Textbooks old Editions or New Ones..

Marie_LPN, RN, LPN, RN · Aug 9, 2003

If the instructor is going to be teaching out of the new edition, you should buy the new edition. You never know just how much something has changed in the book.

Noney · Aug 9, 2003

I used old editions all the time. There is usually not much difference at all.

If you want to try it you could take the $180, put it away somewhere, and if you decide you need it you got it.

You may be surprised to find out half the clas has the old text also. And alot of the time the instructor doesn't vary with a new text.

RN 2005 · Aug 9, 2003

This is something I have always wondered also. Glad you asked....Hope more opinions come in on this thread.

palesarah · Aug 9, 2003

I used some old editions in school... my micro teacher taught straight out of the book, she didn't believe in note-taking if it wasn't necessary so she'd just tell us to flip to page ### and what to highlight (with explanations of course), and even in that class I managed fine with an older edition. If there was pertinent new information I'd just jot it down.

In reality, for my actual nursing classes, I rarely used my text books at all. By senior year I stopped buying them altogether. Obviously I did fine for it. You just need to figure out what will work best for you & your classes. I'd suggest giving it a try with the older edition and if after a few classes you feel like it's not cutting it, buy the newer one.

essarge · Aug 9, 2003

Check with your instructors first. They will know how much the editions have changed.

memphispanda, RN · Aug 10, 2003

For my college courses, the older edition was fine. For the nursing classes, the current edition was a must have, and even then a lot of the information was out of date. My teachers like to use "know chart 22-4 on page 911" and the old books have very different set-ups for their "box" information.