R. Bhatia – Challenging Concepts in Neurosurgery (2015)

Автор: R. Bhatia
Название книги: Challenging Concepts in Neurosurgery (2015)
Формат: PDF
Жанр: Медицина
Страницы: 253
Качество: Изначально компьютерное, E-book

Part of the Challenging Concepts in series, this book is a case-based guide to challenging clinical scenarios in neurosurgery covering the major sub-speciality areas of oncology, vascular neurosurgery, brain and spine trauma, paediatrics, spinal degenerative disease, peripheral and cranial nerves, functional neurosurgery and infection. Specific cases are examined with consideration of clinical presentation, diagnostics, and surgical principles, with a summary of evidence from the neurosurgical literature highlighting areas of interest and controversy.
This book serves as a useful and engaging resource for consultants and trainees in neurosurgery as well as in the disciplines of neurology, maxillofacial surgery, spinal surgery and neuro-oncology.

What is a challenge in neurosurgery? It might be better to ask what isn’t. Of all the
surgical specialties, neurosurgery is arguably the discipline with the greatest number
of controversial and unresolved issues, and these confront the neurosurgeon
whenever he or she manages a patient with a central or peripheral nervous problem.
For instance, one of the first and most ‘basic’ operations a neurosurgical trainee
will learn is burr hole evacuation of a chronic subdural haematoma (CSDH). What
could be challenging about this simple operation? Perhaps the training neurosurgeon
should remember that the aetiology and natural history of CSDH; when (and
when not) to carry out burr hole drainage; how many burr holes to drill; whether or
not to leave a drain; the outcomes of burr hole versus twist drill versus craniotomy
for CSDH, represent just a few of the hotly debated and largely unresolved issues
to this day. Before putting knife to skin, the neurosurgeon must supply answers to
these important questions, but how is this possible when the answers are not clearly
known?
The purpose of this book is to present twenty-two case-based topics in neurosurgery,
and our remit to contributing authors was to tackle the questions that frequently
get asked, presenting evidence-based answers in an easy-to-read manner.
We chose these cases after surveying both junior and senior neurosurgeons and asking
‘What challenges you in your practice?’ Somewhat surprisingly, the challenge
was to be found in the everyday cases, rather than the atypical.
Textbooks of neurosurgery tend to contain editor bias in topic selection.
Challenging Concepts in Neurosurgery reflects the subject matter and questions that
are important to neurosurgical clinicians, both in training and as a guide to senior
neurosurgeons who wish to read concise and up-to-date overviews of a broad spectrum
of neurosurgical pathology.
There are clear benefits of learning by the case-based approach. Indeed, the casebased
discussion has become a pivotal tool of learning and assessment laid out
by the Intercollegiate Surgical Curriculum Programme in the UK, and is gaining
popularity across the world. The wide scope of authors from different units in the
UK and overseas helps to bring together in one book varying perspectives on patient
management, and there are clear benefits of allowing trainees and expert reviewers
to co-write—most notably, that one asks the questions we all want to ask and the
other supplies the answers.