Retaining info from large textbooks (Rosen's / Tintinalli's)...

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@JackShephard

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I'm curious about how attending physicians retain info from 3000 page textbooks like Rosen's?

It seems long to get through during residency, then on top of that - how do you retain the info?

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would love to know...i will transfer the skills to everyday life
 
Psst.

Spoiler alert: A lot of the attendings on here (myself included) have not read either of those. There are better ways to learn/retain than reading bombastic ancient tomes.
 
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Don't, since a large amount of it is wrong.
When you read, read actively, not as if you're reading a novel.
You retain the stuff you need to since you use it every day.
 
Curious. When reading a novel, can you not actively read? I mean, I love reading and I've always heard it makes you smarter and etc, but I am able to recognize how much less effort it takes to memorize biochem/ whatever school stuff than to read a good book for leisure. So is it helpful to read for leisure at all? Thanks
 
I read numerous internet sites, listen to multiple podcasts, question everything, etc.

Yes, you can "actively read" a novel, but most don't, because they aren't looking to retain the information in said novel. It's always helpful to read, be it to build your vocabulary, expand your views or whatever. Walden Pond exists for a reason.
That being said, if you're in medicine, and people tell you to "read more", they aren't talking about 50 shades of gray.
 
I read numerous internet sites, listen to multiple podcasts, question everything, etc.

Yes, you can "actively read" a novel, but most don't, because they aren't looking to retain the information in said novel. It's always helpful to read, be it to build your vocabulary, expand your views or whatever. Walden Pond exists for a reason.
That being said, if you're in medicine, and people tell you to "read more", they aren't talking about 50 shades of gray.
I guess it's because i don't exactly know how it works with the brain, but it seems to me that when you read a book, if you create a mental movie of what you are reading ( plus, trying to read very fast), then it has to be good for you. Do you think we get "wrinkles in our brain" for reading like this? I like to read but i don't want to do it as much as I do unless it is somehow making me smarter, faster, etc. lol.
 
What is it that Joe Lex always says?

"If you want to know how we practiced medicine 5 years ago, read a textbook.

If you want to know how we practiced medicine 2 years ago, read a journal.

If you want to know how we practice medicine now, go to a conference.

If you want to know how we will practice medicine in the future, listen in the hallways and use FOAM."
 
Psst.

Spoiler alert: A lot of the attendings on here (myself included) have not read either of those. There are better ways to learn/retain than reading bombastic ancient tomes.

Don't, since a large amount of it is wrong.
When you read, read actively, not as if you're reading a novel.
You retain the stuff you need to since you use it every day.

Did you guys have assigned chapters (tint or rosen) in residency? Or did you just choose to learn from other sources?
 
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What is it that Joe Lex always says?

"If you want to know how we practiced medicine 5 years ago, read a textbook.

If you want to know how we practiced medicine 2 years ago, read a journal.

If you want to know how we practice medicine now, go to a conference.

If you want to know how we will practice medicine in the future, listen in the hallways and use FOAM."

I would agree with the caveat that board exams etc are based on slightly out of date information so textbooks can be valuable.
Rosen's has pretty good baseline info even though some of it can be wrong.
On the other end of the spectrum, podcasts can go on about the latest study that is not validated, and trick you into thinking that is how you should practice today.

I use textbooks as a reference manual to get some baseline info, then read a few studies related to that topic.
I try to do it right after I've seen a patient with a similar complaint.
That way I have certain management questions in my mind and the info sticks better.

Supplement that with podcasts, but make sure you do your own research before changing your practice based on a podcast.
 
Depends on the podcast. EM:RAP does a pretty good job of not being on the bleeding edge, and gives great background. David Newman does a good job of showing what is wrong with what we are taught, but doesn't do it often enough.
If you want to know what you need to know for the boards, use a board review book. Condensed forms of learning work just fine, as long as you are taking the effort to always continue learning, and delving more into the topics you don't get. And if you don't have the wherewithal to find other sources, you can read one of the tomes.

