9 of 10 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
A Truly Thorough Foundation for Clinical Neuroscience, October 3, 2010
This review is from: Molecular Neuropharmacology: A Foundation for Clinical Neuroscience, Second Edition (Paperback)
Brief Review
This review functions to evaluate the book "Molecular Neuropharmacology: A Foundation for Clinical Neuroscience" in the context of providing a meticulous background of the pathophysiology of neurological disorders. The book thoroughly completes this task by first reviewing neuropharmacological fundamentals of a functioning nervous system, in terms of both biochemical and organism-level homeostasis. The book then proceeds to review the major mechanisms that explain how a nervous system augments its behavior from a biochemical level, by reviewing the effects of drug action. This second segment reviews the natural neurotransmitters which elicit a response, including amino acids, monoamines, neurohormones, and atypical neurotransmitters in a natural setting within the body.
The final segment of the book, its main point, is the neuropharmacology of many neural disorders or behaviors. This section uses the main neuropathological concepts presented in the first two parts of the book to explain how slight irregularities in the biochemistry of neuron interactions can lead to a wide array of clinical manifestations. This section of the book is dense, thorough, and well written. This textbook is a great reference for any student wishing to bridge the biology of neurological disorders with the clinical symptomatic outcomes in order to truly understand the pathology of neurological disease.
Structure, Style and Figures in the Book
The text is broken into three main segments, as previously mentioned, with chapters in each. Each chapter begins with a list of key concepts which state the main facts and points to be discussed. The chapter then thoroughly explains the mechanisms of each point. Reading the key points ahead of time allows one to know the ultimate effects of drugs and neurologically active substances before reading about the minute details which lead to an effect. Knowing the effect ahead of time boosts understanding.
Within each chapter lie text, tables, diagrams, and figures that help to explain the intricacies of many chemical environments and signaling mechanisms. Hardly a page goes by without a half-page figure reiterating a difficult pathway in a pictorial representation. A great plus are the plethora of citations involved in many of the figures and tables, which thoroughly combine data into a modern view of the neurological school of thought. The true power of this book lies in its descriptive figures; the text seems to place them into human and physiological context. For many visual learners, this aspect of the book is particularly appealing.
Many of the figures exhibit parallel structure, in which recurring ion channels are similarly shaped and proteins have an analogous representation. Biochemical synthetic pathways are listed with an almost identical shape and form, and are usually accompanied with a figure box. These explain some clinical outcome, such as postpartum mood disorders, with reference to an inability to move from one step in the biochemical pathway to another. It's useful to directly correlate a specific point in an organic chemistry reaction with an actual neurological disorder.
The end of each chapter lists a section for suggested readings. Unlike many books, the references are stratified by subject which allows one to easily sort through references if it's necessary.
Opinion of Part 1: Fundamentals of Neuropharmacology
This first section of the book reviews the basic elements which are common to the neurological system; enzyme and drug efficacy, cellular bases of communication, synaptic transmission, and signal transduction in the brain and central nervous system. Although this section is somewhat of a review for students with an elementary understanding of neurobiology and biochemistry, it provides a useful introduction into the way in which many neurological drugs are classified as agonists, antagonists, or partial/inverse antagonists/agonists. Additionally, methodologies are explained which are utilized when creating new drugs and analyzing their effects. The chapters become increasing complicated and soon switch from generalized cell diagrams to neurons and effects of specific substances, such as lithium or acetylcholine. Part 1 ends with a review of signal transduction in the brain and, for the first time, discusses higher-level symptoms from biochemical phenomena.
Opinion of Part 2: Neural Substances of Drug Action
Part 2 of the text utilizes the basic principles in part 1 in order to thoroughly review the specific molecules used in synapes between neurons, and the general strategies used in neuropharmacology which augment the neuroendocrine system. Each neurotrasmitter, or neurologically active molecule, is analyzed in genetic and proteomic contexts, with specific focuses on transmembrane receptors and, ultimately, a molecule's excitatory or inhibitory effects. This part of the book densely covers amino acids, monoamines, neuropeptides, and atypical neurotransmitters in order to explain their normal function on a cellular level. Detailed diagrams with specific and complicated receptor families are the main focus of this segment of the text, and it serves are a more complicated primer for the third and main focus of the book.
Opinion of Part 3: Neuropharmacology of Neural Systems and Disorders
Parts 1 and 2 of the text describe how a functioning nervous system works and the specific molecules and biochemical phenomena to keep the nervous system in homeostasis. The final part of the book, the main point of the text, systematically lists clinical disorders and explains their pathophysiology with reference to some sort of disorder in a system which previously functioned in parts 1 and 2 of the text. This section of the book is why people should buy this text.
The first two chapters in this part (Chapters 9-10) review the effects of the neurotransmitters listed in part 2 with reference to the major antonomic processes in the body and lists a series of neuroendocrine systems and axes which act in concert to maintain the internal milieu. From here, the final 9 chapters of the book explain the biochemical bases and pathology of pain, inflammation, sleep, arousal, behavior, mood, emotion, addiction, schizophrenia, neurodeneneration, seizures, strike and migraine. Each topic is described in terms of biochemistry and symptoms, but not as a reference to perform diagnosis.
The sections concerning schizophrenia and other psychoses are especially interesting because they reiterate the profound and real impact that a relatively minor DNA augmentation can have on the consciousness and vitality of a human being. The inability to regulate dopamine or the release of a serotonin can dramatically affect the life of a patient. As in other chapters, descriptions of the drugs used to treat the disease, along with other useful considerations during treatment, are discussed.
Summary of Opinions
In summary, I highly recommend this book. It does a perfect job of synthesizing biochemistry with clinical outcomes. It is also helpful to note that this book isn't a clinical neurology book; few protocols to test for the disease are mentioned. Instead, the book is a pharmacology reference, which starts with changes in cellular phenomena and extrapolates to organism-level diseases. This book truly is a wonderful reference and guide for understanding the pathophysiology of neurological disease from a biochemical point of view.
Recommendation to future readers
To anybody purchasing this book, I would advise to approach each chapter in a similar fashion. First, read the key points in the beginning of the text. Next, scan through the chapter and review each of the figures as an introduction to how the facts in the "key points" sections actually occur. Usually, this is thorough enough of a reference for somebody wishing to obtain a general view of the pathological mechanisms. However, if a more detailed understanding is required, reading the text provides in-depth description and insight that the figures alone cannot address. The key points, figures, and text can be used alone or in concert depending on the level of understanding which one hopes to obtain.
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