Oxford Textbook of Medicine (6th Edition

Oxford Textbook of Medicine (6th edition) Publisher: Oxford University Press

Article by Charlotte Smith

Oxford Textbook of Medicine is now in its 6th edition. The textbook is divided into 30 sections with topics ranging from immunology and cell biology to forensic medicine and psychiatry. Due to it being 7728 pages long I decided to focus on the two following chapters: ‘Patients and their treatment’ and ‘The eye in general medicine’ in my book review.

The first chapter of the textbook is titled ‘Patients and their treatment’. Looking at the contents of the chapter I was happy to see one section titled ‘on being a patient’. This part of the textbook was writing by Christopher Booth a doctor who died in 2012. Through reading his words I was particularly struck by a certain quote “if you are a physician, no matter how important you may think you are, you should so far as your illnesses concerned, consider yourself a layman”. The quote, in turn, made me reflect on how patients perceive the medical field when they are a part of it themselves.

The chapter then leads to talk about a young man’s experience with chronic disease. As a young child with Haemophilia A, he received contaminated blood. As a result, he became infected with Hepatitis A and HIV. Each of the conditions affected his life in many ways. But in the passage, he chose to talk about the actions medical professionals have on patients. He reflected on the importance to him of attending the same Haemophilia Clinic in his local hospital for the past 39 years. Through this familiarity and trust for his medical team, it helped reduce his anxiety about hospitals and his condition. However, in contrast, he talked about moving away for university and moving to a different haemophilia department for 3 years and the effect it had on him. The continuity of his care was broken and in turn, he lost the benefits of the patient-doctor relationship he was building his entire life. As a result, he found his trust decrease. The story helped reiterate the importance of continuity of care and impact changes can have on patient’s, in particular those with complex health needs.

In contrast to the first third of the book, the last two-thirds focused on clinical specialities much like the Oxford Handbook Series. However, compared to textbooks like Kanski Clinical Ophthalmology and the Oxford Handbook of Clinical Specialities. I found that the ‘The eye in general medicine’ chapter was more engaging and concise. The chapter addresses clinical examination, the main eye pathologies, diagnostic tests and their management. Compared to other books I didn’t have to search through the text for the key facts. Each of the eye pathologies mentioned in the chapter was supported by diagrams, pictures and tables. To see if a concise overview of conditions was followed in the rest of the handbook, I also reviewed the Respiratory section which was also concise.

Due to the easy to read nature of the handbook and the concise way in which is written I would recommend the book to any medical student who is studying their specialities. It has all the information in one place-perfect for note-taking and revision.