This pocket size book serves as a quick reference for residents in psychiatry, residents in internal medicine, and any practitioner who wishes to remain current with the literature in this field. The approach is eclectic and gives the several schools appropriate consideration. The reader who wishes a brief and succinct account of a particular subject can find the several pages of information more accurately by noting the table of contents than by relying on the index.
The chapter headings are clear and the style is simple and informative with due recognition of conflicting theory. The chapter on psychological examination is extremely well done. Chemotherapy of mental illness is brought up to date except that the use and hazards of the barbiturate-like, or barbituratoid, drugs are a few years in arrears. Addiction to glutethimide (Doriden) and meprobamate is not mentioned even though cases have been reported with a few deaths due