James C.Y. Chow, editor. With foreword by Robert
W. Jackson. New York: Springer; 2001. 741 pages. $250.00.
This book presents a compendium of arthroscopy of all joints. As
is stated in the introduction, arthroscopy has come so
far in the last thirty-five years that all joints and some soft-tissue areas
are amenable to arthroscopic inspection and treatment.
The editor has superbly organized this complex book and has drawn
on the talents of a large number of experienced authors. The descriptions
of technique are uniformly clear and of top quality. The surgeon
who wants to learn or review how to perform a certain procedure
will find concise, definitive explanations that are generally accompanied
by excellent illustrations.
It should be noted, however, that the book is a "cookbook" of techniques
rather than a comprehensive text. It seems that the editor tried
to include every approach without providing any explanation to the
reader about which technique to use for a given problem, which may
create confusion for the novice.
Some of the chapters are quite terse, offering very little information
on the results of the arthroscopic procedures and the prevalence
of complications compared with that associated with accepted, open
procedures. Conversely, other chapters provide a detailed discussion
and a comprehensive approach to the problems inherent to arthroscopic
procedures.
The illustrations are excellent, especially those that are in color.
It is unfortunate that all of the arthroscopic images
are not in color because details are lost in black and white.
There is considerable redundancy among the approaches described
for particular problems, which may cause confusion for the less
experienced arthroscopist. Some of this duplication could
have been avoided by employing fewer authors and focusing more on
the problem than the procedure.
As a whole, this work is a good textbook that deserves a place in
the library of any serious arthroscopist. It is primarily a procedure-oriented
book for the orthopaedic surgeon who wishes to improve his or her
skills in arthroscopy by learning the masters’ techniques.
It is not a primer for the resident or the novice arthroscopist.