Acute medicine - Declan O'Kane

Acute Medicine 2e is a current and concise guide to hospital emergency medicine for registrars, junior doctors and medical students working on the wards. This second edition has been comprehensively revised and updated to incorporate the latest treatment guidelines. It has been substantially rewritten and streamlined to enable the reader to access the pertinent information even more quickly.

It is not just a list of instructions, but contains pathophysiology and useful clinical pearls:

detailed management of acute medical and surgical emergencies, including in pregnancy

general ward management issues

descriptions of key procedures

normal laboratory values

emergency drug formulary

Acute Medicine 2e is available in two formats (the content is exactly the same in both):

- A pocket-sized black and white paperback
(ISBN 9781907904912)

- A spiral bound, larger format, full colour version (ISBN 9781911510086)

Amazon5-star reviews:

"Great to carry around in my bag.Can pretty much guarantee that the important, practical information is allhere! Thank you Dr O'Kane!"

"By far the best book I've ever comeacross for acute medicine."

"Excellent! Have had it with mesince the first edition in 2013. It has been a lifesaver (literally) on manyoccasions!"

From reviews of the first edition:

"This new book by Dr O'Kane is a very useful and interesting book directed towards Medical registrars but also with many positive features for anyone from Medical Student to Consultants... [It] works through groups of emergencies according to speciality and organ grouping. This is helpful as it enables the reader to link the different differentials together well.
It also tries to signpost all the different conditions in relation to the Acute Medicine and General Internal Medicine curriculums.

There is also an excellent section on fluid prescription, outlining what each fluid option contains along with potential fluid prescriptions in relation to the daily needs of the human body. Each clinical problem is presented in a clear and logical format, beginning with the things to ask or think about when receiving a referral - much as junior doctors would do in a real clinical situation.

The book also includes an excellent 'general management' section, which covers important aspects of the assessment of mental capacity and considerations to make when discharging a patient - things which are often poorly taught in other settings. All of the clinical procedures are described in some level of detail - not enough to learn to do the procedure but enough to signpost as well as getting the reader to think about why it is needed and any associated risks." - Journal for Acute Medicine, October 2015