According to Dr Moffet, the objective of this book is to help the physician to "classify every patient's illness, recognize life threatening emergencies, proceed logically, evaluate the differential diagnosis, analyze situational problems, consult references and recognize new syndromes." To meet these objectives, the problem-oriented approach is employed. The book contains 21 chapters, and they vary considerably in the utilization of the problem-oriented approach and in the achievement of the author's goals.
Dr Moffet is to be commended for this undertaking, in which much of the presented information is based on his own personal experience. In the same vein, however, a bold book of this nature is an easy target for criticism by more conventional reviewers.
The section on "fever syndromes" is a highlight of the book. In this section the author has utilized the problem-oriented approach and divided fevers into several categories. These categories offer the physician an approach that