Community Pharmacy: Symptoms, Diagnosis and Treatment

• Thoroughly updated and revised
• A clearly structured and colourfully illustrated guide to the differential diagnosis of symptoms commonly seen by community pharmacists.
• Organised by body system, each chapter begins with a system overview and a brief guide to history-taking.
• Each symptom or condition examined according to background; prevalence; aetiology; arriving at a differential diagnosis; questions to ask the patient, and conditions to eliminate.

From reviews of the first edition 'Paul Rutter's timely book provides a well-structured guide to making differential diagnoses ... The comprehensive text is easy to read and there are many excellent illustrations. ... All community pharmacists - whatever their experience - will find this book an excellent continuing professional development resource. I recommend it.' The Pharmaceutical Journal

• Covers all the most common conditions and gives evidence to back up over-the-counter (OTC) recommendations.
• Puts the presenting symptoms into the primary-care context.
• Suggests which questions to ask to narrow down the possible diagnoses.
• Gives schematic summaries of how to arrive at a diagnosis.
• Evidence-based boxes as a guide for OTC medication.
• Practical prescribing summary tables.
• Hints and tips boxes for product use.
• Self-assessment sections.
• Colour images of important conditions.
• Chapter on specific product requests.
• Useful websites.

From student and pharmacist reviews of the first edition:
‘This is one of the most comprehensive books on responding to symptoms in the pharmacy that I have found. It does not however just cover illnesses and conditions that pharmacists will be presented with, this book includes so much more... I feel that it will not just be of use to undergraduates, but will also be indispensable to both pre-regs and pharmacists. This is due to its ease of use and the logical thought process.’

‘Very helpful book for pharmacy undergraduates and pre-registration trainees. Flow charts provide easy steps for diagnosis and referral. Dermatology section with pictures is very useful too.’

‘An essential aid for all pharmacy undergraduates, pre-reg students and established pharmacists. This text is well organised by body system and each section opens with an "aide memoire" on the relevant anatomy and physiology. It includes in practical detail the common conditions which frequently present and how to diagnose and differentiate these from other similar and sometimes more sinister conditions. Included for each body system there is a comprehensive section on the evidence-based medication used to treat the symptoms commonly seen by community pharmacists. The lay out includes flow charts for diagnosis with lots of user-friendly text boxes and recommendations on 1st and 2nd line drug therapy options. This contributes to its ease of use in quickly referencing a condition or OTC medicine. There are also great symptom illustrations which help clarify what we need to look out for. At the end of each section is a practical Q&A component ... This text is a great accompaniment to the BNF - indeed it may well become the community pharmacists' second bible!’

‘This book is a brilliant aid for the pre-reg exam with questions at the end of the chapter, to test your knowledge. It is concise and has all the relevant information boxed up in sections. This book would also be useful for newly qualified pharmacists working in the community. Definitely worth buying.’

‘This text is essential if you are studying pharmacy, especially in years 3 and 4 and, unlike other texts, for once is written for at a level suitable for pharmacists ... The flow charts are extremely helpful since they illustrate precisely what your questioning technique should be aiming for to make an accurate differential diagnosis. Many similar books are simply lacking in comparison and in the past I have needed to rely on medical books for GPs to obtain the same quality of information....I only wish that this was available a long time ago!’