Critical-Care Books

Orderd item 1/3/08 and received by mail on by th 8th of Jan. Book was in new condition upon arrival. I will purchase from this seller in th future. Book has helped a lot at work.

The description was misleading. The book may be useful for hospital triage nurses. This is not meant for telephone or outpatient triage.

This is definitely a MUST READ AND KEEP HANDY reference/guide to facilitating an effective and appropriate triage process in any setting, with any patient. Written primarily for the urgent/emergency care nurse, this book is easy to navigate and will be a valuable resource in every ER, outpatient clinic, physicians office, school health center and medical library. I can see it reaching the very top of the "required" reading list for ALL front-line health professionals; especially telehealth/telephone triage nurses.

New nurses will love the "pearls of triage wisdom" section. Experienced nurses will be delighted to finally have such a comprehensive listing of cultural considerations. The Post test feature is a great guide for self directed learners, and would also assist nursing managers in the evaluation of staff competency. The inclusion of humor in many of the illustrations created by John F. Aarne, (who happens to be Val's father) makes this publication not only a incredibly useful educational tool but also a nursing treasure.

Finally an RN Triage guide book plus. This book was written by somebody who has been there and done that.

I recommend this book for nurses who plan to go through the ED experience. This book will guide them through the difficult and trying times.

The "Pearls of Wisdom" Chapter is a definite treasure trove of experience that each RN can relate to.

To top it all, the book size fits a lab coat pocket so one can carry it all of the time or store it in a locker for that essential quick-glance.

The second edition of this popular triage manual still has one important item missing, but I'll tell you what it does have first. It provides a total look at emergency room triage from all angles. For the nursing students and new grads there are pointers about basic patient assessment and evidenced based treatment. For senior staff and emergency department management personnel there are guidelines for leadership and quality assurance. For busy ER personnel there are alphabetized listings of patient complaints, emergency alerts to help nurses recognize serious conditions quickly, "Pearls of Triage Wisdom" with timely clinical tips, and cross-cultural considerations.
Find out how to get the most benefit from a translator. Discover the clinical considerations of Ginseng, Kava, and other natural, alternative and herbal substances. This unique resource has been sprinkled with witty illustrations drawn by the author's father. Tucked in the back there are brand-new exams that will enable purchasers to receive continuing education credits.
The flaw? There is no mention that it should be at the very top of the "required" reading list for ALL front-line health professionals. It's definitely not a glossy "coffee table" book. You probably should order 3 and leave one discussion copy in the break room, one reading copy for library and one crisis copy hanging by the phone.

I thoroughly enjoyed this book. As a professional working with children and adolescents, I think that Dr. Eagle paints a very rich landscape to better understand the emotional development of adolescent girls. This book helped me to better understand this emotional journey as well as the needs of adolescents as they grow to become young women. An unusually thoughtful and insightful book.

I was very disappointed with this book. I had read the great reviews, and it was a basic book that I didn't learn anything new that I didn't know before reading this book.

This book is easy to read and understand. While on the one hand it made me sad to realize my 8 year old is truly poised on the threshold of a new and difficult phase of life, it gave me insight, as well as some tools to use, to make this next journey easier on both of us. It emphasized how critical the pre-teen years are in establishing a relationship that can not only survive the turbulence of the junior and senior high years, but keep the fires of self-esteem and confidence burning in the face of "growing up." Useful, relevant and comforting, this is perfect reading for parents who worry that their daughters will be anything like they were as pre-teens!

I started this book hoping for some ideas to help me deal with my 2 stepdaughters' venture into adolescence. I love it! The authors' experience, insight into girls' feelings and actions and realistic advice on how parents can help their daughters through this difficult time in their lives are invaluable. It is a definite keeper. (I'm also making my husband read it!)

I was very disappointed with this book. I had read the great reviews, and it was a basic book that I didn't learn anything knew that I didn't know before reading this book.

I wish I found this book earlier when I was still a freshman. The contents are well-explained, and easy to understand. I put aside our school's textbook, and used this one instead - helped me a lot!

As a nursing student, this book is used quite heavily by the faculty. The book's infinite charts, tables, and figures are enough to drive you nuts. There are very few good photos. Our nursing teachers were regularly having to use other books to show us photographs of whatever we were studying. Also, after reading the material, I always felt like I didn't really know the material. If I really wanted to know the material well, I had to go study it in an Anatomy & Physiology book.

I have looked at other Med/Surg books and prefer them, any of them, to this one.

This book is more suited for the experienced nurse rather than the nursing student.

Many nursing books are horrible to read and comprehend - NOT this series of nursing books! Easy to understand charts, lists, description boxes, etc. spells terminology and info for newbies easily and appropriately.

