The new edition of the best-selling
Lecture Notes title is a concise introduction to clinical biochemistry that presents the fundamental science underpinning common biochemical investigations used in clinical practice.

Lecture Notes: Clinical Biochemistry allows the reader to make efficient and informed use of the diagnostic services offered by their clinical biochemistry department. The result is a text that serves as a reference to the practitioner as well as the student. The book takes a system-based approach, with the underlying physiological rationale for any test explained in the context of disruption by disease. This leads naturally to an integrated and practical understanding of biochemical diagnostics.

Including multiple choice questions (MCQs) alongside end-of-chapter case studies to help develop test-selection skills, Lecture Notes: Clinical Biochemistry provides the essential background to biochemical investigations and is an ideal course companion and revision guide for medical students, junior doctors on the Foundation Programme, general practitioners, and nurses and laboratory technicians.

Dr Geoff Beckett, Reader in Clinical Biochemistry at the University of Edinburgh

Dr Simon Walker, Senior Lecturer in Clinical Biochemistry at the University of Edinburgh

Dr Peter Rae, Consultant Clinical Biochemist, Western General Hospital, Edinburgh

Dr Peter Ashby, Clinical Biochemist, Western General Hospital, Edinburgh

Preface.

List of abbreviations.

1 Requesting and interpreting tests.

2 Disturbances of water, sodium and potassium balance.

3 Acid-base balance and oxygen transport.

4 Renal disease.

5 Disorders of calcium, phosphate and magnesium metabolism.

6 Diabetes mellitus and hypoglycaemia.

7 Disorders of the hypothalamus and pituitary.

8 Abnormalities of thyroid function.

9 Disorders of the adrenal cortex and medulla.

10 Investigation of gonadal function infertility, menstrual irregularities and hirsuitism.

11 Pregnancy and antenatal screening.

12 Cardiovascular disorders.

13 Liver disease.

14 Gastrointestinal tract disease.

15 Nutrition.

16 Trauma, inflammation, immunity and malignancy.

17 Disorders of iron and porphyrin metabolism.

18 Uric acid, gout and purine metabolism.

19 Central nervous system and cerebrospinal fluid.

20 Therapeutic drug monitoring and chemical toxicology.

21 Clinical biochemistry in paediatrics and geriatrics Self-assessment MCQs.

Answers to MCQs.

Appendix: Reference ranges - SI units and 'conventional' units.

Index.