Medical students ink publishing deal for exam review
By Rimin Dutt
Published: Tuesday, June 1, 2004
NEW YORK - When students Rupen Modi and Naishadh Shah struggled to find helpful review books to prepare for their medicine-licensing exam, they decided to write their own.
Within a year they landed a book contract with Blackwell Publishing.
Modi and Shah's book, a review guide written to help students prepare for the Comprehensive Osteopathic Medical Licensing Exam, will be published in the spring of 2005.
Osteopathy students must pass three levels of the licensing exam, an equivalent of the United States Medical Licensing Exam. Osteopathic medicine focuses on the whole person rather than on symptoms, diseases and medical conditions. Its approach to health care requires attention to the body-mind connection, touch and physical manipulation and to the circumstances in which a patient lives and works.
Modi and Shah are currently fourth year osteopathic medical students at the New York College Of Osteopathic Medicine. They are part of a combined program at their school, through which, they will receive a bachelor's of science degree and doctoral degree in osteopathic medicine. They will graduate in 2005.
During their own preparation for the licensing exam in 2002, Modi and Shah found few review books on the market.
"We would joke about the subject for about six to seven months and then in March of 2003, we wrote a proposal to see what publishers had to say about it," said Modi.
"After studying for our (Comprehensive Osteopathic Medical Licensing Exam) Level 1 exam, we also noticed a need for 'our type of book' in the market," added Shah. "Because we both enjoy teaching and take pride in our profession, we decided to contribute further by officially writing a book," said Shah.
They landed a book deal with Blackwell Publishing by the end of 2003.
"We did not consider what publisher we would get, we were only concerned with putting out a quality product that would help students prepare for major board exams and rotations," said Modi.
The young authors believe that writing a book for students is a difficult task, which is why very few students of medicine attempt to do so.
"It's a tough thing to sell to publishers," said Shah.
According to him their teaching experience helped them come up with a convincing proposal.
Both Shah and Modi were selected as undergraduate teaching fellows, a merit-based scholarship in their second year at the medical school. Under the fellowship program, they invest an extra year teaching their respective subjects to the first, second and third year students.
"One of the greatest benefits of the fellowships is the opportunity to teach... this has taught us how to express our thoughts and ideas in a clear and informative manner," added Shah. "Using our background knowledge, teaching experience, and enthusiasm to contribute to medical literature ... the process became a lot easier."
"Writing a book requires a little vision, some planning and a lot of time," said Modi. "We had a tremendous vision, good planning, but we are always short on time. Between the workload from (New York College of Medicine), working on our MBAs, and all the other extracurricular activities we are involved in, time management was important."
According to them, the format of their book is its best selling point. Topics are explained with a question and answer format for effective learning as opposed to prose and paragraphs, said Modi.
"There are many good resources out there for these same topics, but our book has many unique advantages including its format, size, and high-yield review," said Shah. "This book primarily revolves around making sure students are better prepared for their board exams and rotations."
Shah and Modi received tremendous support from their teachers at their school in preparing the book.
"Our professors and advisors offered their personal library for our use," said Modi.
Both Modi and Shah are also enrolled in the School of Management at the New York Institute of Technology, and are anticipating completion of their master's degrees in business administration this year.
Modi was born and raised in Pennsylvania. Shah was born in Gujurat, India, but grew up in Queens, N.Y, and East Brunswick, N.J.
