Underground Clinical Vignettes: Microbiology, Volume I: Classic Clinical Cases for USMLE Step 1 Review

by Vikas Bhushan

S2S introduces the 2nd Edition of the only Step 1 review series dedicated to Clinical Vignettes. Each Underground Clinical Vignettes book presents 100+ frequently tested diseases with thousands of classic buzzwords in Hx, PE, lab, imaging and pathology.

Paperback

First published March 19, 1999

Reviews

[Elizabeth · Rating 3 out of 5]

I read this book four times through on the treadmill. My goal was really to be able to associate a certain subset of clinical symptoms with a particular pathogen, so that, come exam time, I could just look at the symptoms and KNOW. For that, this book was moderately helpful. I think it really helped me to integrate a lot of concepts from lectures and other reading (for example, what Nikolsky's sign is, what it looks like, and what it means). I also appreciated that lab values were cited.

However, I didn't like that, during the discussion of the case, they would often tell you what the disease was. I would have preferred that they put that at the very end, so that I could read through the case and see if I could figure it out before reading it in the text.

I would not recommend trying to get much out of this book RIGHT before exams, because it's just not specific enough to what you may be tested on, although it is useful clinically. But I would recommend reading it at the gym or carrying it around to read while you're waiting for something.