Written with a reckless disregard for the actual content of most surgery clerkships and of the Shelf exam, this book seems to assume students have completed both a surgical residency and numerous subspecialty fellowships. Many questions deal with fine points of surgical management that are not tested on the Shelf. (Know much about chemotherapeutic treatment for non-Hodgkin's lymphoma confined to the submucosa of the stomach?) Others have multiple correct answers or irritating "trap" answers of limited educational value (does this tumor have 70% or 80% 1-year survival?). Answer key sometimes seems off-topic or illogical (patient in question has MEN II, but answer assumes MEN I) or fails to directly address the question. If you have limited time to study--and I know you do--you would be better off looking elsewhere, for example to the questions in Lawrence's Essentials of Surgery. And keep in mind that the surgery Shelf is notoriously heavy on medicine.
This newer version of Alexander's Patient in Surgery is not as useful as the older versions as they took out the list of surgical instruments set up lst for scrub techs to use as a guide line. This book shows a select group of instruments but the old versions had an actual list of everything you might need for that procedure. 
Before my first spay, I watched the demonstration video a few times, read over my spay manual a few times....but reading the procedure over in Fossum upped my confidence in remembering each step. 
I received this book prior to my surgery from my SO ; so my first thank you goes to him for his support in an unfamiliar adventure. The book is a wealth of information on lap band surgery and nutrition. It is full of hints and useful information to help you from preparing you for surgery and your first days post op. This book is well put together and the pictures are beautiful. The recipes are appealing and well thought out for each phase after your band. 
I purchased this book shortly before my surgery. I was impressed with how thorough it was. It re-verified the information that I had received from my surgeon and local support group but also gave ideas for many recipes and discussed the non-physical changes more in depth than even my surgeon's handbook did.
This book is the @#@!@$. I rarely write reviews, but after getting my score back I had to write something about this book. At the beginning of the surg rotation, I started to read NMS Sugery. Nothing stuck. Then a friend told me about case files and I took a gamble. I learned and retained more from this book than any other. Also I thought this book represented AT LEAST 70 % of the questions on the shelf. I went through it twice before the exam and supplemented this with NMS Surgery Casebook and scored 90th percentile. Excellent series for other rotations too.
I found the 7th edition of Schwartz a chore to read. However, while the recent edition of Sabiston has abridged and cut detail in favor of glossy color pictures, the 8th edition of Schwartz is a well balanced textbook, with an appropriate level of detail and an excellent basis in basic science. The chapters are also immensely readable! This is the text that I intend to finish reading during my surgical residency...
This book is just the right length for an aspiring surgeon to read during their surgery clerkship. If surgery isn't your bag then it's probably a bit much but is excellent as a reference for your patient's surgical issues. When compared against many of the larger texts such as Sabiston it doesn't seem to be missing much of the important information that I needed to write review papers or add to informal presentations. But it is much cheaper and less bulky, and thus ideal for medical students. I used this book along with the "Essentials of Surgical Specialties" volume.
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