By far the BEST nursing series I have ever seen!

As a first year nursing student I thought this book was informative. I also thought this book tried too hard to present the info. in a concise manner. There were charts everywhere! I found the "helpful" charts to be distracting and drew attention away from the important information. I disliked having to look for the case study answers on line. It was difficult to login to their website and annoying to have to do so. Good Luck to future students who have to use this book!

I am also a first year nursing student and the first fundamentals book we used was so useless and hard to read I hated doing my homework. However, this book is so easy to understand and use, especially with the study guide which is also wonderful. I would not trade using any other book for this one. Trust me, you'll really understand what is being talked about.

This book is really not what I wanted. This book would be better for a new grad.

This "book" does a great job with covering the patho associated with many conditions you will find in the ICU/CCU setting. It would be a good reference to keep at home for in depth reading.
I assumed (incorrectly) that since it was a pocket guide it would cover more aspects of hands on nursing care, pharmacology, lab data. I have been an ICU nurse for 10 years, but took a baby vacation. It's great to have a reference that goes into extreme detail of multiple diseases, but I wanted something a bit less in depth for fast reference to jar my memory before calling a doctor, responding to a situation etc. This book has a few quick, helpful facts in it, but not enough to convince me to lug it around in my bag. I wound up printing off my own data & putting it in a small spiral notebook

The book is well organized and the different content areas are written in sections.It covers the basic to advanced critical care concepts and is easy-to-use. Must have for NEW nurses and a good resource for experienced nurses.

This book truly distills the essence of CCU nursing. The companion AACN Essentials of Critical Care Nursing: Pocket Handbook is also recommended as a quick reference.

First, let me say I went to medical school with "Mitch" Spirt at Mount Sinai. Mitch was a good man with good social skills--and, now, I see he's succeeded in the clinical teaching realm, too. I'm sad to see such a prominent surgeon as Dr. DeMeester rate this book so poorly without clarifying more. Having both attending the same medical school, we were often presented with a plethora of textbooks--none of which were EVER "recommended highly" by our professors.

A medical student will NOT--and should NOT read, in its entirety such books as Cecil's or Harrison's textbook of Medicine; nor, should they read Schwartz', Cameron's, or Sabiston's textbook of surgery because, simply, if you're on the wards, learning CLINICAL medicine, doing your H & P's, examining patients, and standing as the first-assistant in the operating room, THERE ISN'T TIME TO READ SUCH MASSIVE REFERENCE TEXTS.

If you HAVE time, you aren't seeing patients (Remember Osler's quote? "To study medicine without textbooks is to sail an uncharted sea; to study medicine without patients is to NOT go to sea at ALL!"
This is where Mitch's book comes in. This is a SOLID, quick reference material for any 3rd or 4th year medical student (it's small and you can fit it in your backpack), you can read it during your rotation, it has the PERTINENT clinical information, and even an intern or 2nd year medical or surgical resident would benefit.

It is written for Dr. DeMeester? Absolutely NOT. Is it written for attending surgeons with 15 years of experience? NO! But it wasn't written for that purpose.

I think this book should sit along side:

a. Wheater's Functional Histology (and Pathology)
b. Lang's Textbook of Medicine (formerly, "The John's Hopkins Textbook of Medicine")
c. Stein's Textbook of Medicine (for 3rd and 4th year medical students
d. "Baby" Sabiston's introduction to surgery.

If you're already in the field, this isn't your book. If your GOING into surgery or gastroenterology, this is a GREAT place to start.

An updated edition, written in conjunction with a general surgeon, would be most welcome in the field of medical student education.

It's a privilege to know Mitch, and, now, as an attending General Surgeon (for almost 13 years, and board-certified, and re-certified), this book is a strong 9.5/10.

Poorly written book obviously written by a non-surgeon. As a practicing general surgeon for the past 30 years this book has little to offer anyone interested in anything but the most rudimentary aspects of abdominal disorders. Don't waste your money!!

A must for all general surgeons in clinical practice.

This textbook focuses on GI disorders in critically ill patients. It is a superbly-written text, and is destined to become a standard reference in the field. A real gem.

Yes, this is the book you need to understand acid-base. The secret is the easy to read and well structured approach. You will stop attending many lectures or workshops to understand acid-base.

I was given this book when I rotated through the ICU as a 3rd year medical student. I had gone through other training classes that attempted to teach me how to read a blood gas but I never could get it down right. THEN, I read this one...it put things into the proper perspective and taught me what I needed to know when I was reading a blood gas. I highly recommend it!

If you could only read one book on blood gasses this would have to be the one.

This book covers the nitty-gritty about Arterial blood gasses (ABG). As a PhD who performs biomedical research, I have come across "experts" who resort to physiological babble because they dont know what arterial saturation is really all about. You will if you read this book.