Assigned chapters doesn't mean anything. What, do they come to your house and watch you read? Ask you questions like "what was the second word of the third paragraph on page 734?" The subjects don't differ much between sources.
 
I heard this book was pretty good:

Tintinalli's Just The Facts.

Maybe I will use that for some light reading.

Thanks for the advice. I'm interested to hear more from residents how they go about maintaining mastery in a broad field.
 
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I heard this book was pretty good:

Tintinalli's Just The Facts.

Maybe I will use that for some light reading.

Thanks for the advice. I'm interested to hear more from residents how they go about maintaining mastery in a broad field.


I'm an intern and I read that this year. It's not bad.
 
I heard this book was pretty good:

Tintinalli's Just The Facts.

Maybe I will use that for some light reading.

Thanks for the advice. I'm interested to hear more from residents how they go about maintaining mastery in a broad field.

Dude, correct me if I'm wrong but aren't you early pre-med?

If so, hey - good on yah for gathering data so early in the ballgame... but sounds to me like you should be busy with things like o-chem, admissions, and getting laid.
 
Dude, correct me if I'm wrong but aren't you early pre-med?

If so, hey - good on yah for gathering data so early in the ballgame... but sounds to me like you should be busy with things like o-chem, admissions, and getting laid.

He's a third year med student
 
Dude, correct me if I'm wrong but aren't you early pre-med?

If so, hey - good on yah for gathering data so early in the ballgame... but sounds to me like you should be busy with things like o-chem, admissions, and getting laid.

Sounds like a plan!
 
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One thing our residency director is telling us as incoming interns is to read EM case studies prior to us starting and NOT textbooks like Tintanalli's (they said you'll get your fill during actual residency). They want us to get a feel for broad diagnoses, how EM docs think, getting a big picture on common things. Even if you don't go into EM, it's good to learn these kinds of things from a case presentation style.
 
One thing our residency director is telling us as incoming interns is to read EM case studies prior to us starting and NOT textbooks like Tintanalli's (they said you'll get your fill during actual residency). They want us to get a feel for broad diagnoses, how EM docs think, getting a big picture on common things. Even if you don't go into EM, it's good to learn these kinds of things from a case presentation style.

Whats a good resource for this? I read bouncebacks and really enjoyed it. . . if theres a good source of high yield case studies it would be wizard.
 
Whats a good resource for this? I read bouncebacks and really enjoyed it. . . if theres a good source of high yield case studies it would be wizard.

FYI:

I heard this series was excellent:

http://www.amazon.com/Resident-Read...019&sr=8-2-spell&keywords=resident+readinness

51R8GN5k8VL._AA278_PIkin4,BottomRight,-46,22_AA300_SH20_OU01_.jpg
 
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One thing our residency director is telling us as incoming interns is to read EM case studies prior to us starting and NOT textbooks like Tintanalli's (they said you'll get your fill during actual residency). They want us to get a feel for broad diagnoses, how EM docs think, getting a big picture on common things. Even if you don't go into EM, it's good to learn these kinds of things from a case presentation style.

For broad overview of how EPs think, the first couple of chapters of Rosen's aren't bad. I'd recommend reading up on whatever you've seen that you didn't fully have a handle on. In med school that was the Current Concepts review articles in NEJM. For residency, I found doing the PEER question sets as case review and using UpToDate in the pit served well. I like EM:RAP although it focuses a little too heavily on certain topics (I'm looking at you hemodynamically unstable pelvis fractures) that come up all the time in academic EM but don't really have that degree of nuance in the community. I used to listen to EMAbstracts in residency. I stopped because I was convinced that Hoffman and Bukata were hopelessly biased and far too cynical about anything that didn't say that what the community EP is doing is absolutely correct. Having been around long enough to see numerous trials showing how fantastic something is only to have it all reversed 5 years later, I'm considering resubscribing.
 
On a related note, what do you guys recommend to read/keep in white coat for a med student ER rotation? Really trying to make a good impression. I have heard Emergency med secrets is good (700+ pages though) as well as Pocket emergency medicine (it has good differentials based on presenting complaints). Any idea which one is better?
 
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