Candidiasis

This is a medically oriented, multi-authored volume, dealing with candidiasis as a disease, with little emphasis on the microbiology of candida itself. Thus, the specifically mycologic chapter (by Roy L. Hopfer) emphasizes laboratory diagnosis and species differentiation rather than basic metabolism, genetics, and so on, and the experimental section (extensively researched and referenced by Donald B. Louria) emphasizes models of human disease. This is a book aimed at the medical specialist, not the student of mycology, and this fact is reflected in the authorship of the articles: primarily infectious diseases experts and other medical specialists. As such, it is a well-organized and up-to-date (references through 1982) small volume which is a useful text for the medical caregiver and medical trainee. Having lived with this book for several months, I have found it much more useful than stacks of research reprints for answering practical infectious diseases clinical questions, and my students have found the section on treatment of candida infections (by John P. Utz and Edouard Drouhet) an especially helpful and brief summary of a difficult problem. As do some of the other chapters, this chapter includes over one hundred references. In addition to general topics such as the diagnosis, pathology, epidemiology, and radiology of candida infections, this book also has whole chapters which contain extensive coverage of certain candida syndromes (mucocutaneous candidiasis, systemic candidiasis) and local candida infections (endocarditis, endophthalmitis, and gastrointestinal candidiasis). These will be especially helpful to practitioners, as general infectious diseases texts do not provide nearly as extensive discussions of the specific kinds of candida infections. There is also an appropriate emphasis on the compromised host. In summary, I have found this to be a useful and up-to-date coverage of all aspects of candida infections, and I recommend it to individuals and hospital sections which deal with medical microbiology, infectious diseases, oncology, immunology, and possibly general surgery. For postdoctoral fellows it represents a good starting point for developing a general understanding of these infections, including the important immunologic aspects, and they will find the reference lists especially helpful. At present, this is not a very quickly moving field, and the volume should be useful for several years.