Textbooks for rotations?

[mercaptovizadeh]

If you know Robbins well and then also the "established" book for a particular rotation, such as Nelson's or Harrison's - would you be well prepared to impress on a clerkship or is more in depth knowledge necessary?

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[45408]

Robbins is probably overkill, and if you actually knew the full editions of Nelson's and Harrison's, you'd be teaching the attendings new things. So, no, more in-depth knowledge is not necessary. At least, I never got pimp questions anywhere near that intensity, and the shelf for medicine certainly didn't require detailed knowledge of a huge textbook (I never even looked in Harrison's - I just used Step Up, Pretest and Case Files, and I did fairly well).

If you want to impress, read up on the latest guidelines for the treatments your patients are receiving. It sounds a lot better to say "Recommended antibiotic treatment for this infection is this drug for that duration" than "How about a week of Cipro?" I've had at least several attendings ask things like "What's the literature say about this?"

 

[themudphud]

I generally study by reading a Step II question/answer book and read the literature (e.g. look up on pubmed) about clinical cases and questions I come across during the rotation.

 

[bigDinLV]

I liked blueprints (for FP, peds, OB/GYN, IM,and psych) for general information. A good base that you can build on and add anything specific that comes along.

Not too heavy, about 300+ pages per book. Read 10-20 pages per night and you'll have the general stuff covered.

 

[BigRedBeta]

If you want to impress, it's better to have an article about the clinical problem at hand. Use UpToDate to find the citation for the data or recommendation and then go into PubMed to find the actual article and print that out.

Obviously this doesn't help you for those off the cuff questions, but those really aren't opportunities to shine anyways.

The other to realize is that you're not going to have the time on clerkships to read anything like Harrison's or Nelson's...just not going to happen. If youre at the hospital for 10 or 12 hours every day with a call night thrown in every so often, you're not going home to read for 4 more hours.

Further, even if you did somehow manage to read the full text books over the course of a clerkship, 80% of the topics in one of those text books are going to be incredibly low yield for a junior medical student to know. You're not becoming board certified in the course of 6, 8 or 12 weeks.

 

[SouthernSurgeon]

You confuse me. In one thread you're asking for 3rd year reading recs...in another you're asking about scheduling aways for 4th year...in another talking about being MD/PhD and how long it will be until you are back in the clinical setting...

 

[mercaptovizadeh]

Thanks all for the advice.

SouthernIM: yes, I'm on hiatus from rotations, just wanted to get some input on what those away rotations were like and whether it's worth my while on the side to read up on Harrison's and Robbins during the "off" years. Sounds like it's not.

 

[anon-y-mouse]

Thanks all for the advice.

SouthernIM: yes, I'm on hiatus from rotations, just wanted to get some input on what those away rotations were like and whether it's worth my while on the side to read up on Harrison's and Robbins during the "off" years. Sounds like it's not.

Honestly, I wish I could have read all of Harrison's, and maybe one day I will. I read all of Robbins second year, and that was really satisfying. Read because you want to enrich your medical knowledge, not to impress or do well (for that purpose, you can read step up / the other books people suggested above). The only issue is that the stuff may not make sense if you haven't seen that particular case in the flesh-- I know that if I tried to read Harrison's before I had a week of IM, I would probably be really ridiculously confused.

 

[SLUser11]

Thanks all for the advice.

SouthernIM: yes, I'm on hiatus from rotations, just wanted to get some input on what those away rotations were like and whether it's worth my while on the side to read up on Harrison's and Robbins during the "off" years. Sounds like it's not.

Some of my classmates swore by "Boards and Wards," but I never really used anything for rotations beyond my trusty "Bluprints and Pretest" formula. The textbooks you may need for each rotation are better off being perused in the library. I really don't recommend buying any for rotations.

And, like someone else said, Up to Date is an excellent resource during your entire 3rd year (and beyond).

 

[45408]

UpToDate is great for things like "What the heck? I've never heard of Loeys-Dietz before!" or getting a quick answer to a common question. It's also nice for a little background information on things.