Customer Reviews

First Aid for the Wards: Insider Advice for the Clinical Years

5 star:		(4)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

What I liked best about this book was the sample SOAP/Admit/Orders that they give, plus all the crazy acronyms that they expect you to know. I found it really made me look like a superstar because I would write a "sample note" on an index card and carry it in my white coat. So when it came time for me to write notes, I didn't miss much. Every clerkship has their expectations for note writing and this book is so helpful especially in your 3rd year when you know zippo about how to write good notes. Highly recommended. Plus it gives you a brief synopsis of what each clerkship is about, and for the most part, it is pretty right on.

Bhushan and Le have created a guide that is most useful as an introduction to the ward experience for medical students. They discuss particulars about each rotation and this information is certainly important for students to read before each rotation. Although I do recommend this book to my students, I also encourage them to use another book entitled the 101 Biggest Mistakes 3rd Year Medical Students Make and How to Avoid Them. This latter book is the only book I know of that helps students recognize the major mistakes that are made during clinical clerkships. By using First Aid for the Wards and 101 Biggest Mistakes 3rd Year Medical Students Make and How to Avoid Them together, students will place themselves in a position to do their best work during their clinical clerkships.

The best part of this book is the reviews of other books. For each clerkship, a review of books in the categories of textbook, review size book and pocket size books is given. Definitely use their reviews as a guide to the immense amount of shelf and board review material available. The rest of this book consists mostly of description of different clerkships which may be more or less applicable to those at your home institution. I would suggest a quick skim of those areas. If you have this in your medical bookstore or library you may just want to skim the section about the clerkships shortly before it begins and use the review of books to chose reading material.

I bought a used copy for $3 along with a new copy of FA for the Wards 4th edition. I'd say FA for the WARDS pretty much covers everything you need to get started with a new rotation thus making much of what is in the Insider book a bit redundant. Nonetheless, it does contain lots of helpful tidbits of information that can really make your day on the floor that much easier. - Gabriel Labbad

This was a book that I used intermittently thru my rotations and wouldn't have felt as prepared (although each rotation will always have suprises)if I didn't have it. Strong points include: notes/and or orders tailored to each rotation, tips on etiquette, and brief reviews of the major conditions that you'll likely see. This book was given as a gift and I had thought I wouldn't use it much (even at first glance), but I find myself relying on it throughout my rotations in addition to other sources that highlight in depth information I am expected to know.

A great idea - just a few pages dedicated to each discipline which allows for it to be read rather quickly. That book doesn't dawdle on the tiny details, but focuses on the key points needed to succeed without leaving important information.

This book is a great resource for any medical student on rotations! Get it before you start your third year and keep it close until graduation. It will even be helpful as you rotate through your intern year!

This is a great book to buy for 3rd year. It covers a lot of ground and includes something that I've wanted for a long time: book reviews by and for medical students. NOTE: while shopping for this title I read many reviews that suggested buying 101 Biggest Mistakes 3rd Year Medical Students Make and How to Avoid Them - don't buy that book! It's all common sense and a waste of money. This book plus Tarascon Publishing's "How to be a truly excellent junior medical student" are a much, much better combonation.

This book will be useful particularly for those who have taken some time off between their basic science and clinical years in medical school. It is a good refresher of knowledge for the wards.

I bought this book at the start of my third year in med school (I'm now MS4). It was useful for just one thing: making me feel less nervous about starting clinical rotations, since it gave me a general idea of what would be expected of me. The most useful parts of the book are the ward tips that give you a feel for the setup of each service. The actual review of relevant topics was pretty poor - too many details to be a broad overview of what you should be learning, but not enough details for you to learn each topic well enough, so you end up reading the same information again in a textbook. Also, once you do one rotation, many of the tips given in the book are useless, since by that time you will have a pretty good idea of what is expected of you and how the wards work. I didn't spend much time on this book once my first rotation started, and I stopped using it completely during the second rotation.