Surgery - Reviews & Recommendations

Taking more of a problem-based approach to it's surgical teaching, this book comprehensively covers pretty much everything you need to know (and maybe even a bit more). With clear and detailed explanations, complemented by great colour photos and diagrams, this book is another top favourite.

Another 'must buy'. This book is clear and concise, with excellent explanations for most topics. The level of detail is pitched at just about the right level for finals. One drawback, however, is that this book is in black and white, and contains very few diagrams and absolutely no photos. This can unfortunately make learning from it a little 'bland' at times, but the high-quality text more than compensates for this.

Although this book is designed for those studying for the MRCS exams, this is a superb text for student-level surgical exams as well. With clear divisions of the content into 'basic' (for everyone) and 'advanced' (for MRCS-studying grown-ups), this book takes you through a whole range of common OSCE and short-case stations. With accompanying facts and explanations of what to do, why you do it and background on the condition being discussed, this is a perfectly structured book that is a must-have for surgical exams.

Another book with a 'love-hate' audience. Either way, this book is basically a collection of lists, that emphasise the categorisation of every condition into a standardised system (i.e. incidence, presentation, management, complications, etc.) Taken alone, it's a rather dry way of learning, but as a final revision aid this style has advantages. For one, it is an ideal book to use for testing your knowledge of those hard-to-recall facts in the last few weeks before the exams. Even better, get others to ask you specific questions based upon the lists in the book during group revision sessions - it's great practice for the real-thing.

A very useful and under-used book that relates the various aspects of the surgical clinical examination and disease processes to the relevant surface anatomy. Certainly worth flicking through in the early days of your clinical training, as the relationship between the clinically relevant anatomical landmarks and 'what lies beneath' can be quite difficult to relate to one another. This book reaches just the right depth and is very easy to read, featuring colourful images and diagrams in abundance.