Book reviews

Pathology of soft tissue tumorsSteven I. Hajdu, Philadelphia, 1979, Lea &Febiger. 599 pages with illustrations. $65.00.

This book is organized into nine chapters andthree appendices. The first chapter is a history andclassification of soft tissue tumors; the next eightdeal respectively with fibrous tissue, tenosynovialtissue, adipose tissue, muscle, vessels, peripheralnerves, extraskeletal bone tumor, and miscellane­ous tumors.

Each chapter is introduced by a historical sec­tion which considers terminology, morphology,physiology, and chemistry. This is followed by adiscussion of the tumors which is lavishly illus­trated. Each chapter also includes charts and dia­grams which represent incidence, recurrences,location, age, distribution, and survival. An ex­tensive bibliography is at the end of each section.

The appendices of the book represent a uniquefeature. The first is entitled "Recent Trends inTreatment of Soft Tissue Sarcomas" and is writ­ten by M. Shiu, G. Magill, and S. Hopfan of theMemorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center. Theseauthors, in five pages, discuss the treatment mo­dalities varying from excision, amputation, andnode dissection to chemotherapy.

The second appendix, entitled "DifferentialDiagnosis of Soft Tissue Tumors," containscharts which give age incidence, sex incidence,size, and site. The author has also made charts ofthe histologic morphology, special stains, andelectron microscopic features as well as metastaticsites.

The third appendix is a self-assessment quizconsisting of 150 questions.

The text is well written and, for the most part,well illustrated. Some of the illustrations are un­necessarily large, but they demonstrate what theauthor intended. The use of electron microscopicphotographs is not excessive. One aspect I wouldconsider inappropriate is Appendix 3. This' appar­ently represents an appeal to the current interestin, and abuse of, testing technics. Most examina­tions are tests of that which one has committed tomemory. The test-taking student has developed tothe point where he can memorize great masses of

material and then cleanse his mind completelyafter a test so that it may be filled with other"facts. " Of greater importance is whether the stu­dent knows where to acquire the needed informa­tion.

This book does perform as the author intendedin his preface. It is a compilation of many aspectsof soft tissue tumors which will be very useful topathologists and less so to the oncologists and sur­geons because of the emphasis on morphology.

Bernard F. Fetter, M.D.Durham, NC

The invisible alcoholic: Women and alcoholicabuse in AmericaMarian Sandmaier, New York, 1980, McGraw­Hill Book Co. 298 pages. $12.95.

The female fix: Women and legal drugaddictionMuriel Nellis, Boston, 1980, Houghton MifflinCo. 228 pages. $8.95.

Social causes of illnessRichard Totman, New York, 1979, PantheonBooks, Inc. 263 pages. $10.00.

Holistic medicine has been much in the newslately, attaining a popularity which seems entirelyundeserved. Most reviewers who have a moderateknowledge of science and philosophy find holismto be shallow, intellectually, but the general publicdoes not agree. Marian Sandmaier's The InvisibleAlcoholic: Women and Alcoholic Abuse in Amer­ica, Muriel Nellis's The Female Fix: Women andLegal Drug Addiction, and Richard Totman's So­cial Causes of Illness are three popular and well­advertised books. What the hell is holism, youask. Holism is a semireligious faith in mentalism(opposed to materialism), intuition (opposed toscientific analysis), and in a mystical unity of allthe universe. The faith owes primary allegiance toHegelian idealism, a European philosophy whichflourished briefly and was rejected a century ago.Holism is favored by many recent college grad­uates, mostly students of the new idealist doctrinesin the social studies, especially psychology. Some

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