The Genetic Basis for Human Disease

This book is part of a series called Fundamental and Clinical Aspects of Internal Medicine, a series of volumes for a postgraduate course. Short chapters cover the subjects of cytogenetics, mendelian genetics, genetic markers, multifactorial inheritance, biochemical genetics, genetics of cancer, and treatment of genetic disease. It attempts to be a fairly comprehensive resource for clinicians who want to be aware of how genetic knowledge can help them in management of their patients' disease. The chapters are succinct and pertinent. There are a number of black and white photographic reproductions which illustrate classical genetic disorders in patients and idealized pedigrees which illustrate mendelian genetics. There are drawings but no photographs of chromosomes in metaphase. A short, fairly comprehensive index and a selection of general references, including both textbook references and references to the original literature, serve to make this book an easy resource to use. The book, short and concise, is by no means complete but appears to be accurate in what it has done. It can be recommended for clinicians who wish to bring themselves up to date in new developments in clinical genetics in a short time. It can be recommended as a review book for medical students who wish to recall their information about the clinical aspects of human genetics. It can not be recommended as a textbook for a medical genetics course and will be most useful when used in conjunction with the literature references which it contains.