The third incarnation of this popular tome remains as imposing as ever. However, it has less the feel of an encyclopaedia about it than one might initially have feared. Whilst there is clearly some very great detail here – with sections relating specifically to meningomyelocoele for example – the rest of the text is nicely broken down into digestible bite-sized chapters.
Chapters relating to neurologic pathologies (multiple sclerosis, multi-system atrophy, etc.) will be of greater interest to those facing the FRCS(Urol) whilst those dealing with more clinical issues will be of greater interest to the rest of us who have long since forgotten that which we once knew.
Those chapters relating to the evaluation of the neurogenic bladder (voiding diaries to imaging, urodynamics to electrophysiology) are perhaps worth the entry fee itself and certainly the most clinically relevant of the book. The practical guide to the diagnosis and follow-up of patients with neurogenic bladders should arguably be available in every urology outpatient’s department. There are chapters which deal with sexual dysfunction in those with neurogenic dysfunction and those clinical scenarios which crop up from time to time (such as pregnancy and spinal cord injury) which seldom make it through to more popular and generalist texts. Ultimately it is the sections relating to management which give (and have always given) this textbook its universal appeal.
Whether conservative, electrical or surgical, the authors provide an evidence-based and practical guide to management which appears to have a real world resonance rather than that preached from an ivory tower. As a result, time devoted to reading this text is time well spent.
