| HOME | HELP | FEEDBACK | SUBSCRIPTIONS | ARCHIVE | SEARCH | TABLE OF CONTENTS |
Guest Access | Sign In via User Name/Password
|
|
|
|||||||
Guest Access | Sign In via User Name/Password |
|||||||||
Khartoum, Sudan
Abstract
Joseph P. Lynch III, ed. New York, NY: Marcel Dekker, 2004; 800 pp; $235.00
Idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis remains one of the most perplexing of pulmonary diseases. Overall, the prognosis is poor, available treatment remains ineffectual, and little is understood of its pathogenesis. In recent years, considerable progress has been made in research on the inflammatory processes of the lung, and we now recognize that idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis is a distinct clinical entity defined by the histologic pattern of usual interstitial pneumonia. It is hoped that new therapeutic interventions and effective drugs will be based on these advances.
Idiopathic Pulmonary Fibrosis, a recent addition to the Lung Biology in Health and Disease series and edited by Joseph P. Lynch III, gives a comprehensive account of this vexing disease. The text is divided into three major sections, which lead the reader logically through epidemiology and clinical presentation, then on to pathogenesis and disease mechanisms, and finally to current and future therapies. The authors of the 28 chapters include renowned names in their field from the Americas, Europe, and Japan, thus enriching the text by providing geographically varied experience; editor Lynch also co-authored three chapters. Each chapter of the text can be read independently and gives a state-of-the-art account of the particular subject discussed.
The chapters on clinical features cover the differential diagnosis of idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis in great detail, thus making it easier to understand some of complexities and controversies associated with this condition. In this respect, I especially admired the chapters on nonspecific interstitial pneumonia and pulmonary fibrosis in connective tissue disease. The chapter on imaging gives a detailed account of high-resolution CT scanning techniques, a modality that is quite useful to the clinician, and the included CT images are reasonably well reproduced. There is some repetition and overlap between various chapters, particularly with respect to imaging, physiology, and disease definition, but I suppose this is inevitable in a multiauthored book. I would have liked to see the slides in the chapter on pathology of usual interstitial pneumonia reproduced in color rather than black and white, as that would have illustrated the findings more graphically for the clinician.
The most important breakthroughs in idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis have been made in the area of pathogenesis, and early concepts of pathogenesis have evolved and changed dramatically over the last few years. The section covering pathogenesis gives a comprehensive account of this, with chapters discussing in great detail putative biological and immunologic mechanisms thought to play important roles. While these chapters provide so much scientific detail that a clinician may be overwhelmed, this information would clearly be indispensable to the researcher in idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis.
In the final three chapters, the authors evaluate current treatment options for idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis, including pharmacologic therapy and lung transplantation. This discussion is rich and very much focused, with suitable analyses of their limitations and an appropriate forecasting of future therapies based on the evolving understanding of the pathogenesis of idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis. The book concludes with an elegant chapter on genetic strategies for treating idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis.
Overall, this is a well-written book that would likely appeal to a broad audience of pulmonologists and pulmonary scientists. The inclusion of comprehensive referencing and the detailed discussions of pathogenesis and disease mechanisms make it quite well suited to the pulmonologist with special interest in diffuse lung diseases, and also to the researcher in this subject.
| ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| HOME | HELP | FEEDBACK | SUBSCRIPTIONS | ARCHIVE | SEARCH | TABLE OF CONTENTS |
