Bates' Guide to Physical Examination and History Taking (14th Edition)
by Rainier P. Soriano · Wolters Kluwer / Lippincott Williams & Wilkins
The standard reference text for patient assessment, pairing interviewing technique with head-to-toe examination and regional anatomy. Covers common symptoms with clinical reasoning prompts, lifespan variations, and documentation, so you can conduct and record a complete adult examination.
This link may earn us a small commission at no extra cost to you. Affiliate disclosure
More resources on Clinical Skills
Geeky Medics
Free written and video guides to clinical examination, practical procedures, and OSCE stations, aimed at UK medical students. Working through them prepares a student to perform a structured examination or procedure and talk through findings under exam conditions.
The Clinical Problem Solvers
Medical education podcast and case library from UCSF-trained internists who walk through unknown clinical cases step by step, modelling how to build problem representations, differential diagnoses and illness scripts, so learners can improve their own diagnostic reasoning.
Skills for Communicating with Patients (3rd Edition)
The reference text behind the Calgary-Cambridge consultation guides, setting out the evidence for each communication skill in the medical interview. Gives you a named framework for structuring consultations, eliciting the patient's perspective, and explaining and planning.
Evidence-Based Physical Diagnosis (5th Edition)
Compiles the published accuracy data behind physical signs, giving sensitivity, specificity and likelihood ratios for hundreds of findings. After using it you can judge which bedside manoeuvres actually shift diagnostic probability and which are safely abandoned. It converts the physical exam from ritual into probability revision, which is the mental model every other resource here presupposes.
Stanford Medicine 25
Stanford's bedside medicine initiative: free written guides and demonstration videos for around fifty examination techniques, from jugular venous pressure to gait. Shows what each manoeuvre detects and how findings change the differential rather than only how to perform it. The strongest free video-plus-text library in this space. Each entry ties technique to what the sign means diagnostically, which is the step past a checklist. Elite-institution provenance, openly accessible, actively maintained (annual symposium, active blog and YouTube channel).
Geeky Medics OSCE Guides
Free step-by-step guides and videos from UK doctor-educators covering clinical examinations, communication stations, and core procedures such as venepuncture and catheterisation. Gives you a repeatable structure for performing and being assessed on each skill. Covers basic clinical procedures (venepuncture, cannulation, catheterisation, ECG) and ABCDE assessment.