Textbook list (if any) for UWO

[Guest monkey]

hmmm..as the title says it, i cannot find a list of possible books for 1st yr med in UWO...help UWOMEDS2005?

[Guest UWOMED2005]

I think this is covered on the http://www.mni.uwo.ca/discus forum. . . there you can get other meds 2005 opinions, on this is somewhat subjective.

 

I'd say you can break down the text requirements into 4 categories:

 

REQUIRED:

 

-Netter OR Yohen & Rokochi Anatomy Atlas

-Bates's Guide to Clinical Examination (the 4th years tell me this is a pretty useless text by the time you get to clerkship; there are better guides to clinical examinations, but this is the one they teach out of in first year. Ask around and you might be able to buy it off a 2005er.)

 

HIGHLY RECOMMENDED (by,well, uh, me):

- Janeway's Immunology. Only if you don't have another Immunology text, and Immunology comes in the last quarter, so you can wait.

- Clinical Microbiology made Ridiculously Simple. It makes microbiology ridiculously simple (or at least close to). This one too maybe can wait until 4th quarter when you'll cover most of micro in one week.

- Wheater's Histology. I think the Histology lectures are the weakest part of the Western curriculum. . . supposedly, they're going to completely reorganize things for next year and one of the proposals is to teach the course out of Wheater's. Even if they don't, I'd almost recommend getting Wheater's just so you understand Histology better. It might not help for exams, but it will help you understand.

- A good simplified Neuroanatomy guide (Ian mentioned the best one in another thread). Because (at least I found that) neuroanatomy is really, really hard.

 

USEFUL:

- A good embryology or Developmental biology textbook. I didn't have one and wish I did as this was my first time studying embryology.

- A good physiology textbook. I bought Johnson's Essential Medical Physiology - it seemed to be more than the essentials, with a lot of physics and equations and no colour pictures . I think Guyton's physiology textbook is more on the level of what you need to know. A good physiology textbook will cover most of what you need to know for most body systems.

- Moore's Clinical Anatomy. It's very thick but covers Anatomy quite well. . . so if you want to kick some butt in anatomy (one of the tougher courses at UWO) it's worthwhile.

- Rubin's pathology. Supposedly it is excellent, though I didn't buy it. It's also supposed to be useful for 2nd year.

 

ABSOLUTELY USELESS AND WILL CLUTTER YOUR BOOKSHELF AND VISA BILL:

 

C. Shah - "Determinants of Public Health in Canada" or something like that. The epidemiology prof will tell you to buy it because it is "interesting." It's not. I read about two pages before falling asleep and haven't touched it since.

 

Don't worry TOO much beyond Bates & an Anatomy atlas. The UWO meds notes are pretty thorough in most cases, and all of the above books are available on overnight loan from the LRC or the library.

 

I'll try starting another thread do the same for equipment.

[Guest JSS02]

Do we want the full Bates' Guide to Physical Examination and History Taking, or is the "pocket version" good enough? Anyway, the first one is on sale at chapters.ca for $75 (compared to over $100 at amazon).

[Guest Ian Wong]

I'd get the full one, which again is what 99% of your classmates who buy a clinical skills book will purchase. I personally think that developing good clinical skills is what separates good medical students from great medical students; it's a real art that takes a while to master.

 

You might as well get the big book to start with, and learn from that. You'll almost certainly end up selling it later on, and getting the standard one will make it easier to re-sell later to an incoming med student.

 

If you are thinking about a small clinical skills book, I think there are a couple of pretty good small clinical skills books, one being Epstein's, and the other being the one published by the U of T med class. I think I've reviewed both of them in this forum.

 

Ian

UBC, Med 3

[Guest JSS02]

OK. I noticed that there's a new edition coming out soon (updated at the UWO bookstore but not at the other sites I've checked), so it might be worth holding out for. However if the older edition is just as good then you can save $30 by ordering from Chapters/Indigo.

[Guest Ian Wong]

It'll be the same thing. Clinical skills hasn't evolved in the last 100 years; if anything, it's gotten significantly worse over that time as people have become more and more reliant on technology. The same is true for most basic science books, such as physiology, pathology, anatomy, histology, etc. Where getting a more up to date book might help is in anything to do with treatment, eg. the Merck Manual, any pharmaceutical books, etc.

 

However, by buying the older edition, you obviously aren't going to be able to re-sell it for as much as a newer book, (and the truth is, if you buy a book that most people like, you can easily re-sell it), so you don't gain all that much in the end by buying older editions. Rather, the best deals are to buy a used book of the current edition, if you can find them.

 

Ian

UBC, Med 3

[Guest UWOMED2005]

I bought last year's version (7th edition?), and then happened to get the previous edition when buying a huge library of books off a 4th year. The two editions are exactly the same, with just a different coloured cover.

 

Bates is pretty much essential for first year, but I've heard a number of clerks/4th years mention that there are much better clinical exam books out there (Ian could probably comment way better on this.) Personally, I've already picked up the U of T "Essentials of Clinical Examination" Handbook and Berg's "Advanced Clinical Skills and Physical Diagnosis" (off the aforementioned 4th year.) U of T book is nice because it is pocket sized and summarizes Bates pretty well (though it has that ugly U of T logo on it ) and Berg is nice because it's much more advanced than Bates, and goes much more into diseases. Wait on both of these though. There will probably be a class order on the U of T book and you can probably pick up the Berg book for cheap off of a 4th year.

 

BTW - the 4th years tend to sell a lot of books during April before taking off for residency. I was able to pick up a bunch of textbooks that usually run for $50-100 for $10-30! It's a great way to pick up books for Clerkship for cheap.

[Guest Ian Wong]

Talley and O'Connor is the best Clinical Skills book that I know of. Unfortunately, I think it's also a bit higher-level than what the average first year med student should be learning, so I suggest that you use Bate's to get the basics, and then sell it and pick up Talley and O'Connor when you actually want to develop those skills further. I've reviewed it below in this forum, but for some reason all the punctuation is garbled.

 

Ian

UBC, med 3