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Oxford Textbook of Rheumatology. 2nd ed. Edited by P J Maddison, D A Isenberg, P Woo, D N Glass. (Pp 2208; £195). Oxford: Oxford Medical, 1998. ISBN 0-19-262697-3.
First time around, I must confess to having purchased “The Other” rheumatological tome—that is, Klippel and Dieppe (KD), attracted by its user friendliness and liberal use of eye catching coloured diagrams, tables, and photographs in contrast with the more monochrome first edition of the Oxford Textbook of Rheumatology (OTR). It was therefore with interest that I agreed to review the second edition of the OTR to see whether I would change my allegiance!
The two main differences from the first edition, immediately evident from even the most cursory of glances of the textbook are as follows:
(1) The second edition of the OTR is dramatically more colourful with numerous colour photographs. Furthermore, the tables and line diagrams have improved both quantitatively and qualitatively as well as acquiring colour themselves, somewhat reminiscent in appearance and style of KD (fig 1). An infectious side effect of healthy competition, I suspect! This is most obvious in such chapters …