Physician’s Handbook for Post-Graduation and Compulsory Service

Editor Yavuz Furuncuoğlu's preface candidly explains why the book exists: as a student you carry no responsibility for patients; the real trouble starts after graduation, because «there is no longer a teacher beside us to consult». He recalls the old professors' line that, examining a patient, you sometimes want to shout «call a doctor!». The book combines the earlier «Akıl Notları» (Mind Notes) series into a single volume, aiming to be «at hand» for doctors heading to compulsory service, family physicians, residents and those starting emergency rotations.

The book's greatest strength is its roster of contributors: each chapter is written by a specialist in the field — infectious diseases by Recep Öztürk, paediatrics by Fahri Ovalı, forensic medicine by Nezih Varol and so on. Chapters share the same structure: a brief introduction, diagnostic criteria in bullet points, tables, treatment steps and references. The strapline «Reference sources summarised for you!» captures the format well.

The infectious emergencies chapter explains when an acutely febrile patient should be treated as an emergency, and how to recognise sepsis, purulent meningitis, herpes encephalitis, necrotising fasciitis and other conditions. The practical details are valuable: the first half-hour to hour is decisive in sepsis; a third of febrile elderly patients may be bacteraemic even without an obvious focus; despite sepsis, fever may be absent in 36% and leucocytosis in 33% of cases; blood cultures must be taken before antibiotics. Local notes — such as considering Salmonella and Brucella bacteraemia under Turkish conditions — are especially useful.

But the book's main weakness also shows here. Sepsis is defined using systemic inflammatory response syndrome (SIRS) criteria, with targets from the 2012 Surviving Sepsis guidelines such as «central venous pressure 8–12 mmHg and venous oxygen saturation 70% within the first six hours». Yet in early 2016 the Sepsis-3 definitions abandoned SIRS, and the «early goal-directed therapy» built on these targets showed no advantage in the large trials of 2014–2015. That is understandable for a book printed that year, but a doctor reading it today should check it against current guidelines — as the book's own opening «Warning» note advises.

«Bites and Stings» from the poisoning chapter is a good example of the format: local, toxic, anaphylactic and delayed reactions to bee, wasp and fire-ant stings are briefly described, and treatment steps — removing the stinger, cold compresses, antihistamines and, in anaphylaxis, epinephrine into the anterolateral thigh — are set out clearly. Ready-made algorithms like these are genuinely useful to a young doctor on call.

In short, the book was a valuable pocket companion for a doctor starting compulsory service in 2016, and many chapters remain useful. But it should be used alongside current guidelines rather than as a sole source, and drug names and doses in the prescription section must always be double-checked.

• Short chapters with bullet points, tables and algorithms
• Each chapter written by a specialist, with references
• Three parts: emergency medicine, prescription guide, laboratory values