1st Edition
Clinical Consultation Skills in Medicine A Primer for MRCP PACES
This book follows the revised format of the Practical Assessment Clinical Examination Skills (PACES) exam conducted by the Royal College of Physicians in the UK, where ‘clinical consultation skills’ will be tested twice in two separate stations. Thus, coming closest to what doctors do in real life: obtain a structured history, perform a focussed examination and explain the problem to the patient in lay terms. This book takes readers through a rational approach to 63 common presenting symptoms or laboratory abnormalities in medicine. It is aimed at improving the clinical consultation skills of young doctors and preparing them for the new format of MRCP PACES. Readers will learn:
1. The approaches to common presenting symptoms and blood test abnormalities.
2. What questions to ask the patient and why.
3. What to check when they examine the patient.
4. What to tell the patient and how to convey this information in lay terms without jargon.
5. How to investigate the problem, how to manage and when to refer to a specialist.
Key Features
• This book follows a narrative style with each case being discussed in a story-like manner, helping readers understand the process of narrowing the differential diagnosis, just like solving a crime!
• It includes a ‘What to tell the patient’ section, where the main points to convey to the patient are highlighted and fully dialogued to help readers understand how complex medical jargon should be conveyed in layperson's terms.
• It simplifies several complex and difficult-to-understand topics like haematological malignancies, thrombotic microangiopathy, glomerulonephritis, systemic vasculitis and eosinophilia.
Preface
Case 1 The 46-year-old lady with pain in multiple joints.
Case 2 The 49-year-old man with recurrent joint pains.
Case 3 The 26-year-old man who is struggling to walk.
Case 4 The 29-year-old man with a painful, swollen knee.
Case 5 The 68-year-old lady with pain in her right knee and hands.
Case 6 The 72-year-old man with pain in all four limbs.
Case 7 The 67-year-old man with back pain.
Case 8 The 38-year-old lady with widespread pain and tiredness.
Case 9 The 38-year-old lady with pain and colour changes in her fingers.
Case 10 The 65-year-old man with a painful right leg.
Case 11 The 24-year-old lady with a painful and swollen leg.
Case 12 The 56-year-old lady with microcytic anaemia.
Case 13 The 38-year-old lady with macrocytic anaemia.
Case 14 The 27-year-old lady with thrombocytopenia.
Case 15 The 33-year-old man with eosinophilia.
Case 16 The 64-year-old lady with an enlarged cervical lymph node.
Case 17 The 64-year-old man with abdominal discomfort.
Case 18 The 52-year-old man with headache.
Case 19 The 28-year-old lady who is losing weight.
Case 20 The 54-year-old lady with weight gain.
Case 21 The 45-year-old man with giddiness.
Case 22 The 64-year-old lady who recently fractured her wrist.
Case 23 The 43-year-old man with hypercalcaemia.
Case 24 The 36-year-old lady with amenorrhoea.
Case 25 The 51-year-old man with polyuria.
Case 26 The 28-year-old lady with high blood pressure.
Case 27 The 27-year-old lady who is passing very little urine.
Case 28 The 46-year-old man with swelling of his legs.
Case 29 The 34-year-old man with haematuria.
Case 30 The 55-year-old man with dysuria.
Case 31 The 40-year-old man with acute kidney injury.
Case 32 The 51-year-old man with impaired renal function.
Case 33 The 56-year-old lady with dysphagia.
Case 34 The 46-year-old man with epigastric discomfort.
Case 35 The 53-year-old man with hematemesis.
Case 36 The 38-year-old lady with jaundice.
Case 37 The 44-year-old lady with abnormal liver function tests.
Case 38 The 22-year-old lady who took an overdose of paracetamol.
Case 39 The 32-year-old lady with diarrhoea.
Case 40 The 42-year-old lady with diarrhoea.
Case 41 The 59-year-old lady with recent change in bowel habits.
Case 42 The 36-year-old lady with chest pain.
Case 43 The 46-year-old man with palpitations.
Case 44 The 56-year-old lady with syncope.
Case 45 The 28-year-old lady with shortness of breath.
Case 46 The 62-year-old lady with shortness of breath.
Case 47 The 22-year-old man with wheezing.
Case 48 The 63-year-old man with breathlessness.
Case 49 The 56-year-old man with haemoptysis.
Case 50 The 54-year-old man who snores at night.
Case 51 The 25-year-old man with Marfanoid habitus.
Case 52 The 62-year-old man with transient right sided weakness.
Case 53 The 27-year-old lady with seizures.
Case 54 The 35-year-old lady with headache.
Case 55 The 26-year-old lady with headache.
Case 56 The 71-year-old man with dizziness.
Case 57 The 43-year-old man with facial weakness.
Case 58 The 54-year-old man with tremor.
Case 59 The 32-year-old lady with double vision.
Case 60 The 62-year-old lady with weakness.
Case 61 The 68-year-old man with leg weakness.
Case 62 The 46-year-old man with elevated creatine kinase.
Case 63 The 56-year-old man with numbness in his feet.
Biography
Dr Suresh is currently the Head of Medicine at Ng Teng Fong General Hospital in Singapore. Over the last three decades, he has worked in three different countries with contrasting healthcare systems and cultures. He has been teaching MRCP candidates for over two decades, and received more than a dozen teaching excellence awards in the last ten years alone. He has regularly published educational review articles on a wide range of topics in peer-reviewed internal medicine journals, and written an acute medicine handbook to guide the junior doctors in his hospital.
