What MCh Cardio Thoracic and Vascular Surgery (CTVS) residents and departments actually read in 2026 — with journals, a year-wise reading plan, and the references you will need for your thesis and exit practical.
These 18 titles are the standard references for Cardio Thoracic and Vascular Surgery (CTVS), drawn from the NBE DrNB curriculum and the texts Indian teaching departments work from. Each is shown with the edition in circulation now, so you can print or buy the right one first time.
Source: NBE DrNB curriculum for Cardio Thoracic and Vascular Surgery (CTVS)
The books most residents actually buy. These are the editions in circulation now, with a note on whether each is something you read through, keep as a reference, or open only for the viva.
Three years of superspecialty training goes faster than it sounds, and most of it is spent on the floor. The order below is what works for most MCh Cardio Thoracic and Vascular Surgery (CTVS) residents.
Khonsari for operative steps plus Gravlee for bypass physiology; Braunwald sections for haemodynamics and echo; begin Cohn & Adams by chapter as cases arise; register the thesis protocol.
Systematic Kirklin/Barratt-Boyes for congenital and valve surgery, Jonas for congenital operative logic, Shields for thoracic and Rutherford for vascular; complete thesis data collection.
Revision pass through Cohn & Adams and Sabiston-Spencer, guideline and landmark trial review (SYNTAX, EXCEL, PARTNER, FREEDOM), then intensive mock long/short cases, imaging spots and viva practice.
Protocol, methodology and reporting standards examiners expect you to have followed.
Cases, spotters and stations that come up again and again in the exit exam.
The MCh CTVS exit examination follows the affiliating university's scheme under NMC Postgraduate Medical Education Regulations. In practice this is four theory papers of 100 marks — typically applied basic sciences and cardiopulmonary bypass, acquired cardiac surgery, congenital heart and thoracic/vascular surgery, and recent advances — plus a clinical/practical examination with long and short cases, ward rounds, imaging, cath and echo spots, instruments and grafts, and viva with logbook and thesis.
The titles on this page are the ones residents and departments actually use, each with the edition in circulation now. Start with the first one listed and add the references as your reading deepens.
Kirklin/Barratt-Boyes Cardiac Surgery (2 vols) by Nicholas T. Kouchoukos, Eugene H. Blackstone, Frank L. Hanley, James K. Kirklin is the usual anchor. The definitive cardiac surgical reference for both congenital and acquired disease.
MCh Cardio Thoracic and Vascular Surgery (CTVS) is a superspecialty course taken after a broad-specialty MD, MS or DNB, so the reading is narrower and deeper. The broad-specialty texts are assumed knowledge by the time you start.
No. Most residents own two or three and use the department or library copy for the rest. That is exactly why printing selected chapters from a PDF works out cheaper than buying volumes you will open twice.
We print from the PDF you send us. Send the file on WhatsApp with your page count and whether you want colour, black and white or mixed, and we print, bind and deliver anywhere in India. We do not supply copyrighted book files.
Black and white is 50 paise a page, colour is Rs 1 a page, and binding is Rs 40 per bound volume. A 400-page mixed set with binding usually works out around Rs 300 plus delivery.
Send the PDF on WhatsApp — colour Rs 1/page, B&W 50p/page, binding Rs 40. Printed, bound and delivered anywhere in India.
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