OB/GYN Clerkship Books

[orientedtoself]

Blueprints was good. I thought it was very high yield for the shelf.

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[tiredmom]

Case files is good. Blueprints is good. I also really like Ob/Gyn Secrets (sounds like a tell all book, doesn't it? - but I want to do Ob so I'm more interested than most in my group. There is a little red book that's good if you are interested in going into ob/gyn... blanking on the name right now, clinical obstetrics and gynecology or something like that.

 

[RonaldColeman]

Blueprints or BRS is all you need to prepare for the ob/gyn shelf. Don't even waste your time on a question book (A&L is HORRIBLE!). Nearly all of the pure OB/GYN questions will be in BRS or Blueprints. I almost felt like the OB/GYN questions on the shelf were a gimme, and that my final score was ultimately determined by my ability to answer the handful of questions that required knowledge of other specialties (IM, psych, etc).

 

[12R34Y]

Blueprints is ALL i used and I did very well on the shelf. It's very high yield.

Having said that.........many in our class used case files and it was an excellent question source as well.

later

 

[ziffy 850]

thanks everyone - advice much appreciateed

 

[Green912]

Just finished my OB/GYN clerkship and used Blueprints. In hind sight, and having gotten a glance at others First Aid for OB/GYN, I would have chosen First Aid. More concise, quick read, and the point.

 

[excalibur]

I guess I'm lucky. I'm a tulane student who got moved to Houston and am doing an OB/GYN rotation. I'm studying under the guy who wrote Case Files, Dr. Toy. It's good to know his book is held in such high esteem. I noticed also that First Aid OB/GYN acknowledges Dr. Toy for reviewing the manuscript of the First Aid text. He is a really good teacher, man I lucked out.

 

[MeganRose]

Just finished my OBGyn rotation, dont know how I did, but I recommend FA--very readable and high yield

 

[tufts02]

just finished ob/gyn today...good riddins

so i'm one of those people who had absolutely no idea what was going when i started ob/gyn. and even though i just took the shelf today i can tell you what really prepared me for the shelf.

i read blueprints once through. it gives a really good basis for the rotation. pretty much everything you will need to know for the rotation. everything else can be supplemented with uptodate or something. at our rotation we rotated through the clinics, the l&d ward, gyn surg and gyn onc so bp was good for covering all of those topics.

Second, you MUST buy case files. its such an easy read. the thing i found most helpful about the book is that by the end of a case, the major topics are repeated about 3 times so its drilled in your head. by quick read i mean it takes about 3 hours to run through 15 cases...there are 60 cases.
by the end of the book you'll have all the key buzzwords down.

finally ucv for ob/gyn is a decent day of/night before read in about 2 hours to refresh your brain with topics.

that combination of text, cases, and questions worked really well for me and it made the shelf seem pretty easy...knock on wood.

other tips/observations...there were absolutely no questions on cancer staging, although it is something good to know for clinics and what not b/c it is a frequent pimping question. know amenorrhea, infertility, there was one question each on stress incontinence, overflow incontinence, and detrussor instability. basics of preeclampsia. delivery complications (uterine rupture, changes on efm, dystocia maneuvers), placental issues (abruption risk factors etc), know your stds - case files is really good for this, ovarian masses, uterine masses. hope that helps

did i mention case files?

 

[excalibur]

CASE FILES
This book is THE BOOK to get for the Ob/gyn shelf. I can't speak for the other shelf tests, but it is such an easy read, and it hits all the pertinents. This book is a must. I luckily also rotated under the author, Dr. Toy. He was a great teacher, and prepared us for clinic and the test very well.

Still, you will need a textbook and probably a pretest to go along with CASE FILES. My text was obstetrics and gynecology 4th ed by Beckmann et.al. I found it very helpful. Others used blueprints. Pretest was good as well, but the questions on the shelf seemed liked they were derivatives of the cases in CASE FILES.

Did I mention CASE FILES?

 

[substanceP]

thanks everyone, these comments are very helpful. my ob shelf is coming up at the end of january, so i need to start looking into what books to get. thanks for your opinions. --sp

 

[Kluver_Bucy]

I have Ob/Gyn next.

I noticed in the latest First Aid that Case Files is given only a B, and BluePrints is given a A. Do people on SDN know something that the thousands of students that rank books in First Aid don't know?

 

[excalibur]

I have Ob/Gyn next.

I noticed in the latest First Aid that Case Files is given only a B, and BluePrints is given a A. Do people on SDN know something that the thousands of students that rank books in First Aid don't know?

