Customer Reviews

Gray's Anatomy for Students

5 star:		(19)
4 star:		(6)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

This is the single book that has made me enjoy anatomy. As a second year medical student who previously used Moore's Anatomy, I have to say this book is vastly superior, as another reviewer mentioned.

Here's what you get: the book itself, online access to the book's contents, and 6 months of "big Gray's" online.

The book is very well-organised. It uses the time-tested tradition of segmenting the book by anatomical location (abdomen, pelvis, head & neck, etc.) like most other books. In each section, there is an overview section, and then it delves into each portion (e.g. Pharynx, Larynx, Nasal Cavity, Oral Cavity, etc.). For each of those sections, it then covers the bone/cartilages and ligaments, muscles, blood vessels, lymphatics and nerves in order. The table of contents list things so well, that I use it more than the index, something I cannot say about many other books.

The text is extremely clear, and doesn't use any unnecessary obfuscation. :) However, it is also very precise, meaning that it usually uses the correct anatomical words to describe locations of structures --- make sure you learn that well because it is the way it ought to be done. It also uses the updated Terminologia Anatomica terminologies. So, instead of finding the Eustachian tube, you have to look for the pharyngotympanic tube. This is both good and bad though, as your school might still not use the correct terms. Most of the time they do include the alternative names (ligament of Trietz, Sphincter of Oddi, etc.) for reference, but not always, as in the case of the Eustachian tube.

There are also many tables and figures. Muscles are always presented in both the text and tables to summarise their actions, origin, insertion, etc.. The figures are all very clear, and large with some taking up the whole page with clear labels. Most of the time, everything referred to in the text is also found on the figures (referenced by the text, or in the pages around that topic). This is not true for many other anatomy books, forcing the students to flip all over the books to get a clearer picture (especially if the index doesn't work, like in Moore's!) This can still be further improved in future editions, but as it is, I am satisfied (a big improvement over other texts I have used).

And yes, the index is very well organised, and indicates the pages with figures for the topic. I have yet to fail to find figures in the book using the index.

There are also good clinical discussions, questions, and also radiographic pictures (x-rays, ultrasound, CT, MRI).

At UCSD we take Human anatomy in the fall of our second year of medical school. Typically our faculty recommend a different text and I bought that book and used it for our first section, thorax. I wasn't impressed and so I started shopping around for a more student friendly resource. The Gray's Anatomy for Medical Students was just what I was looking for.

The front cover pulls you in as it sits there on the dining room table; it is just easier to start reading a book that looks like it has good pictures. When you open it up, you aren't disappointed. From the beautiful large illustrations to high quality radiographs, I was consistently satisfied with the attention that had been put into integrating structure with clinical relavance. I loved the color coded sections and the good sized, easy to read print. It is amazing to me how often publishers forget that med students read all the time and our eyes get tired. It is refreshing to pick up a course text and not have to squint to read it. Many of my classmates who had stuck with the faculty recommended text were envious of my beautiful, easy to read Gray's for Med Students.

On top of these obvious benefits, the text organizes the material in way that facilitates learning. Each section begins with a conceptual over view, the "Big Picture, and then gradually pares down the material by regional anatomy. The surface anatomy part of each section is extremely useful when trying to integrate your anatomy with physical exams and living bodies. Additionally, each section concludes with clinical cases that reinforce and highlight concepts that are essential for real world medicine and surgery.

The online Student Consult access was just icing on the cake. It was great to be able to search my text book from any computer regardless of if I had my text with me. I also liked being able to print images from the text for writing study notes.

Overall, I was extremely happy with this text for my medical school anatomy course. I've already been using it to review anatomy for the USMLE Step 1 and I'm looking forward to cracking it open again for a refresher on my surgery rotation this next year. I highly recommend this book!

I'm a first year medical student who just finished three grueling months of gross anatomy. The required textbook for the course was Moore's Clincally Oriented Anatomy, but when I looked at it for the first time I just knew that myself and that book WERE NOT going to get along. The paragraphs seemed convuluted, and it went to far too much detail.

So when I was online one day and was looking at the soundtrack for the ABC show "Grey's Anatomy", I saw a link for the anatomy textbook titled "Gray's Anatomy". After reading some reviews and taking a look at for myself in a local bookstore, I was convinced that this was the book I was going to use....and it was HIGHLY useful and effective despite the fact that Moore's was the official text for the course. It is organized in a way that makes it easy to read and extremely informative. I would reccommend this text to any medical student over Moore's Clinically Oriented Anatomy anyday.....

A very useful book, easy to use with informative text that is easy to read. Great illustrations. A good study aid.

The progression of topics within sections makes it a relatively easy read and the illustrations are great to supplement the text. The companion website has excellent resources. Clinical applications are italicized as they come up in the chapters and are an interesting diversion from the pure anatomy.

This is a concise version of the grandfather of all anatomy books, the famous Gray's anatomy. Perfect for biomedical students of all disciplines it has the best diagrams available in full, rich colour. Organised according to region, and cross referenced to system, it has many clinically related text boxes linking the anatomy to a clinical pathology/condition.

Well written and easy to understand. An easy 10/10. I totally recommend it!

Pros:
Good organization of the material
Chapters are structured in a way that helps learning
Images are unique in their approach to demonstrating the anatomy

Cons:
I've heard from several unrelated sources that the book has lots of inaccuracies in it (I've yet to find one)
Many of the diagrams are oblique views that take some time to figure out the orientation and then relate it to anatomical position

Dense book with excellent illustrations and good text. Helpful but lacking solid overviews at the beginning of chapters and connections between systems. Also not very helpful index. I would look elsewhere for another text to accompany this one or perhaps a better all-around text.

This is very good book with nice pictures, clear anatomical views.

This book is awesome - great graphs and illustration, and simple and explinatory text! It's like a hybrid between Netter, Moore and Snell! Excellent stuff, highly recommended! The best all-around anatomy book available for med-students!