Surgical residents epitomize information overload. They are expected to have a mind-boggling amount of data and procedural protocols on immediate recall. To ease this burden, many surgical programs have developed their own procedural manuals, most of which have an interest radius that barely reaches the hospital parking lot.
Dr Warren Kortz, senior resident at Duke University, and his chief of anesthesiology, Dr Phillip Lumb, have, however, produced a white-coat—pocket-sized book that has an almost universal appeal to those who take care of sick surgical patients at a bedside level. The reader is assumed to be knowledgeable in basic physiology and pathophysiology and only needs to be reminded of the many easily forgotten facts. The authors assiduously avoid scattering their shots in generalities. With 19 other Duke colleagues, they have produced a gem-filled guide that cleverly weaves pragmatism with basic pathophysiology. One of the book's great assets is its meticulous