Greenspan. Basic & Clinical Endocrinology

[Guest Ian Wong]

Basic and Clinical Endocrinology, 5th Ed. Greenspan, F. S., Strewler, G. J. 1997. Appleton & Lange. Stamford, Connecticut.

 

ISBN: 0-8385-0588-0

Chapters/Indigo.ca price: $59.95

Pages: 823

 

I was recommended this book by a Med 4 student, and this book was also part of the Required Reading list from UBC Medicine. Even though I bought this book at the beginning of my Endocrinology block, I still found that I didn't use it very often. Thankfully, the endocrine section at UBC was very well taught, with extensive handouts for each lecture. Also, my strategy for this block was that I'd previously purchased a number of USMLE prep books, and therefore used these instead. The two major texts I used here were First Aid for the USMLE and Cracking the Boards by the Princeton Review. These books are designed to give students a quick refresher in major topics on each subject before writing the first part of the US Board exams. As such, reading the USMLE prep sections on Endocrinology gave me a good foundation for the basics of hormone feedback loops and pathways, and gave a short introduction to many common diseases involving each endocrine organ. eg. Hashimoto's thyroiditis, Cushing's disease (adrenal glands), central diabetes insipidus (posterior pituitary).

 

For the complex parts of our Endocrinology block, such as the flow charts of lab tests and clinical exams needed to rule in or rule out your differential diagnosis, our class notes were excellent and most importantly, probably correspond quite well to the actual tests performed at our local Vancouver hospitals. As a result, I didn't need to use the Lange textbook that much, and so I can't really comment too much on it. In fact, a new edition of this book was released the month after our Endocrinology block. Talk about bad timing!

 

As for the textbook itself, it's quite text-dense, with all diagrams being in black and white, with a third bluish-grey colour. My opinion is that this textbook is on the difficult side to read; I found it nearly impossible to read more than five pages or so at a stretch, although perhaps that's because I have no great love for endocrinology itself! I also found this textbook to be a little too detailed for my liking, and it's probably most useful for a resident or fellow looking to refresh on clinical details, and not as useful for a medical student trying to learn the material for the first time. For example, the section on the adrenal glands spans three chapters and 86 pages! This is not a book you want to be reading the night before Adrenal Week to get the big picture, nor is it likely to be something you will read through while prepping for final exams.

 

In particular, I find Endocrinology to seem even "bigger" and "denser" than it already is, because for me, Endocrinology is a very physical and time-intensive subject. Unlike something a little more brain-dead like Microbiology where you can cram to your heart's content, I found it necessary to draw out pathways and really trace out all the intrinsic feedback loops and tests before arriving at the solution to a clinical problem. For that reason, five pages of Endocrinology might take half an hour to cover for me, but I could breeze through five pages of Microbiology Made Ridiculously Simple in ten minutes (less if using the cramming section so thoughtfully provided in Ridiculously Simple, and lacking in the Encrinology Lange book). Because of this, I made heavy use of my USMLE prep books and my lecture notes, and didn't use this textbook a lot. I think you would get maximum benefit from this book if you've already got previous experience in Endocrinology, and weren't using it to get the big picture.

 

Of course, you've really got to look at the material you are being tested on, and whether the Lange textbook covers that. I found the book too detailed for my tastes, and I don't think it's clear to me that I would have gained much more from studying with the book. At UBC, the exam seemed to be very heavily weighted towards the lecture notes and presentations, and the combination of lecture notes for clinical exams and testing protocols, and a general reference book like the Merck Manual for the actual disease symptoms and treatment was sufficient for me. I'm fairly certain that a medical physiology textbook would have a pretty good treatment of Endocrinology to the level that you are expected to learn as a medical student.

 

This is probably a block that you want to learn well; if your curriculum is at all like UBC, you'll encounter the same material again and again. We got quite a good review of Endocrinology in our second term of Med 2, during our Brain and Behaviour, Reproduction, and Growth and Development/Pediatrics blocks.

 

In Summary, I don't think I needed to purchase this textbook. For the level of Endocrinology that I was expected to know during our five-week block, the Lange book was over-kill. It has too much information spread out over too many pages. It might be a handy book to have available as a desk reference, but I personally didn't use it enough to justify its cost.

[Guest milkytooth]

We used it as our main textbook and I find it too detailed and badly organized.

[Guest Ian Wong]

Yeah, I thought it sucked. Don't buy this book. (I wonder why all my punctuation in the review is messed up?)

 

Ian

UBC, Med 3