapy-ish slant in how they talk about or recommend implementing concepts (it's basically talking about interpersonal dynamics).

 

[Evidence Based]

I found first person accounts to be some of the most compelling when I was in med school, and could make for good spare time reading. The Center Cannot Hold (psychosis) and An Unquiet Mind (bipolar disorder) are two classics. I also really liked the Noonday Demon, which is a mix of a first person account of depression alongside a historical/anthropological account of it in various cultures. Think "The Emperor of All Maladies," but for depression.

 

[Matthew9Thirtyfive]

Thinking, Slow and Fast

This is a great book. It’s really long, but good. A good book that is a quicker read and focused on how it applies to physicians is How Doctors Think.

 

[himomitsme]

If you're looking for light/pleasure reading agree with Nick about The Body Keeps the Score. More related to neuro, but Oliver Sacks also has some interesting reads, the most popular being "The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat". For more of a fictional perspective, "The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time" is a very easy read and is written from the perspective of an autistic adolescent. Not really scientific, but very interesting in terms of understanding the thought process and has been given some credibility by both medical professionals and individuals in the ASD community. I'll also second the suggestion of reading some historical books from some of the more influential psychiatrists/psychologists (Freud, Jung, Kraepelin, etc).

More related directly to psychiatry, I'm currently reading "Uncommon Psychiatric Syndromes" which talks about some zebra diagnoses and cultural phenomena. Very interesting for those interested in the more bizarre side of our field. I'd also recommend reading or at least skimming the original DSM and DSM-II. They're both pretty short (~130 pages) and easy to read while giving a look into how diagnoses evolved and how much the field has changed in the last 60-70 years.

If you really want to look into more clinically relevant stuff and get a head start on residency reading. Maudsley's prescribing guide is a good start or Stahl's Essential Psychopharm if you're more into the molecular/neurochemical aspect of things.

For psychotherapy, Beck(s) and Linehan are the way to go for CBT/DBT. Judith Beck's most recent edition of CBT: Basics and Beyond was just released this month. For psychodynamic therapy Cabaniss was recommended to me by our more therapy-focused attendings, though I haven't started reading it yet. Additionally, Gabbard has a book that summarizes the most common therapeutic modalities (supportive, psychodynamic, CBT, a few others) pretty well. May be a good place to start if you're really interested in doing psychotherapy but don't want to go down a rabbit hole for a specific modality.

Note, I have not read most of those psychotherapy books, but they have been recommended to me by our psychology staff and/or therapy-oriented psychiatrists I've talked to. Others may have better suggestions, which I'd also be interested in hearing.

thanks for all these amazing recommendations!
Do you have the name of the book by Gabbard, Is it "Psychodynamic Psychotherapy"? I think I might go for that. Seems like something more general and interesting for me at this time

 

[splik]

not sure it is fun but I read The Art of Psychotherapy by Anthony Storr when I was a med student and I think it is still a good book to introduce you to psychotherapy. Others had taken up the recommendation more recently and found it of interest. It's not too long and pretty easy ot read though it was written in the 80s I think. It was written for psychiatry house officers faced with their first therapy patient.

Listening to patients by richard Druss is another book I recommend to students wanting to learn more about psychotherapy

 

[himomitsme]

not sure it is fun but I read The Art of Psychotherapy by Anthony Storr when I was a med student and I think it is still a good book to introduce you to psychotherapy. Others had taken up the recommendation more recently and found it of interest. It's not too long and pretty easy ot read though it was written in the 80s I think. It was written for psychiatry house officers faced with their first therapy patient.

Listening to patients by richard Druss is another book I recommend to students wanting to learn more about psychotherapy

awesome thanks for the recommendations! I’ll look into these

 

[Stagg737]

thanks for all these amazing recommendations!
Do you have the name of the book by Gabbard, Is it "Psychodynamic Psychotherapy"? I think I might go for that. Seems like something more general and interesting for me at this time

This is what I'm referring to. Pretty sure there is an updated version, but I got this version for free:

Amazon product