shaking and other non-accidental head injuries in children. edited by r. a. minns and j. k. brown....

SHAKING AND OTHER NON-AC-CIDENTAL HEAD INJURIES INCHILDREN. Edited by R. A. Minnsand J. K. Brown. Mac Keith Press,London, 2005. pp. 528. Price: £95.00,$175.95, h128.30. ISBN 1898683352.

Unlike previous books on this topic,which have relied heavily on the inputof child abuse experts, this book isedited and substantially authored bytwo paediatric neurologists, and thisbrings a refreshingly different ap-proach, to give just one example a newclassification of cases according to theirclinical presentation. The book startswith an outstanding 105 page carefullyreferenced neurological perspectiveand overview. Chapters on bio-mechanics and epidemiology are fol-lowed by a section that presentsoriginal and largely unpublished ori-ginal data on 129 cases included in theScottish non-accidental head injurydatabase. The chapter on haemor-rhagic retinopathy is most helpfullyillustrated with a series of excellentcolour photographs, thanks to the in-put of Parsons, one of the establishedworld authorities on eye pathology inchildhood trauma. The well-illustratedchapter and clear exposition on neu-roimaging come from Jaspan, primusinter pares among paediatric neuror-adiologists in the UK, followed by se-parate chapters on magnetic resonanceand skeletal imaging. A chapter onmechanisms and management comesfrom J. Punt, a paediatric neuro-surgeon with a particular interest inhead injury, and this helpfully ad-dresses likely as well as less likelymechanisms. Excellent and useful re-views on the non-surgical manage-ment, the neuropathology, and theprognosis and outcome are followedby short chapters on child protectionand the prevention of abuse, policeprocedure, legal aspects, and a socialwork perspective. Finally there is a

helpful glossary of terms prepared byN. Punt.

Rather than merely regurgitatingand digesting available data, this bookoffers a great deal of new data and newinsights to a very difficult area. Thelabelling of non-accidental head injuryposes a real problem, and this is re-flected by the different names that ap-pear in this book. My personal view isthat the label ‘shaken baby syndrome’is particularly unhelpful, and leads toendless and generally sterile debatesabout the relative importance of shak-ing versus impact, so I was sorry to seethat a few chapter authors had usedthis term. I hope that there will be afurther edition of this invaluable andin many ways definitive (512 pages)textbook, the authors taking the op-portunity to introduce a uniform ter-minology and maybe trade in some ofthe social topics for new chapters oninjuries occurring at birth and theirpossible relevance, and an analysis ofthe various alternative (sometimes al-most extra-terrestrial) theories that aresprouting up like weeds in the garden.

The medical science that underpinsthese types of injuries is undoubtedlycomplex, and this means that thoseinvolved in such cases have to grapplewith a number of difficult concepts.Whilst a medical reader will have anobvious advantage, the text is pre-sented in an unusually clear and con-cise manner, and most of the book’scontents should be readily compre-hensible to the non-medical reader,who will be greatly helped by the highstandard of illustrations throughoutthe book.

Tim DavidDivision of Human Development,

University of Manchester,Booth Hall Children’s Hospital,

Manchester, UK

DOI: 10.1002/icd.588

Book Reviews 101

Copyright r 2009 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. Inf. Child. Dev. 18: 95–104 (2009)