Physician-informed medical book reviews and clinical education resources.
Dr. Timothy Root’s OphthoBook, videos and flashcards are entertaining, memorable, and super high-yield. In fact, according to the book’s subtitle, it is “The funniest, cartooniest, most high-yieldiest book about eye diseases ever written” – and I agree. I consider these to be among the finest medical educational resources on the internet, and I recommend them … Read more
I believe that it is not possible to practice general medicine intelligently without knowing the contents of this book very well. This is the only monograph about antibiotics that I know of which focuses heavily, and sometimes exclusively, on the why of antibiotic selection. And when it comes to antibiotic selection, you need to know why you are … Read more
Robbins and Cotran Atlas of Pathology by Edward C. Klatt MD contains more than 1,500 high-yield medical images, including clinical and intraoperative photographs, pictures of gross pathology specimens, blood smears, H&E stains, electron micrographs, funduscopic and endoscopic images, plain radiographs, CTs, ultrasonographic images, MRIs, and many other. The pictures are generally clear and clinically relevant, with authoritative and concise … Read more
You can judge this book by its title. Illegal Drugs: A Complete Guide to Their History, Chemistry, Use, and Abuse (2003) by Paul M. Gahlinger MD is, in fact, an extremely comprehensive treatment of both illegal and legal psychoactive substances, including their history, law, chemistry, processing and distribution, metabolism, neuroscience, medical management, linguistics, folklore, and popular culture. Hundreds of … Read more
Clinician’s Guide to Laboratory Medicine: Pocket (2009) by Samir P. Desai MD is an excellent handbook about the use laboratory studies in clinical medicine. Almost every laboratory abnormality contains an extensive differential diagnosis, along with an intelligent and efficient approach to further workup and diagnosis. It contains dozens of useful charts, algorithms and tables. The hematology and … Read more
Primary Care Otolaryngology is a free downloadable publication by the American Academy of Otolaryngology-Head and Neck Surgery. You can get it here. The original version of the book was written by J. Gregory Staffel, MD more than fifteen years ago and was most recently updated in 2011. It was written primarily for medical students, but it would serve … Read more
Acing the Hepatology Questions on the GI Board Exam, the Ultimate Crunch-Time Resource by Brennan M.R. Spiegel (2012) is an excellent choice for anyone who is looking for a solid understanding of hepatic pathology, diagnostics and therapeutics. The book is vignette-driven and features most of the important and high-yield hepatic conditions including acetaminophen overdose, viral hepatitides, and dozens … Read more