Customer Reviews

First Aid for the Family Medicine Boards (FIRST AID Specialty Boards)

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

 

 

When I first saw the book, I was under the impression it had some practice questions to go along with the material. This is not true. There are no questions in the book and the information is provided in different chapters and arranged almost in an outline form with many charts to supplement the material. I do think it is important to do some study questions as preparation for the test but given that this is not the purpose of this book, I find it hard to fault it for the lack of questions.

As far as the information is presented - it's actually pretty well done. It casts a wide enough web to hit the major topics and presents it in a way that makes it so you don't snooze off as if you're reading a textbook. Don't let the outline form fool you - there's a LOT of information in this book. It misses some of the random esoteric questions that the family medicine board exam has but it gives a pretty good framework for the stuff you should know.

For those of you that are taking the Family Medicine Boards, definitely do the practice questions on the website. They say that none of the questions will be in the actual exam but I found that a lot of the same information on the practice questions is on the actual test.

Very comprehensive review book for the boards. Lots of good hints and facts without being overwhelming. I especially liked the Derm chapter, quite trenchant.

I initially purchased Swansons to study with but quickly decided I hated it. There are soooo many typos and it doesn't provide very detailed explanations. Some friends were editing First Aid and I decided to give it a try. It's in the usual First Aid format, which I was used to. Provided good explanations and I don't think I encountered anything on the exam that I hadn't read in the book. My study plan including reading First Aid front to back and doing as many of the practice questions on the AAFP website (free) and old in-service exams as possible (ended up doing about 800 questions). Several of the questions were repeated word for word on the actual exam. Overall, First Aid was a great part of my studying and I will definitely buy it again when I'm up for recertification.

The only downside I found is that the Women's Health section is a little disorganized and could contain more material. That was my strongest area though so I felt prepared. If you haven't done ob or gyn in a long time though, you might want some additional materials. It also does not provide many sample EKGs for review.

This is a great review book before the examination. It has lots of facts to digest and is well organized in topics and questions. This is a good review book for family practice certification or recertification examinations.

This book is great for clinical rotations. It's reasonably portable. The sections are easy to navigate so you can find the snippet of information that you need. I like the memory tips too.

It's kind of good for review if someone has time but I think it's as not as good as the other First Aids. I like the Mnemonics to help jog my memory.

I was disappointed after buying this review book for my Kindle and finding that you can't select the section you want to read from the table of contents and jump right to it. You have to scroll through page after page in order to get to the section you desire. Don't know if this can be fixed, but would be a huge improvement to the use of the book on the Kindle.

Pretty good summary and add on resource for standard family medicine texts and question banks. The only downside is the price, which I think is a bit inflated because of the "first aid" name that everyone at the stage of requring board cert reviews is very comfortable with.

Tables are extremely difficult to read on my first-generation Kindle. I'm getting a new Kindle today (Jan 2011) and I'll see if there's an improvement and edit the review. Plus, the book is about 4 years old now. This worries me because of changing recommendations for family medicine. Take the simple aspirin, for example.