Muir Gray, Anne Mackie and Angela Raffle have been at the forefront of achieving improvements in UK screening over recent years, and they bring a wealth of experience to this non-technical introductory guide covering all aspects of screening. As USA expert Gilbert Welch describes it, this book is “A readable yet encyclopaedic guide to screening: its history, its key design elements, its implementation and policy challenges… A must read for clinicians, managers, and policy makers who would like to assist Raffle Mackie and Gray in achieving their goal: ‘to sort out the mess’.” The first four chapters deal with concepts, methods and evidence, explaining what screening is and how it is evaluated. Chapters five to eight describe practical aspects, for example how to make policy, and how to deliver screening to a high standard. The book includes numerous examples and real-life case histories, giving important reminders of the need to be vigilant for the hidden influence of commercial incentives and ‘bad science’ if we are to achieve best value health and healthcare. A comprehensive glossary makes medical terms accessible to all, and each chapter concludes with a summary and self-test questions. Reference is made to the UK National Health Service, a leader in screening, but the book is internationally relevant because the principles of good screening apply in any setting. The controversies, paradoxes, uncertainties, and ethical dilemmas of screening are explained in a balanced way.