Doody's Review Service

Reviewer:	William Finnerty, PharmD (NBCRNA)

Description
The 13th edition of *The APhA Complete Review for Pharmacy* encapsulates the body of knowledge required of an entry-level pharmacist. Subjects include pharmacy math, compounding, clinical trial design, and therapeutics. Published five years after the previous edition (2017), it is on pace with the NAPLEX competency statement changes that were updated in 2016 and 2021.

Purpose
The book's primary purpose is to provide study material and practice for the NAPLEX. Secondarily, it can be used as a refresher for currently practicing pharmacists. Like most textbooks, each chapter is written by a different author and is aligned with corresponding experts in the field. However, this means that the utility as a study guide varies throughout the book.

Audience
Refresher pharmacy material and NAPLEX study guides are both welcome aids for students and pharmacists alike, even in a market with several options. Covering the entirety of pharmacy (even at the entry level) is likely an unattainable goal for a single book. However, the book contains a lot of useful information and the authors have appropriate credentials.

Features
The 43 chapters include key points, study guide checklists, practice questions, and a breakdown of topics with many tables (almost one on every other page). Every chapter is also mapped to specific secondary-level NAPLEX competency statements. It would have been better organized if the chapters themselves had been arranged according to the competency statements. Each chapter follows a shared general outline but differs in approach. Summary and study lend themselves to bullet points and sparse visual aids, but some authors lean heavily on a narrative method or include distracting basic knowledge. The key points at the beginning of each chapter are sometimes useful as a specific pearl of knowledge, but often require follow-up study. Chapters also include short lists of additional resources for further study on the specific subject. However, the resources sometimes feel like overkill for a study guide. One chapter suggested reading the original Holliday-Segar publication from 1957. Some of the best features are not chapter specific. Throughout the book, the top 200 drugs are bolded when they appear in text. It helps to learn topics holistically while focusing on the most pertinent drugs. Also, the answers and rationale to the practice questions in each chapter are useful summaries of important information.

Assessment
This series of books has been plagued by typos in the past. This edition improves but does not eliminate typos or imprecise text. It may be distracting but should not interfere with the usefulness as a study guide. Most importantly, it is up to date in content and in reference to the newest NAPLEX competency statements (e.g., including callouts to boxed warnings when such drugs are mentioned). Another trend for this series of books is the increasing size. At 1,220 pages, the 13th edition is significantly larger than the already hefty 950 pages of the previous edition. Throughout the years, this series has kept up with the rapidly changing practice of pharmacy and the NAPLEX. Although it could benefit from more and better illustrations, visual aids, and mnemonics, the content is solid and useful for any student or practicing pharmacist.