you will most likely still end up learning the DSM-IV criteria anyway. If you do your boards at the end of residency in 2017, you will be tested on DSM-IV criteria still. At any rate, I have not opened the DSM-IV-TR this year once, and they gave us a handbook. I think the open secret is no one really uses the DSM in clinical practice. I bet you 99% of psychiatrists do not know the diagnostic criteria for PTSD, and those <1% do, most of them do not stringently adhere to it to make that diagnosis.
The changes in DSM-5 are fairly small anyway. The major disorders are the same. depression is still depression, bipolar disorder is still bipolar disorder, schizophrenia is still schizophrenia. hypochondriasis is now called 'illness anxiety disorder', asperger's disorders has been subsumed under autistic spectrum disorder, OCD is no longer an anxiety disorder but has its own category, and hoarding is its own disorder instead of a subtype of OCD it is an OC-spectrum disorder, abuse and dependence have gone, 'addictive disorders' makes it debut and there are now substance use disorders which meld abuse and dependence on a spectrum. The multi-axial system has gone. Apart from that very little is different and as an incoming resident you will undoubtedly be using the old system anyway which again matters little.
In short, just buy the handbook if you want.
