Textbook Authorship

[Gracile]

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I recently was offerred an opportunity to write a Derm textbook. I am very excited about this opportunity for sure but just wondering how much weight writing a textbook carries in comparison to clinical research.

Thanks guys!

 

[starbuckscoffee]

I recently was offerred an opportunity to write a Derm textbook. I am very excited about this opportunity for sure but just wondering how much weight writing a textbook carries in comparison to clinical research.

Thanks guys!

When I was on my interviews, people seemed much more interested in the research papers I had published than in the textbook chapter I authored. A textbook chapter just doesn't really provide interesting information for discussion.

It looks good to be the first author of a textbook chapter, but if this will prevent you from doing quality clinical research, you may want to choose the clinical research instead. If you have a full-time research rotation, I bet you can do both though. When you're doing clinical research, there's often down time while you're searching for patients to enroll, getting various things approved by the IRB, and waiting for drafts of publications to be reviewed by your coauthors. I always liked to have some type of writing project going on that I could work on while there were delays in my research project.

 

[N-Surge]

Sounds like what happened to one of my friends when he was offered to re-write encyclopedia Britanica in its entirety (he frequents this forum as well). Instead he took up a research opportunity developing lasers for toenail fungus removal.

I jest of course. But yeah, I'd go with research any day. It pushes what we know (and don't) further ahead. 👍

 

[Tamahawk]

I agree with the above posts. Even though research and textbook chapters (or in-depth review articles) take an almost-equal amount of time and effort, programs view research much more favorably. That said, if the person who offered you the textbook chapter is also the person that you know best and will be writing your LOR, it might be worthwhile to agree to write the chapter sometime in your 4th year (when you have more time).

 

[sore eye asses]

i never wrote a chapter because it seemed impossible and presumptuous to write in detail about a subject that so many others already know better than i. it seemed akin to a fourth grader writing a report on puberty, and then presenting it to a bunch of high schoolers.

if you are up to the task, then write the chapter (or was it an entire book?), but i agree with all above that original research is probably viewed more favorably, and is actually easier to do in many cases.

 

[N-Surge]

i never wrote a chapter because it seemed impossible and presumptuous to write in detail about a subject that so many others already know better than i. it seemed akin to a fourth grader writing a report on puberty, and then presenting it to a bunch of high schoolers.

if you are up to the task, then write the chapter (or was it an entire book?), but i agree with all above that original research is probably viewed more favorably, and is actually easier to do in many cases.

You are so modest. I was referring to you. 🙂