Vascular Disease and Affective Disorders. Edited byChiu E. Ames D. and Katona C. Martin DunitzLimited, London, 2002. Pages: 275. $44.95

This text book has come at a very appropriatetime, when there is much contemporary interestin the relationship between vascular disease and affec-tive disorders. Some of the concepts covered are fairlycutting edge and not yet firmly established within thebody of general psychiatric text books or DSM-IV. Inparticular, the concept of vascular depression and vas-cular mania are attracting more and more attention.This text has 17 chapters which look comprehensivelyand in a very up-to-date way at the relationshipbetween vascular disease and psychiatric condition.There are chapters with great relevance to liaison psy-chiatrists treating anxiety disorders, panic attacks anddepression in patients with cardiovascular disease,including cardiac surgery. Other chapters cover therelationship between cerebrovascular disease andaffective symptoms, such chapters are of particularinterest to geriatricians, neurologists, neurovascularspecialists and old age psychiatrists.

Broadly speaking the text book aims to pulltogether four dimensions. Firstly, how vascular dis-ease might psychologically impact on patients. Sec-

ondly, how psychiatric morbidity might impact onvascular disease as an outcome. Thirdly, how specifickey neurological areas of vascular damage mightincrease biological risk or depression or mania, withparticular reference to the new concepts of vasculardepression and vascular mania. Finally, the text bookdraws attention to shared risk factors that mayincrease an individual’s risk of both vascular diseaseand affective disorders parsimoniously, e.g. constitu-tional abnormalities in lipid metabolism and plateletactivity. The text book is further rounded by givinggood advice on how to treat psychiatric disorders inpatients with cardiovascular and cerebrovascular dis-ease. The interested reader is likely to be a doctorworking in the field of psychological medicine, neu-rovascular medicine, old age psychiatry, geriatrics,neurology, cardiology or liaison psychiatry. It is ofexceptional interest for doctors researching thesefields.

STEVE SIMPSON

Old Age PsychiatryYeatman Hospital

Dorset, UKPublished online in Wiley InterScience

(www.interscience.wiley.com).DOI: 10.1002/gps.889

Copyright # 2003 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. Int J Geriatr Psychiatry 2003; 18: 659–660.

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