Review of Radiologic Physics

As the back cover of this paperback volume explains, this book is intended as a comprehensive review source for radiology registrars preparing for the physics portion of the American Board of Radiology written examination, and for radiographers preparing for the American Registry of Radiologic Technologists certification examination. The strong American accent of this statement might be seen by some potential European purchasers as a reason to mistrust the material presented, but this would be a somewhat short-sighted view as the book succeeds in covering virtually the whole range of diagnostic radiology physics, MRI, ultrasound, nuclear medicine and radiation protection in a compact, `bullet-point' format ideal for the purposes of exam revision. The level of detail presented is fairly uniform across the variety of subjects and it is difficult to see any obvious gaps in the material, but the compact format is probably not suitable as a primary text as the depth of explanation is intentionally limited. Approximately one-third of the page count is taken up with 550 exam practise multi-choice questions complete with answers and explanations, but as these are very specifically modelled on the American examinations at which this book is aimed, they are perhaps of limited use to a non US readership. Similarly, the European reader needs to guard against soaking up American technical standards relating to power supply frequency, TV formats etc, and references to American radiation safety legislation. However, such references are, in general, made clearly enough to avoid confusion. Overall, this review would be a good buy for radiology and radiography students approaching their physics examinations who wish to use a ready-made revision source book, but it does not include a great enough depth of explanation to act as a primary text.