OK, I went to medical school and I got a PDR (Physician's Desk Reference) because it is supposedly the best reference. Well, after a few years, you learn!

To start, the first good thing about this book, is that it is readily available just about anywhere. Most doctor's offices, medical libraries, and almost every hospital floor has their own copy. Why? I couldn't tell you.

Secondly, there are pictures of most of the medications in the front. I've heard that this is occasionally helpful, however, I've never found the need to look. Truthfully, there are so many generic pills out there now, that I don't know if the pictures would help. The only reason I think that the pictures could possibly be helpful is in the situation where a person has overdosed, they are in the Emergency Room, there are pills left over, and you need to identify them!

OK, why shouldn't you get this book. It is basically just a collection of all the package inserts for medications, bound, and placed in a single book. Did you know that companies actually have to pay to put their drugs in this book!?! Therefore, only drugs that the companies pay for end up in the PDR!

Also, there is no easy way to look for drug-drug interactions. This is usually the one thing that you need to look up immediately. Granted, you can look up dosing in the PDR, but there are better resources to use.

The Drugs Facts and Comparisons is a bigger book and much more helpful. Also it is more complete and frequently updated. It is recently available on CD and also available for the Palm OS.

For quick and pocket sized references I recommend the Pocket Pharmacopeia. This book is $8 and often free from drug reps. It has quick dosing information readily available and many good charts. I wrote a review of the 2000 edition earlier and maybe I'll write a review of the 2001 edition soon.

Also, for those of you using the Palm OS on your PDA, check out Epocrates QRx (www.epocrates.com)(I also wrote a review) and the electronic version of the Pocket Pharmacopeia (available at www.medscape.com). Both are available for free download and the Epocrates also gives drug-drug interaction information.

I guess overall, I wouldn't recommend the PDR for general (quick) use. It is available almost anywhere, but if you buy one it is pretty expensive ($83.95 for the 2001 edition on amazon.com).

Recommended: No