The book centers around four classic expresssions: (1) partial pressure of co2, (2) pH (3) alveolar gas equation, and (4) o2 content. From these four expressions, and a little knowledge of clinical medicine, you will understand just about everything you need to know about ABG. Dont let the equations scare you off; you know them already.

The book is simple to read, and has example problems. The real-world examples/problems really help in applying the knowledge, which I found to be quite useful. The author does not go into deep biochemical details. But if you need a good solid introduction to blood chemistry, or have to review how to read an ABG report this is a great book.

I am an RT instructor and I chose this book as a text book for my arterial blood gas analysis class. the students found it very difficult to understand and some of the formulas have been abreviated to the point that a novice will have trouble understanding them. This is a very good review for anyone who already has a general understanding of acid base, blood gas and electrolyte interpretation and can clear up some misconceptions, however, this book is not adequate for someone just learning the basics. My students were very unhappy and I wound up not using the text nearly as much as I had planned.

I carelessly flipped the pages of a copy owned by a coworker and it seemed good. So I bought one for myself.

I had not noticed the book does not have an alphabetical index. It is set up as a horrible maze where you cannot find anything easily. Its only index is arranged by categories and only with the generic names. When a patient tells me he is taking a certain drug, first I have to look it up on line or in another book to see what the generic name is and what category of drug it is, and only then can I look it up in this book. But then it is useless, because if I have to look it up somewhere else, I get all my information there in the first place.

The book has lots of useful information, but most of it is inaccessible when you need it.

I cannot recommend it until they come up with a decent complete alphabetical index of generic and brand names.

This is good start for CA-1 who want to be an critical care Anesthesiologist.

I would reccomend to buy it.

thanks

This would have been the perfect book to refer to when I was in clinical. We had the MGH Clinical Procedures book and John Snow's manual, but this goes way beyond those two. Like the previous reviewer, I would carry this book before any others. (It is also available for the PDA.) A "must have" resource for your practice or residency.

This is a must-have for anesthesia residency. It contains complete information not only for po/iv drugs, but inhalation agents as well. In addition, the book has appendicies that cover additional information in condensed form for easy reference (categorized drugs and their affect on local, general or regional anesthesia, tables of all anesthetics with their chemical and physical properties, flow-graphs of ACLS and other protocols. If I could carry only one book (beside Morgan and Mikhail) this would be it.

Concise,well organized book. Alittle disappointed with diskette. I thought it would be more in the format of the CEN test.

I found this book to be the most useful book in the market today for reviewing for the new CEN computerized exam. The questions were very similar to the ones included in the exam and the layout of the material, i.e. questions on one page and the answers with rationale on the flip side of the page made it extremely user-friendly. This book is valuable especially for those nurses fearful of computer tests in that a sample test of 250 questions is included on the CD-ROM enclosed with the book. This allows the computer-shy nurse an opportunity to simulate taking the test in a computer setting. I have tossed out all my other numerous review books from over the 12 years and will only keep this book in my review library.

This book had good content, but for someone studying for the CEN exam, it is way too basic. This is an easy to use book and I liked the format, with the answers on the back of the page of questions.

The computer program that came with the book was fun to use and reduced my anxiety about taking the CEN on a computer, but again the questions were too easy.

Very informative in its line of questioning with rationale answers. Offers a variety of questions that coincide with the CEN exam. Could go the extra mile and explain all the chooses given more consistantly.

An excellent tool for any one starting in critical care, particularly the newly qualified.

Facts and information are well laid out and easy to find.
Very useful parameters for weaning off ventilation, blood gases and pH classifications

A lot of info for such a tiny book

Very nice synopsis of hard to remember critical care facts. A wonderful reference for orienting new nurses to the field of critical care, for writing unit standards and for inservices. Pictures illustrate concepts succinctly. I am buying one for each of my staff members.

This is a handy little reference that covers a great deal of info in a pocket-sized form.

I thought the book was too vague and it not as informative as it should have been. I would have much rather spend more money on a more detailed book.

Contains important topics needed in the ICU like : Admission, Orders, Diagnostics, common complications, theraputic drug levels and others all in outlines. help you to remember critical things in the ICU.

This book is way overpriced @ $7.50. It lacks any detail whatsoever and is written at 1st year medical student level....really. Save your money and get the Tarascon critical care pocket guide, that will give you more bang for your buck.

I'm working as a nurse extern at the ICU for the summer and I purchased this book knowing it was for medical interns. but it helped keep me one step ahead of the doctors orders.. it was simply written and just humorous enough to keep me reading.

A very concise review of the key points needed for patient management in the ICU...a good buy.