Mario Campanacci. New York: Springer; 1999. 1319
pages. $379.00.
The second edition of this textbook, which deals with tumors
of the musculoskeletal system, is a marked improvement over the
first edition. The first edition was a translation from an Italian
text, and it suffered as a result. The current edition was written directly
in English. The text represents the life’s work of one
of the world’s most prolific tumor surgeons, Mario Campanacci,
who included clinical material derived from more than 20,000 patients treated
at the Rizzoli Institute in Bologna. Professor Campanacci was uniquely
suited to write such a book. He was an outstanding physician and
tumor surgeon, but he was also well versed in orthopaedic pathology.
He was a student of the distinguished pathologist L. Lichtenstein,
and Campanacci’s expertise is reflected in this text. One
of the icons of orthopaedic oncology in the United States, William Enneking,
wrote the foreword to this treatise. He describes the text as an
invaluable resource, an inspiration, a prodigious effort, and authoritative.
The text is well organized. It starts off with important definitions
related to terminology and the spectrum of benign and malignant
disease. It also covers normal tissue, so that the reader can better
understand the process of neoplasia. Patient evaluation is discussed
in a coherent manner, encompassing the medical history, physical
examination, radiographic and laboratory evaluation, biopsy, and
staging. You almost feel as though you are evaluating a new patient
in Professor Campanacci’s clinic. General principles of
tumor treatment, both operative and nonoperative, are presented.
The discussions of the treatment of each type of tumor are particularly good.
They represent years of experience at the Rizzoli Institute and
are both thorough and timely.
Campanacci devotes as much coverage to benign lesions as to malignant
ones. Each tumor entity is considered individually. The format for
each chapter is the same, covering the epidemiology, location, symptoms,
imaging, gross pathology, histopathology, histogenesis, diagnosis,
stage, treatment, and prognosis.
Each chapter has a bibliography that includes the important references.
The references are listed by year, making it easy to follow the
evolution of the literature. Most of the reference lists end with
the year 1997, so they are reasonably up-to-date.
The text is concise: rarely are there more than two paragraphs
under each heading. Figures are used effectively to make a point.
All figures are in black and white and are of good quality. However,
the inclusion of some color in the illustrations of pathology would
have been useful.
This outstanding text will be an excellent reference for orthopaedists,
radiologists, pathologists, oncologists, and students in general.
It should be a part of any orthopaedic library. It is unlikely that
the text will be improved on in the future, because of
the unfortunate passing of Professor Campanacci.