Abstract
The Color Atlas of Veterinary Pathology is divided into 16 chapters covering 7 organ systems (hematopoietic, circulatory, respiratory, urinary, genital, nervous, locomotory), 5 organs (liver, exocrine pancreas, skin, eye, ear), the alimentary tract, peritoneum, endocrine glands, and mammary glands. Each chapter provides an index of its photographic content listing the illustrated lesions by page number. A short summary of the anatomic components of the covered organ system and, in many chapters, a 1- to 2-sentence synopsis of the basic functions of the system or organ follows. Most chapters have a bullet point list of the principal pathologic processes commonly encountered in the system or organ (e.g., congenital anomalies, regressive changes, hyperplasia, inflammation, neoplasia in the pancreas chapter). Each of the basic pathologic processes is explained in a short paragraph providing a concise introduction of technical terms, like the nomenclature of inflammatory processes of individual components of the organ or organ system. The skin chapter offers a table with definitions of primary lesions and a list of secondary lesions. A few chapters also include a paragraph on the clinical context—for example, a brief explanation of the effects of reactivity on function of the eye. Mention of possible causes has been limited to a minimum, which avoids factual overload. The volume is rich with illustrations, and photographic and print quality is exceptionally high. Common and less common lesions in domestic species are balanced. Some of the detail omitted in the synopses at the beginning of the chapters is provided in a few figure legends. References are not provided and, given the nature of the book, this is neither surprising nor a problem; it is nonetheless obvious that the content has been thoroughly updated. The index is adequate.
The intended audience is students of veterinary medicine, but it encompasses veterinarians working in a laboratory, meat inspection, and practice, too. The book is of interest to veterinary pathologists in training and to the trained veterinary pathologist, mostly in the context of teaching (veterinary students).
The major change, and huge improvement, from the first to the second edition is the addition of the synopses at the beginning of each chapter. They provide a basic, yet helpful contextual scaffold for the photographs and introduce/reinforce terminology efficiently. The classification of lesions is up to date (especially noticeable in the liver chapter, in which the organization is in close alignment with the WSAVA standards for diagnosis of canine and feline liver disease—an excellent text by the way) and, for most systems and organs, is clear and easy to follow. Unfortunately, it is not always based on gross morphologic presentation and so appears to be somewhat in disagreement with the scope of the book. All of the (few) suboptimal pictures of the first edition (mostly histomicrographs) have been replaced, the gross photographs have a uniform grey background and increased crispness, the figure legends are now shown within a unifying box below their respective pictures, and the sequence of pictures has been modified to achieve an organized and logical flow—all adding substantially to the visual appeal and clarity of the volume.
The inclusion of some of the rarities might result in confusion rather than clarification, especially when the uncommonness of the lesion is not always made clear to the reader. Given that the student of veterinary medicine is the target audience, quite a few photographs would have benefited from labeling of structures referred to in the figure legends. The correlation of microscopic photographs with gross pictures is a very useful feature, and I wished it would have been used more extensively. Unfortunately, some entities are illustrated microscopically only, where a gross picture would have added a lot to the understanding of the process (e.g., thrombus, hemangiosarcoma of the heart). The classification systems used in the synopses of a few chapters are not replicated in the illustrations. For example, the inflammatory reactions of the intestines are classified by the cellular response (proliferative or not) in the text and illustrated by exudate. Rarely, the terminology is not up to date (schwannoma instead of benign peripheral nerve sheath tumor). Some of the figure captions are confusing (“septic tubulonephrosis” or “parasitic nodules”) and are not consistently providing morphologic diagnoses, which muddies the clarity of the structure provided in the synopses. Only a few figure legends provide the wrong orientation of the plane of organ sectioning, misname the organ, or show poor choice of descriptive terms (“diffuse spotty” rather than “disseminated,” feeding a misconception common among students).
No comparable atlas on gross pathology of domestic species is on the market. It is therefore a nice addition to the standard textbooks on veterinary pathology. The significance of the atlas’ contribution might decrease as more and more material becomes available in color print but is, at this point in time, still substantial. The strength of the book rests with the superb quality of the photography and high quality of the print. It has gained a lot over the last edition because of the addition of the synopses, even if, occasionally, the emphasis on brevity is achieved at the cost of clarity. The atlas is a valuable resource for the student of veterinary medicine and resident in anatomic pathology with its fine balance of providing ample material illustrating the gross appearance of common pathologic processes without overwhelming the reader with minutia and examples. It could also serve as a useful quick reference for practicing veterinarians who perform necropsies or slaughter house inspections.