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FOREWORDTo the 1st EditionIt is with the greatest enthusiasm that I introduce Pocket Medicine. In anera of information glut, it will logically be asked, “Why another manualfor medical house officers?” Yet, despite enormous information readilyavailable in any number of textbooks, or at the push of a key on a computer,it is often that the harried house officer is less helped by thedescription of differential diagnosis and therapies than one would wish.Pocket Medicine is the joint venture between house staff and facultyexpert in a number of medical specialties.This collaboration is designedto provide a rapid but thoughtful initial approach to medical problemsseen by house officers with great frequency. Questions that frequentlycome from faculty to the house staff on rounds, many hours after theinitial interaction between patient and doctor, have been anticipated andimportant pathways for arriving at diagnoses and initiating therapies arepresented.This approach will facilitate the evidence-based medicine discussionthat will follow the workup of the patient. This well-conceivedhandbook should enhance the ability of every medical house officer toproperly evaluate a patient in a timely fashion and to be stimulated tothink of the evidence supporting the diagnosis and the likely outcome oftherapeutic intervention. Pocket Medicine will prove to be a worthy additionto medical education and to the care of our patients.DENNIS A. AUSIELLO,MDPhysician-in-Chief, Massachusetts General HospitalJackson Professor of Clinical Medicine, Harvard Medical School