Pocket Medicine: The Massachusetts General Hospital Handbook of Internal Medicine (Pocket Notebook) Fifth Edition Ring-bound – October 7, 2013

This is a great resource for medical students doing IM rotations. Just wanted to write this review to warn folks when buying this book from 3rd party sellers or other websites. Be especially wary if they are selling brand new books for $30 because they may be fake. It is a bit challenging to distinguish a real copy from a fake one but here are some differences I found:1) The real copy's pages are plastic wrapped and separated from the cover which has rings. You have to open up the pages from the plastic and insert them into the book. The fake ones have the pages already in the rings.2) The pages of fake copies are made with shinier paper while the real copy has rougher paper3) Fake copies generally have blurry text almost as if you used your own household printer. The letters are very sharp in the real copy.4) The cover's colors and fonts are different (but this is very difficult to distinguish unless you compare with the real one side by side)5) Fake copies are slightly largerWell there you go. Apparently this is a very profitable book to counterfeit. Go figure.

Are you on an internal medicine rotation/clerkship? Then you need this quick reference in your pocket. I used this and an iphone subscription to UpToDate and my preceptors gave me good reviews and I did well on the PA end-of-rotation exam. More importantly, however, I kept my head above water on the wards! I definitely used this resource more than anything else and the interns, residents and even my attending now and then would ask to borrow it to look something up on rounds.Know that it has very small print and uses a lot of abbreviations, but it does have a very useful table for abbreviations in the back. It is organized intuitively into sections like 'cardiovascular,' 'renal,' 'oncology,' etc, which make it easy to use. The information is pretty well updated and detailed. No complaints from me! I'll be keeping this book on hand for the next few years, I can tell.

This is a staple for residents, gauging from how many folks on service seem to have this crammed into their pockets. Rounding rooms abound with the older edition, known as the "green book." Thus, if you're a 3rd or 4th year medical student and you're invested in your IM clerkship or 4th year rotations, Pocket Medicine is a huge asset. I highly recommend it.Additional bonus: as another reviewer pointed out, even if you can get Uptodate or Dynamed on your phone, it still seems awkward or weird to pull out a phone during rounds. No one will get on your case about consulting Pocket Medicine.One caveat - guidelines change constantly, so even though this was recently updated, some of the criteria and algorithms within already require updates. Keep a very fine-tipped pen for annotating handy, as the pages are glossy and the print borders on microscopic.

Great book, easy to read, easy to find what you need, and very helpful. If your attending was like mine he hated it when I used my phone too lookup anything, this book became my go to for quick info.Pros:Fits in my white coatEasy to find what you need.Cons:Wish it was easy to clean, after all that time in my pocket and placing it on many table tops, and desk tops it would be interesting to see what type of bacteria we could culture from it.

I am very pleased with this purchase. It's filled with great information and I'm anxious to use it as a resource for my Medicine rotation. I've only heard good things about it and knew I had to invest in it.My only complaint is that the paper is very thin. When putting it into the spiral bound cover, the pages were stuck together and had to be torn apart to read the content. It caused several tears near the hole punched portion of the pages. Luckily there are 6 holes per page, so if 1 or 2 are ripped, it'll survive. I'm a little OCD, but better quality pages for a good quality book would be appreciated.

I LOVE THIS BOOK! This is the Holy Grail of Internal Medicine. Just about everything you need to know is in this pocket-sized book. Don't let the size deceive you though; it is full of high yield, crucial facts, condensed for your benefit. Did your attending ask you a question and you need a few minutes to refresh your memory? Did you need to look something up online on your smart phone, only to find you have no service? Pocket Medicine always delivers. I used this as a medical student during all my clinical rotations, not just Internal Medicine. I was the trend-setter and had all my fellow classmates buy this book too. I am now a medical resident, and this is one thing that will always be in my pocket.

I am a 4th year med student who put off getting this until 4th year due to financial issues. BIG mistake. Even if you cannot afford this book, put it on the credit card. This book is a MUST have for 3rd year, I don't know how I did it without this book. I got it during my ER rotation in 4th year and it helped even with that. It helps with whatever rotation you are on. It is an amazing guide, easy to use, and great when your at a hospital with slow computers.The best reference I have used all of medical school, I told my friend to get it for her husband who is a 2nd year medical student. There is no complaints about this book.

I am a new NP, and I was was hesitant to purchase yet another pocket book.However, if you are new to working in an inpatient setting, this is an amazing resource. A few months into my new job, I realized several of my co-workers had the older (orange) edition of this book, and they still used it even a few years years later. It is very concise information on many critical care processes.I'm not sure why, but it is in a small binder, which could be better because it's almost too many pages to fit and turn well. Also, I can't imaging taking any pages out, so I'm not sure of the need for the binder aspect. Still, Not enough reason to take a star away.

The information is american but still useful for canadian medical students when on the internal medicine wards and specialty clinics

Dopo aver superato lo scoglio delle sigle in inglese (peraltro non sempre spiegate nell'esiguo glossario delle sigle a fine libro) posso affermare che tutti i medici di medicina interna dovrebbero averlo nel camice.Lo consiglio caldamente.La versione con miniraccoglitore e fogli intercambiabili lascia un po' a desiderare. Dopo una manciata di volte che lo si apre le plastiche del raccoglitore cedono e a me ad es. si è staccata la copertina. Se si fosse fatto in brossura secondo me costava meno ed era più pratico, tanto nessuno si sognerebbe di togliere qlc foglio, sono tutti indispensabili!!

The entirety of clinical medicine in your pocket!

Great tool for your everyday practice, even in Germany can help you around when you feel you need that extra tip or push! One of the best pocket books for medicine if not the best.

Nice product. 2014 edition. Very helpful during duties.