Case Files is a book of 60 case scenarios for OB/Gyn. Each case is followed by 1 or 2 questions. These questions are always one of the following seven questions:

1. What is the most likely diagnosis? (The most common question)
2. What is the next step in management?
3. What is the treatment?
4. What are the risk factors for this condition?
5. What are the complications/associated conditions?
6. What is the diagnostic test?
7. I can't remember

Sorry, about 7, but the idea is that those 7 questions are the most common questions that appear on the shelf, so the book gives you a case scenario, and one of these questions to follow, and it gets you thinking like the test. Most of the cases in case files are the vignette/question stems that appear on the shelf or a derivative of it.

Also, look in the acknowledgement section at the beginning of First Aid OB/GYN, and you'll see that the writers of First Aid acknowledge Dr. Toy, the author of Case Files, as approving the manuscript used to write First Aid. So Dr. Toy knows what he's talking about.

That said. You do need a text to study while on OB/GYN. A lot of my classmates did use Blueprints and enjoyed it, so I recommend it along with Case Files. I used Obstetrics and Gynecology 4th ed by Beckmann et.al. which I found very helpful. Those were the 2 main texts I noticed being used at school. As far as question books go, Pre-Test was average. It was something to do and look over, but nowhere near as high yield as Case Files. The Appleton and Lange questions are simply too much, so don't bother.

 

[zedpol]

Stay away from A & L for OB/gyn, biggest piece of garbage known to mankind. I used BP, BP questions and did some pre-test (which gets better farther into the book), got a 95 without too much effort. Don't bother with beckmans either, entirly too many pages.

Z

 

[tufts02]

as excalibur said before, casefiles isn't a stand-alone book. but its great to use in that it will drill the most important points about all things ob/gyn into your head to the point you won't have to think twice about certain dz processes. i recommend reading blueprints at least once through along with casefiles within the last two weeks of the rotation and then doing the bp questions on the very last day.

g'luck

 

[alexo1]

well OB rotations require a lot of bedside skills,so i prefer u to purchase a book written by Dr.JAMES DRIFE clincal obg 516 pages,452 illustrations,saunders publishes feb 2004,price 28.99 pounds

Hi I am a third year going into ob/gyn, I wonder if it is worth buying the Clinical ObG by Dr. JAMES DRIFE as you rexommended.

thanks

alex

 

[Long Dong]

Okay here is my input. Keep in mind that my memory is kind of crappy and that I need to put in more effort then the average medical student to get a good score. It is like going to the gym. I wouldn't ask the naturally buffed out guys how they got those guns. I'd have the ask the thin body types how they got their bench press up. So most of the people's advise I've read so far on this thread are the really smart peopel who always do well with minimal effort like just reading blueprints. Where as if I just read blueprints I might not even pass.

So as for my sources, I read blue prints (probably all you need to read) and the ob section from boards and words. I also did a ton of questions since questions seem to help me remember the stuff more then anything else. Question sources were Appleton & Lange, Pre-test, and OB questions from Qbook. Lucky my OB service was kind of slow so while doing call in L&D I had time to do alot of questions. My results 87 raw score and 97th percentile.

If one were pressed for time I'd say make sure to read blue prints, do Qbook, then pre-test and review the ob section from Boards and wards the weekend before the exam. A&L think most can do well with out it since most of it is one linear definition type questions, which the shelf is not. Out of all the shelfs that I have taken I would agree with the others on this thread that OB/GYN seemed to be a little bit easier then say the medicine or psych shelf.

 

[dynx]

our senior panel told us blueprints sucked and high yield OB GYN was the way to go. any thoughts about this?

Blueprints blows. Its enough info to pass, if you want to do more than that get something else.

 

[katrinadams9]

I agree Blueprints is the way to go....and thick skin will be a definite must....out of all my rotations...Ob/Gyn was the most emotionally labile....

I'm starting off in Ob/gyn in a few short weeks. Why was this rotation so emotional? Was it the long hours? I'm excited and nervous. Pretty much sure I won't want to go into this specialty.

 

[uclalee]

So how does everyone feel about FA for the Wards. Worth buying, or a waste of time?

 

[medicinehopeful]

hey all,
i'm trying to decide between blueprints and first aid for obgyn. what are you thoughts? i have read other threads about this, but not much is said about first aid. during psych and peds, i used the first aid series and that worked well. does anyone have any experience with first aid for obgyn?

 

[Richie Truxillo]

I used Blueprints and OBGYN Recall for my rotation and did just fine with it. Don't have experience with the First Aid OB book though.

 

[BillyWitchDoctr]

I used both and they are both really good books. I liked First Aid but mainly because I like the bullet format better.

 

[Blade28]

I read Blueprints a couple times over, used the "red book" as my pocketbook, and did well on the shelf.

 

[AbuJadenDO]

the only blueprints that was really impressive was actually the OBGyN edition imho