It has been my great privilege to study under Dr. M.M. Wintrobe's tutelage for three years and to be asked later, as one of five former fellows, to contribute as writer and editor of the seventh through twelfth editions of Wintrobe's Clinical Hematology. In the process, we taught a generation of medical students about the wonders and challenges inherent in the study of the blood and its diseases, as well as the application of the scientific method to clinical practice and research. One of my students was Douglas Tkachuk, now one of the editors and a driving force behind the creation of Wintrobe's Atlas of Clinical Hematology. The circle is almost complete.

 

Dr. Wintrobe was a tough taskmaster as clinician, scientist, and communicator of knowledge; the standards he set for himself and his students were high. He would have been proud of this book that honors his name and that emphasizes the three pillars on which he considered excellence in all of medicine to restcritical apprehension of physical findings, astute laboratory testing of derived hypotheses, and informed decision-making based on the most up-to-date evidence provided by research in molecular and cellular biology. Wintrobe's Atlas of Clinical Hematology makes a superb contribution in these areas. The illustrations of physical findings are excellent and well described in the accompanying text; the reproductions of blood and marrow smears, as well as the histologic sections and other microscopic and submicroscopic illustrations, are among the best I have seen. Most important, wherever possible, clinical and laboratory findings are explained on the basis of the most up-to-date scientific insights available. All these features make the Atlas an excellent companion to Wintrobe's Clinical Hematology and, indeed, a growing number of textbooks dealing with the fascinating subject of hematology.

 

In the preface to an early edition of Clinical Hematology, Dr. Wintrobe quoted Leonardo da Vinci as saying that, “The love of anything is the fruit of our knowledge, and grows deeper as our knowledge becomes more certain. Wintrobe's Atlas of Clinical Hematology contributes to this process in significant measure.