The Unofficial Guide to Practical Skills

by Emily Hotton MBChB (Dist), BSc (Hons) PhD, MRCOG (Editor), Sammie Mak MBChB (Editor), Zeshan Qureshi BM, BSc (Hons), MSc, MRCPCH, FAcadMEd, MRCPS(Glasg) (Editor)

Overview

The unique and award-winning Unofficial Guides series is a collaboration between senior students, junior doctors and specialty experts. This combination of contributors understands what is essential to excel on your course, in exams and in practice – as well as the importance of presenting information in a clear, fun and engaging way. Packed with hints and tips from those in the know, when you are in a hurry and need a study companion you can trust, reach for an Unofficial Guide.

Designed for medical students, nurses, junior doctors and other healthcare professionals, The Unofficial Guide to Practical Skills contains step-by-step guidance to over 50 core practical procedures. Information is easy to follow and procedures are explained clearly – along with expert practical tips.

This book covers the essential skills you’ll need throughout your course and for the OSCEs. It also provides a succinct, day-to-day reference for those in practice.

• Wide range of procedures covered – more than any other book of its kind
• Accompanying mark schemes and typical exam questions to simulate real-life assessment
• Fully illustrated with over 200 color photos/illustrations
• Model answers so you can check how well you are performing
• Content aligned to the latest GMC/MLA requirements

• Additional stations covering lateral flow tests, PPE, using a hospital bed
• Standardisation of different scenarios
• New COVID guidance
• More answers to examiner questions in each scenario

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780323937191
Publisher:	Elsevier Health Sciences
Publication date:	03/08/2023
Series:	Unofficial Guides Series
Edition description:	2nd ed.
Pages:	232
Product dimensions:	8.50(w) x 10.88(h) x (d)

About the Author

Emily Hotton, MBChB (Dist), BSc (Hons) PhD, MRCOG, is an obstetric registrar and a leader in medical education, teaching on paid courses and within university and hospitals. She has contributed to four textbooks, including editing Unofficial Guide to Practical Skills, and nine peer reviewed journal articles.

***

Zeshan Qureshi is a Paediatric Registrar, London Deanery, UK

Table of Contents

1. Basic Patient Assessments
2. Blood Tests
3. Acute Patient Management
4. Medication Administration
5. Medicine and Surgery
6. Urology
7. Paediatrics
8. General Skills

What People are Saying About This

From the Publisher

Essential practical procedures brought to life

Editorial Reviews

Reviews of the previous edition:
"The once daunting prospect of approaching practical skills can now be overcome by using this refreshingly comprehensive and user-friendly guide.Including both skills focused on by the GMC and an array of additional skills essential in the armory of a junior doctor, this book really is a must have." —Robert Miller (final year medical student)

"The Unofficial Guide to Practical Skills is a successful attempt at providing a solid foundation to over 50 practical skills. In addition to core clinical competencies, a number of additional practical skills expected of junior doctors are also detailed. Amongst the numerous practical skills guides available globally, it is refreshing to find a book which brings together many of the appealing features seen in clinical skills guides, resulting in a highly interactive and informative book. This makes the cost of this book a worthy investment and it will no doubt become engrained into the resource portfolio of clinical skills students and act as a summary guide for junior doctors." —International Journal Of Clinical Skills

"This book is far better than others I have previously used for learning and practising practical skills. The best thing about this book are the examiner style mark schemes, which make it obvious how and what to revise, and make it easy to practise the skills. The content is very comprehensive, containing everything you need for exams, with other more interesting and advanced skills as well. It has a great, easy to see layout with useful pictures which makes very clear what you need to know and the techniques you need to use. I am using this now for finals revision and wish I had something like this in earlier years." —Nathan Prost (final year medical student)

From the Publisher

This book is far better than others I have previously used for learning and practicing practical skills. The best thing about this book are the examiner style mark schemes, which make it obvious how and what to revise, and make it easy to practice the skills. The content is very comprehensive, containing everything you need for exams, with other more interesting and advanced skills as well. It has a great, easy to see layout with useful pictures which makes very clear what you need to know and the techniques you need to use. I am using this now for finals revision and wish I had something like this in earlier years.

Nathan Prost

Practical skills can be very tricky to master, and performing them on the wards can be nerve wracking - especially when you're being observed by more senior doctors! I found this book really helpful. It includes loads of pictures as it's really difficult to learn practical skills just from notes. For example, at one point it says, 'occlude the vein' and then gives a picture of how exactly to do this. Some other guides can take it for granted that you already know what this means! Guides to learning practical skills can also be rather dry and technical but this book breaks it up with bits of advice such as when to ask a colleague for help. The OSCE mark schemes and Q&A sections give you an insight into what you need to know beyond simply carrying out the procedure.

Rachel McNulty

The Unofficial Guide to Practical Skills is a successful attempt at providing a solid foundation to over 50 practical skills. In addition to core clinical competencies, a number of additional practical skills expected of junior doctors are also detailed. Concise details about each practical skill are provided along with bullet point lists and illustrations. A step-by-step guide helps ensure the reader does not become lost in the complexities of a skill; moreover the authors manage to breakdown the individual skill into components, allowing the student to appreciate the underpinning science whilst improving their proficiency. The clear layout, colour print, varied text size, photographs and illustrations all add to the appeal of this book. This guide gives the reader a good summary of knowledge that might have been acquired previously or seen in the clinical setting. Particularly helpful are the ‘Additional Questions to Consider’ which allow the reader to reflect on what they have learnt and consider additional knowledge that they may require. The sometimes fast pace of the clinical environment necessitates healthcare workers to conduct a skill as if it is second nature. Although no clinical skills session, book or video can fully prepare any clinician for the complexities of real clinical practice, The Unofficial Guide to Practical Skills certainly provides the essential building blocks for students and doctors to consolidate their knowledge and perform skills with confidence. Throughout the book there are ‘Mark Scheme for the Examiner’ sections – clearly these are useful for students preparing for exams, or indeed even practicing the skills with colleagues. However, readers should always remember that such mark schemes have limitations and cannot be fully reflective of exam mark schemes at medical schools – knowledge and evidence is always changing in the world of medicine, and consequently, procedural skills are modified over time to reflect this. This will no doubt result in future updated editions of this book. As with any practical skill there is always variation in technique and this has to be remembered when learning from this informative book. Such differences provide opportunities for discussion and reflection with faculty staff and peers – indeed, learning about varied techniques can be helpful reinforcement of the knowledge provided in The Unofficial Guide to Practical Skills. One might consider the size of this guide to be rather large at A4, however, it seems this is necessary to help convey the right amount of information and display it in an acceptable format. In the next edition of this book it would be useful for the text to contain links to any (online) resources which might help the reader reinforce what they have learnt. Amongst the numerous practical skills guides available globally, it is refreshing to find a book which brings together many of the appealing features seen in clinical skills guides, resulting in a highly interactive and informative book. This makes the cost of this book a worthy investment and it will no doubt become ingrained into the resource portfolio of clinical skills students and act as a summary guide for junior doctors.

International Journal of Clinical Skills - Waseem Ahmed

The once daunting prospect of approaching practical skills can now be overcome by using this refreshingly comprehensive and user-friendly guide.Including both skills focused on by the GMC and an array of additional skills essential in the armory of a junior doctor, this book really is a must have.

Robert Miller