With the prevalence of the common dementia disorders set to rise substantially worldwide, there is an increasing need for primary care physicians to develop their knowledge base of dementia. Situated somewhere in the space between short handbooks on dementia and more detailed specialist tomes, this multinational and multi-author textbook provides a series of clearly written and concise reviews on the latest developments in clinical and basic neurosciences. This is not an introductory text and so would also be of interest to trainees in both physical and mental health care of older adults and also in neurology.
The book is divided practically into four mains sections devoted to the most common causes of dementia: Alzheimer's disease, vascular dementias, dementia with Lewy bodies and frontotemporal dementias. Each section comprises several succinct chapters that address clinical diagnosis and investigation, pathophysiology, neuroimaging and therapies plus their limitations. I particularly found the section and chapters on frontotemporal dementias to be a useful account of these capricious but merciless disorders, providing relevant pathology and imaging figures as well as a helpful account of their current classification and molecular genetics.
The reader should note that the emphasis here is more on basic neuroscience. There is little in the book on differential diagnosis of cognitive impairment, dementia health service research, carers, epidemiology, dementia care services or non-pharmacological approaches to management of behavioral and psychiatric symptoms of dementia. However, to be fair, this is not the book's remit and the interested reader can readily look elsewhere for this information. A greater shortcoming is the book's price. I could readily locate less expensive suppliers for this book on the internet than the publisher's asking price. Nonetheless, the high cover price will put off many potential buyers who might find this book useful in their daily work. Perhaps it is one for the library rather than the individual consumer.
