History Taking and Physical Examination: Essentials and Clinical Correlates

"Physical Diagnosis" addresses the skills to perform the physical examination as well as important elements in clinical reasoning. Both organizationally and conceptually, this text is based on a number of assumptions. The first is that medical students possess a good working knowledge of gross anatomy and normal physiology and do not need extensive repetition of this material. Secondly, the book assumes that medical students want to reach a working clinical hypothesis as a result of the physical examination. Coverage of basic anatomy and physiology is substantially reduced, with a proportionately greater emphasis on extensive tables of differential diagnosis, pathophysiologic correlates, common pitfalls and clinical cases. In essence, this text aids problem-based learning to correlate physical examination with clinical diagnosis.