This handbook is a comprehensive text covering nearly every psychiatric, neurologic, and general medical condition capable of affecting mental status. It covers both common and uncommon disorders with well-organised, concise, and practical discussions geared for quick reference.

The book is divided into 30 sections patterned after topic headings in the DSM-IV. Within each section is a series of chapters that briefly describe an overview, time of onset, clinical features, course, complications, aetiology, differential diagnosis, and treatment of a given disorder. A short list of references follows every chapter, and many chapters include radiographs that show characteristics of the disease process. The final section covers psychopharmacology, emphasizing medical features such as pharmacokinetics, side effects, drug-drug interactions, and complications of overdose.

This is a comprehensive, medically oriented, and user-friendly text that complements - and in some cases takes the place of-the larger psychiatric tomes. It is equally useful to the medical student and to the practitioner in need of a quick refresher or confronted with a rare or unusual condition.