Synopsis
As part of the popular High-Yield(tm) Series, this updated Second Edition provides a succinct review in outline format of psychiatry for students preparing for the USMLE.
Doody Review Services
Reviewer:Pamela Vergara- Rodriguez, MD(Rush University Medical Center)
Description:This slim 150-page book serves as an easy to read overview of psychiatry. It uses bold text to emphasize key words and summary tables to compare individual disorders.
Purpose:The book aims to define the basic psychiatric diagnoses based on DSM-IV criteria as well as outline the most common treatment modalities. This concise review ultimately serves as a medical student's starter kit for a psychiatric rotation. It may also be used as a quick-read for the medical student's final exam.
Audience:The audience should include primarily medical students in their first rotation of psychiatry. Psychiatric residents would find the material oversimplified. Nonpsychiatric residents would do better with a case-based review book.
Features:The book offers tables for nearly every set of definitions, disorders, and treatments. It gives information on certain topics that are commonly overlooked such as geriatric psychiatry and legal and ethical issues in psychiatry. Additional reading is required for greater understanding of the individual disorders, psychotropic management, and emergency psychiatry.
Assessment:This book serves its purpose as a basic guide to the DSM-IV definitions and diagnosis for third year medical students preparing for their psychiatric rotation. The information is given in a simple user-friendly style but still lacks enough case reviews to serve as preparation for the USMLE Step 2 and 3.