Essential Family Medicine: Fundamentals and Cases with STUDENT CONSULT Access (Rakel, Essential Family Medicine)

This textbook provides 46 case studies representing problems frequently encountered in primary care. They are authored by family physicians and are typical of patients seen in their practices. Each case includes a table listing the Key Points presented. An evidence-based grade is given to each reference. • Provides evidence-based grade given to every reference with the strength of evidence shown by a grade of either A, B, or C. • A table listing the Key Points or Pearls is included with each case study. • Case studies focus on the differential diagnosis of a presenting symptom that can be the sign of a simple common problem or a complex and potentially life-threatening disease. • The Relevance of Medical History to Medical Education is a unique look at the importance of medical history to the education of health professionals. Doody Review Services Reviewer: Donald R. Frey, MD(Creighton University Medical Center) Description: This paperback manual is the portable version of Rakel's landmark Textbook of Family Practice (6th edition, Elsevier, 2002). This smaller edition is packed with web-linked, evidence-rated information woven together in a case studies format. Purpose: The book is designed for students of the discipline of family medicine, and those seeking a thorough overview. The work fits that unique middle ground of a near-comprehensive text in an easily readable format. Audience: The intended audience is medical students learning the basics of family medicine, although midlevel providers as well as a variety of primary care residents will find the book's patient-focused approach useful. The authors are all distinguished family medicine educators from a variety of institutions around the country. Features: The breadth of family medicine is well covered in the 96 chapters. Each begins with a series of key points that serve to focus the learner, followed by an illustrative case, including differential diagnosis and follow-up. A discussion section refocuses the case toward the disease process being presented. Charts, diagrams, and illustrations are very well done and extremely helpful. Assessment: Any work on family medicine that carries the name Rakel is immediately held to a very high standard, and this book doesn't disappoint. A student -- or more experienced physician -- will find the nuts and bolts of the specialty between the book's covers, in a readable format that will continue to make it one of the most widely read family medicine guides in our learning institutions. Provides 46 case studies representing problems frequently encountered in primary care. In this package each case includes a table, listing the Key Points presented. Some of the cases and supplemental material that cannot be accommodated in the printed version, are placed on an accompanying CD-ROM.