Junior Doctor Medical Textbook

[Barquentine]

Back in the 90s I knew a newly-qualified junior doctor who used to carry around this miniature textbook in her doctor's coat pocket. It had very thin paper and tiny print, was about A5 size and 300-400 pages thick.
Does anyone happen to know what that was called?

I once asked her which bits of it she needed to know off-by-heart.
"All of it" was her disconcerting reply which shone a glaring beacon on the grand canyon between her intellect and mine!

[Sqad]

That was many years before I was a Junior Doctor 1959 lol.

There way many pocket books, but was this the one?https://www.worldofbooks.com/en-gb/books/nisha-patel/clinical-practical-procedures-for-junior-doctors/9780443068065?gclid=EAIaIQobChMI9_KjvdDO8wIVDOvtCh2F0gsqEAQYBSABEgIPOvD_BwE

[Sqad]

https://www.google.com/aclk?sa=l&ai=DChcSEwis8aXF0s7zAhU9gFAGHUNvBvgYABAOGgJkZw&ae=2&sig=AOD64_3x9_BfkBpwKng2HECvkNBukv5z6Q&ctype=5&q=&ved=2ahUKEwiKzZ7F0s7zAhWWilwKHbreD14Q9aACegUIARCMAQ&adurl=

[pastafreak]

Sqad...you need to leave a space between your text and the link.

[pastafreak]

;)

[Sqad]

Thanks pasta, providing links is not my forte -;)

[vulcan42]

An interesting line in the book description.
\\ Many of these procedures are not taught at medical school, yet are expected to be routinely implemented as a junior doctor.//
If the Doctors are expected to use the procedures, why aren't they taught at medical school?

[Barquentine]

Thanks Sqad, but no, that Handbook looks much simpler. Hers had tiny text and no illustrations and it was more than just clinical procedures. It was a summary of the whole medical degree in a single compact book (this is what she told me). I think towards the back it had indexes of different drugs - both generic names and various proprietary names. It was terrifying just how much knowledge a doctor has to know. I didn't believe that she (or any human) could possibly remember so much so I asked her questions at random (mean, I know!) - not that I knew what most of the words I was reading actually meant! She did. She knew all of it! Respect!!

[Sqad]

//////If the Doctors are expected to use the procedures, why aren't they taught at medical school?////

Good question Vulcan, I can only speak for my era, 1960 onwards but it appears nothing has changed.

If you have good and understanding doctors around you, they will instruct you, but I'm afraid the old medical axiom of " Watch one, do one, then teach one " still persists as a method of teaching.......unless I am well out of date.

[anneasquith]

See one, do one, teach one .

[Prudie]

I wonder if it was the MIMS catalogue/annual. It listed every prescription drug and their uses/side effects. I'd have thought every doctor back then had copy.

[anneasquith]

Mims was a largish book , just about able to stuff into the pocket .

[Prudie]

Well I used to read it all the time as a boyfriend's father was a chemist. It was an A5 paperback.

[Sqad]

MIMS was totally pharmaceutical and I have the impression that Barquentine was describing a " mini textbook" of Medicine.

[Sqad]

Any doctor who was a Junior in the 90's, wont be on AB lol...lol

[wardie100]

The Oxford handbook of clinical medicine is still a bit of a bible amongst medical students and newly qualified docs. Fits your description so it could have been that?

[pastafreak]

^^^...an early version of this one?

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/353672718414?chn=ps&norover=1&mkevt=1&mkrid=710-134428-41853-0&;mkcid=2&itemid=353672718414&targetid=1278608955016&;device=t&mktype=&googleloc=9045312&poi=&;campaignid=14727339348&mkgroupid=127909237815&rlsatarget=pla-1278608955016&abcId=9300672&;merchantid=137596430&gclid=CjwKCAjw8KmLBhB8EiwAQbqNoMZLWpxUE1dFL6tzx1Z0Aaz3PtUNA6qvrVEIVQH6O4RWVXNipE3rjhoC-2cQAvD_BwE

[vulcan42]

Thanks Sqad, I think this must come under the "interesting but odd category". Just like the one where everybody is expected to know every law in the land because ignorance of the law is no excuse.