How much did you really use your textbooks?

Xoja87 · Jan 5, 2016

I bought all mine because I was able to charge it to my pending financial aid. I use campusbooks.com to search for the lowest prices.

RegularNurse · Jan 5, 2016

Rent textbooks from amazon or use the internet.

applesxoranges, BSN, RN · Jan 5, 2016

I would look at the current list and also next semester. There's a handful of books I bought a previous edition. I didn't use the lab values book. The NANDA book I bought an older edition and made sure that I used the correct list of diagnoses. I rented most of my actual textbooks that I didn't reuse.

I don't recommend going the old edition route for textbooks. I'd rent those before going old. A lot of time there was a huge disclaimer that if you used an older edition and the values or anything was out of date, you were sol.

Bigwords.com can help too.

Julesmama28 · Jan 5, 2016

I didn't buy them or bought used, old editions. Never had a problem and saved a ton of money! Talk to some upper class men. My professors used their own power points and as long as I showed up and took good notes or printed the power points I was golden. Graduated with a 3.75 gpa!

RescueNinjaKy · Jan 5, 2016

Your core nursing text book will probably be used consistently. Some other textbook that they wanted me to have like community nursing and holistic nursing wasn't used at all almost. But the medical surgical nursing textbook was used throughout the entire program and very frequently. Basically read the whole book.

Purple_roses · Jan 6, 2016

I never used text books during pre reqs (or at least I hardly every used them). My first semester of nursing school, I used every single one and read almost every single page of assigned reading. I spent over $900 on books alone; luckily, 75% of those books will be used throughout my entire program. There are students in my cohort who only skimmed the chapters and focused on the boxes, and they seemed to do fine. I still read everything.

What books are on your list, if you don't mind me asking? It would be easier to tell you if it's worth buying if we knew what the book was.

ETA: Oh, also! This is random, but it helped me out. Buy two or three more Nursing Diagnosis books by different authors (being sure to buy updated-enough editions). Some of the books describe things in a way that helps you decide which nursing diagnosis is the best for a particular patient. It's nice to compare them and to get more ideas for interventions. I bought an extra one for only $4 :)

achurley · Jan 6, 2016

I respectfully disagree - I DO recommend using older editions!

I have a 3.89 and graduate in May. I have used all older edition of textbooks these past 4 semesters. When you buy used older editions (I always use amazon), they are usually even cheaper then renting the current edition and you get to keep the book for reference or sell off to other students. This has never once been a problem for me.

Often you do not have time to read many of the textbooks anyways. Some you will but most will just be used for reference to write papers/care plans, online posts/forums, reference before tests to confirm or expand on learning in lecture.

You can always buy a lab value/medication app with current lab values and medications for current reference to use the whole program.

I second the idea of trying to talk to an upper classman about which texts are used multiple semesters. The only text I chose, which I felt was helpful to have current, was my nursing diagnosis handbook because that is used almost the whole time and interventions are evidence based....you want your care plans to be backed with the most current research based evidence.

For class papers that ask for evidence within the last five years, you can use peer reviewed nursing journal articles.

Xlorgguss · Jan 6, 2016

I know with my program we got the book list for our entire program at the beginning. I bought them all but by no means was that necessary. First semester the only books I used were the Fundamentals book and the Care Plan book. Technically we had one or two reading assignments from our Med Surg book and Maternity/Child book but I never actually read it.

KThurmond · Jan 6, 2016

I would email your instructor to see if you can use the last edition. My sister and I go to the same college and I'm taking a class she had last year. I brought her book to class and the instructor said its fine and I can borrow his when I need because the new version is formatted different.

I'm saving approximately $60. Amazon is good. I've heard of people using chegg.com. use the search bar. Other people listed others before but I can't remember what they were.

db2xs · Jan 6, 2016

If you know anyone who took the classes previous to you, offer to rent their books. If they're extremely generous, they might even lend them to you for free.

I graduated two years ago. The only textbooks I really used (and bought) were in med-surg and critical care nursing. I rented the rest. I will say, though, that I wish I bought the nursing assessment and plan care books.

Elevense · Jan 7, 2016

It depends on the topic and instructor. I would say personally anyway, patho and med/surg were books I used and ended up referring to from time to time afterwards. The rest, kind of depend on how the instructor teaches the class.

Contacting the instructor and asking about old editions is a great idea - most of ours were really understanding about that. Also some texts were available in the library or through interlibrary loans. I think in one case, I needed a $250 book for an 8 week class that barely used it, so my friend who torrents got me a pdf of the book. I also rented a couple of the cheaper books through Kindle.