Schober O, Heindel W. PET-CT Hybrid Imaging. Thieme 2010 Stuttgart, New York. 296 pages, 623 illustrations.

Nuclear medicine, once considered somewhat removed from the daily practice of Neuroradiology, has entered our lives, particularly (but not exclusively) in the area of head and neck radiology.

The recently published book PET-CT Hybrid Imaging written by Drs. Schober and Heindel with contributions from 31 other authors (the majority of whom are from Munster Hospital in Germany), takes the reader from the Basic Principals to Imaging of Neoplastic Diseases to Imaging of Inflammatory, Cardiovascular and Neurodegenerative Diseases.  The book ends with an Appendix with useful websites for PET imaging along with limited glossary of terms (this is actually less useful than the 5-page listing of abbreviations found in the front of the book).  To this reviewer, the book gave the opportunity to review fundamentals of PET imaging and to review the benefit of PET/CT imaging in head and neck tumors as well as to understand some of the problems inherent in imaging this area.

The book will be useful for the entire Department.  While a neuroradiologist would not necessarily purchase this book, it would be one to recommend to a Departmental library so it could serve as a ready reference.