Starting derm residency soon...recommended study methods / materials?

[DermalDanger]

Hi all,

I am 6 weeks away from starting derm.
If anyone has recommendations regarding worthwhile study methods / books / materials, i would greatly appreciate it.

Student doctor was an invaluable resource for me through med school, and helped me tailor my time towards high yield resources and useful strategies.
I am hoping the derm boards have some equally effective advice.

Thank you in advance!! ^_^

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[asmallchild]

Hi all,

I am 6 weeks away from starting derm.
If anyone has recommendations regarding worthwhile study methods / books / materials, i would greatly appreciate it.

Student doctor was an invaluable resource for me through med school, and helped me tailor my time towards high yield resources and useful strategies.
I am hoping the derm boards have some equally effective advice.

Thank you in advance!! ^_^

I wouldn't purchase anything just yet, most programs have a didactics schedule in place and will usually provide the books they want you to review (core books at least, you may need to supplement in certain areas). The advice I have is pretty generic. See as much as you can in clinic even though those around you may lose that urgency. You would be amazed at how even the most enthusiastic of students trying to get into derm suddenly morph into lazy-won't-pick-up-a-chart residents once they've matched. Read as much as you can after clinic. I don't subscribe to the theory that you have to read daily in order to be successful, although that certainly makes plowing through the material more manageable. But you do need to have a schedule of some sort whether it's the weekend, weekdays only, or a slow, steady daily pace.

 

[DermViser]

Unlike other specialties, Derm is really a field in which you're truly not expected to come in knowing anything from Day 1. Depending on your program, you really do have enough time to read either outside of clinic hours and/or on the weekends. Most residency programs have a structured reading schedule for the different core texts that your residency gets for you (Bolognia, Andrews, Wolverton, Rapini) which you'll go thru at resident conferences, you'll probably get the Galderma board review binder that all residents get, free Derm journal subscriptions, etc. while you're in residency for journal club, etc.

If you're really that gungho (and are truly getting sick of your prelim year), start with the Habif atlas (the small book) and/or Derm Secrets book as a primer to start getting the lingo down. During residency, besides what asmallchild said above, I would add to constantly expose yourself to pictures whether they be in book atlases, Kodachromes your residency has, Google images, etc. I felt that being able to correlate a patient with a picture - skin or histology, within the same time period really helped cement things.