Practical Endocrinology: Symptoms and Treatment

The author presents what appears at first sight to be a plausible discussion of present knowledge of endocrinology applied to clinical medicine. The work is well arranged and fairly well written. However, much of the material does not withstand critical analysis. Many conditions are described as having an endocrinologic etiology for which there is little except a theoretical basis and often not a good theoretical basis at that. Despite this fact, the casual reader may not be aware of the extent to which pure conjecture has served as source material for this book.

The author states, for instance, that the "function [of the parathyroid glands] with respect to calcium metabolism has been definitely established." This will be news to the physiologists; the fact that some of the effects of parathyroid extracts on calcium distribution in tissues and body fluids are known does not constitute adequate basis for the foregoing statement.