Customer Reviews

EMS Medication Field Guide, Fourth Edition

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The EMS Medication Pocket Field Guide by Dillman is a monster in comparison to the LaSage ALS EMS Field Guide. It's nearly twice as thick and a touch wider (7/8" thick x 3 1/4" wide x 6 1/4" (including spiral which is 1 3/16" diameter) vs. LaSage at (<7/16 thick x 3 wide x 5 5/8" tall). Dillman's is too big to make it into my uniform shirt pocket where the LaSage fits acceptably.
However, it has listings for roughly twice the prescription meds (~3400 vs. 1600) and a much heavier focus on toxicology. Half of the guide (113 of 207 pages) is devoted to the prescription meds, and it is in the same style as LaSage except that there is no mention of generic names in the trade name listings, and vice-versa. About 60 pages are devoted to description of the different drug classes. There's a nice pharmacological differentials section that lists potential pharmacological causes for different SxS, as well as other perks such as a slightly more thorough lab value section. This makes a great supplement to LaSage. Contrary to what you might guess from the title, there's no generic formulary section (which in my opinion is good given the supplementary role that this guide fills).
They put some time into creating this, and it was a worthwhile purchase. Hopefully in future versions they will make it more compact, taking out a lot of the unused white space, and do little things such as round the corners, improve the indexing some, and add cross referencing between trade and generic names, all of which I'd be willing to pay a touch more for. In summary, if you are at all frustrated by the incompleteness of the drug listings or the lack of toxicology in LaSage, Dillman's is a valuable guide.

I had been looking for a book such as this for a long time. While the paramedic field guides are useful for a 1st year medic, they quickly loose their value once the new medic becomes proficent. However, the EMS Medication Field Guide is useful to quickly determine most every prescription a PT could have and it's general effects. It is a valuable tool for the OD PTs. I strongly recommend this book and have given it as a gift for a medic student.

I am an EMT (soon to be medic) who just started working on the night shift a couple months ago. It was an eye opener to get call after call for overdoses and to see the variety of drugs used. This guide helped me in determining which drugs could cause potential damage and at what doses. About half of the guide is a large list of prescription meds and there drug class. Next is a section explaining different drug classes (corticosteroids, benzos, narcotics, and so on). In these sections it gives a list of drugs that fit in the class, the effects of an overdose on that drugs, the toxicology, and what signs and symptoms might be present in a person who overdosed on that drug. The next section is "Clinical Differentials". It starts with the signs and symptoms and helps you identify what drugs are capable of causing the symptom. The guide also gives minimum lethal dosages of many drugs (for a 150 lb. person). It explains the dangers and lethal dosages of various abused substances. It has a list of antidotes to certain substances. That is just the basics of this guide and there is a lot more. I am very happy with the buy and got a lot more than I was expecting. My only worry is that it is going to get worn out very quickly sitting in pocket for 12 hour shifts. Still highly recommended.