Best books & resources for the Internal Medicine Shelf & Rotation 2024
We know that getting a consensus on the best books and resources for any given rotation can be difficult. Asking friends, searching SDN, and consulting seniors can provide a confusing mixed bag of advice.
Turns out, we've done the work for you. Compiled below are comprehensive recommendations on the best books and resources. Click here to find out how we ranked each resource as well as a description of the tiers used. Happy studying!
Highest Yield — The best internal medicine book for medical school
Step up to Medicine — Agabegi & Agabegi
For Internal Medicine, Step Up to Medicine is a no-brainer. It breaks concepts down in an easy-to-read outline based format (breaks most pathology down into "General Characteristics, Clinical features, Diagnosis, and Treatment) and has high yield points, called "Quick Hits" on the sides so that you can easily review important, often tested, points. A great text to have for Internal Medicine as well as Family Medicine, and Neurology as well. If there was one book to purchase for all of third year, this would be it.
Internal Medicine Essentials for Students: A companion to MKSAP for Students — American College of Physicians & Clerkship Directors In Internal Medicine
The main competitor to Step up is this one, the sister book to the MKSAP question book which will be described next. If you prefer a more textbook-based feel with complete paragraphs, this text does a great job of summarizing the key points in diagnosing and managing medicine pathology and is set up to describe the prevention, screening, diagnosis, therapy and follow up for each disease process.
IM Essentials Questions — American College of Physicians
The American College of Physicians puts out board prep for internal medicine residents. Fortunately for medical students, it also puts out a question book with over 500 multiple choice questions which are extremely relevant for the internal medicine shelf. Not only are the questions similar to what you would see on a Shelf exam, but the answers are thorough and go over all of the different answer choices so you can see where your reasoning went wrong.
Next Steps
Rapid Interpretation of EKG's — Dubin
The OG, Dubin's original Rapid Interpretation of EKGs came out in 1972 and has since significantly helped medial students and residents understand reading EKGs. It takes the reader step by step through the very essential basics and then slowly builds on that foundation and has been one of the essentials of the internal medicine rotation, especially for those who are planning to pursue IM as a career. Interestingly, Dubin was a plastic surgeon with a knack for cardiology and supposedly hid an offer within the fiftieth printing of this book's copyright text to give away his Ford Thunderbird.
Case Files Internal Medicine — Toy, Patlan & Warner
If you're familiar and enjoy the Case Files format, the Internal Medicine Case Files is nothing to scoff at. It, in an easy to read paragraph format, goes over different patient scenarios and then provides information about the scenario's disease process. It finishes each chapter with a few relevant questions and explanations. While this may not be the best choice as your primary text, this easy to read text is a quick and undemanding way to review a few concepts or diseases while waiting to present patients in clinic or during some downtime.
If You Have Time
Pocket Medicine — Sabatine
Not so much a resource to kill the medicine shelf, but more so a great resource to have while on the wards. If high-yield was a noun, it would be this. It jams most of medicine into a small, attractive purple book and condenses it into the bare bones of diagnosis and management for, say, atrial fibrillation or DIC. Great for almost every rotation and a great resource for almost every residency.
Medicine PreTest Self-Assessment and Review — Urban, Pierce & Smalligan
If you want to absolutely crush the medicine shelf, and you've already gone through MKSAP and UWorld questions, this question book will provide questions which are similar to the shelf with brief explanations of each answer choice. A good question bank to have in your white coat when you have a spare moment.