Product Description

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #6337 in Books
• Published on: 2008-10-01
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 464 pages

Features

• ISBN13: 9780781779418
• Condition: USED - VERY GOOD
• Notes:
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Customer Reviews

Vital - get it!
For 99% of medical students, this book is essential. BRS Pathology provides a framework that will help you better understand course lectures and materials. It helps provide the "big picture" as a great deal of path is condensed into a few pages a section, with the most important (and board relevant) details. You can do well with simply BRS Path, your course materials, and Google to fill in the gaps. An efficient method I discovered late in the year is to write additional facts straight into the book, and review from that.

What about Robbins? Yes, Robbins has it all, and I gave it a glowing review, but it's good to be honest with yourself if you have the time. I bought it, but didn't use it as much as I liked due to time pressures. (So buy Robbins in addition to BRS Path if you have the money or if you study incessantly and want to work straight from it.)

Questions: there are questions at the end of each section. They seem easy after you've just reviewed the material, yet they're still good for solidifying info/ immediate feedback, or for going to later to assess your retention. There is also a "comprehensive exam" at the end.

Old editions: Newer editions have not changed much content-wise, I think the layout of the newer edition is nicer, but you can get away with an older (cheaper!) copy for sure - I used the original, from 1993!

A comprehensive review, readable, good tables
This book is written for Step 1 of the National Boards. This is a comprehensive review of pathology. The information is clearly written with the most improtant points in bold letters. This makes the matterial easy to absorb. In addition, the information is strictly categorized, and there is little irrelevant and wasteful writing. You will find this quick reading (for a comprehensive review) simply because of the way it is written. Furthermore, each chapter is followed with a short but thorough Q&A review section. Another additional feature is the frequent use of very useful tables, which often give a good understanding of a whole chapter. Although the book is thorough, I have never regretted having read it. I have found it useful even though I did not specialize in Pathology. It is enlightening in just about any general specialty one may be interested in. The book's only short coming is its number of pictorials which are few and far in between.

Ok, but misses some important details. Rapid Review pathology is much better.
This is a good book, well organzied with nice explanations. However, it lacks illustrations, lacks questions in clinical vignette format, and lacks important details with emphasis on low yield subjects.
What do I mean by lacks important details? Well, it leaves out important things sometimes, for example:
1.Down syndrome is associated with ALL, hirschsprung disease, duodenal atresia (actually book makes no mention of duodenal atresia)
2.Pulsatile mass seen in abdominal aortic aneurysms
3.Kawasaki disease associated with heart disease in children
4.Neurofibromatosis type II
5.Tuberous sclerosis and hypopigmented patches on the trunk
6.Turners syndrome and increased risk of dysgerminoma, hypothyroidism, horseshoe kidneys, bicuspid aortic valve
7.Scleroderma associated with primary biliary cirrhosis
8.Primary sclerosing cholangitis associated with ulcerative colitis
9.alpha1 antitrypsin deficiency being mcc of cirrhosis in children
10.Chronic pyelonephritis.
11. Hashimoto's thyroiditis and anti-microsomal antibodies
12. the age groups for leukemias: 0-14 ALL, 15-39 AML, 40-60 AML & CML, 60+ CLL (you can answer any leukemia question on the step just by knowing how old the patient is)
13. AML association with Auer rods and 15:17 translocation and DIC
14. CD15 and CD30 and the Reed-Sternberg cell
15.Exophageal webs
16.Mallory-Weiss syndrome, Boerhave syndrome
17.Seborrheic keratosis association with gastric carcinoma
18. focal segmental glomerulosclerosis seen in HIV and IVDA's
19.adult polycystic kidney disease associated with mitral valve prolapse (25% of the time!, how could this book miss this)
20.renal cell ca is discussed but it doesn't mention the increased incidence after dialysis or its association with adult kidney polycistic disease
21.seminoma and placental alkaline phosphatse (palp) as a marker
22. papillary carcinoma associated with radiation
23.hypoparathyroidism and chvostek sign (tapping face in front of ear elicits tetany) This showed up on my test on two questions! Yes step 1.
24. actinic keratosis - easily scrapped off and recurs
25. keloid and type III collagen. hypertrophic scar and type I collagen
26. malignant melanoma and its tumor marker s-100
27. squamous skin cancer associated with tertiary burns, immunosuppresive therapy, draining sinus tracts
28.pseudogout and positive birefringent
Honestly, the list goes on and on, and these are all very high yield points missed by this book.
29.cerebral palsy
30.neurofibrillary tangles and the tau protein
31.familial ALS and a mutant superoxide dismutase 1 (SOD1) gene
32.neuroblastoma and bombesin
33.pilocytic astrocytomas
34.oral contraceptives and thrombophilia
35.septic shock association with ARDS
36.dilated cardiomyyopathy and mural thombi
37.myxoma of left atrium and syncope due to obstruction of mitral valve
38. malignant mesothelioma (mentioned only briefly)
39.pneumocysis carinii pneumonia and the silver stain
40.hemorrhoids and pregnancy, cirrhosis, constipation
I'll stop there, but there are more...

What do I mean by too much emphasis on low yield subjects?
1.Lupus nephropathy type I - type V (the subtypes won't show up on step1)
2.Subacute thryoiditis, Riedel thyroiditis (only hashimoto's thyroiditis will be on step1)
3.Philadelphia chromosome association with ALL (step1 will only ask about its association with CML)
4.Precursor T lymphoblastic lymphoma/leukemia (low yield)
5.osteoid osteoma, osteoblastoma
6.prothrombin 20210a transition

And the again, no mechanisms. I know this is a pathology book, but basic mechanisms should be included because it helps students retain more if they understand the mechanism. For example,
why is CLL associated with hypogammaglobulinemia? (because the neoplastic cells less capable of differentiating to plasma cells)
why sarcoidosis associated with hypercalcemia? (because epithelial macrophages convert vitamin d to active form)
why is diverticulosis associated with diverticulitis? (because of fecalith in the diverticulum sac)
carcinoid is most commonly located in the appendix but when located there it doesn't metasize. why? (because the appendix only allows the tumor to grow to <2cm and tumors usually metastasize when larger than 2cm)

Sorry, I got carried away...there's just so much I remember that were missing from this book... other reviewers have noticed this as well i'm sure. however, the info that is in this book is well organized and an easy read...so i give it 2 stars.
Goljan's Rapid Review has more high yield material, but the organization of it is not as good. Actually I'm going to write a review on that book now.