With Dr Joe Antony's comprehensive text, Step by Step Sonographic Atlas of Thyroid and Appendix, they can successfully meet that challenge. He has produced an up-to-date and factual textbook while capturing the reader's attention with high quality images and an interesting and enjoyable format. This is a textbook that deserves a place in every ultrasound department, clinic or office. It is a ‘must read’ for novice and experienced sonologists and sonographers.

So why did I prepare this book? The thyroid is a superficial organ but its pathology is, in reality, embedded in mystery. The field of sonography is growing by leaps and bounds and nowhere is this more apparent than in the zone of high resolution ultrasound. High resolution ultrasound of the thyroid has been evolving so fast that many radiologists or sonologists have been left far behind. Many sonologists still believe that sonography of thyroid is limited to determining the size of thyroid and whether a mass is solid or cystic. Nothing could be further from the truth! In fact, the latest ultrasound/color Doppler machines make it possible to come very close to making a pathological diagnosis of thyroid disease. From Hashimoto's thyroiditis to thyroid malignancy, sonography has reached a stage where FNAC and histopathology can be avoided to a very large extent, with management often based on a thyroid ultrasound aided by serology/hormonal assay.

This ultrasound atlas of the thyroid fills the gap between terminology, pathology and the tremendous progress in the field of thyroid ultrasound. Affordably priced and with the backing of a leading publisher like Jaypee Brothers, this book will be available to a vast medical audience, worldwide. This text helps the novice and the expert alike to master ultrasound of thyroid 8diseases using images. The motto of the book is “Let the images do the talking and teaching”. There is extensive use of color Doppler and power Doppler images in this atlas and I trust, the reader will be impressed with the quality of the pictures.

The second part of this book is an atlas of appendix pathology using ultrasound. This section could be considered as a bonus that explores the field of high resolution sonography of the appendix. Here, the images are supplied by experts in this field from different corners of the world. The appendix is often a gray area (like the thyroid) and this section attempts to cast a “beam of sound” to enlighten the reader.

I trust that readers will find both sections of this atlas interesting and a quick guide to mastering sonography of thyroid and appendix.