Venous and Lymphatic Diseases PDF

Preface

"The best preparation for tomorrow is to do today's work superbly well."

The new millennium is an exciting time to be involved with the care of venous disorders, and there have probably been more key advances in the last 20 years than in the previous 200. Despite this, phlebology remains a relatively under-represented specialty in many countries, and there is sometimes a lack of high-quality data and access to training materials. As a result, sufferers of venous and lymphatic problems are often inadequately investigated or mismanaged. This is a situation that cannot be allowed to continue. Venous and lymphatic diseases are both common and distressing for suffers. They also impose a large financial burden on the health services of most industrialized countries. These alone are reasons why the topic is worthy of study, and patients have the right to be seen by physicians and nurses with a special interest in the management of their condition.

This book, Venous and Lymphatic Diseases, is an attempt to draw together a wide range of experts in various aspects of venous disease to cover the full range of conditions encountered in clinical practice. The aim has been to produce chapters that are both definitive and readable, so that they will be of utility to both the expert in the subject and the novice. To aid this, most chapters have a clear "key points" section. In addition, we have deliberately chosen to invite a mixture of North American and European authors to produce a genuinely international, multidisciplinary approach to the subject. The book is subdivided and organized into related sections and includes sections on investigation as well as treatment, including complex venous surgery and radiological therapies. However, it has been the deliberate aim of the editors that this should not simply be a surgical textbook; as a result, there are extensive sections on non-surgical topics, including drug therapy, venous disorders in pregnancy, compression therapy, and conservative therapies in lymphedema. The first three chapters set the scene by reviewing the historical context, the anatomical terminology, and the physiology of the veins and lymphatics.

If the book is useful to those involved in caring for patients with venous or lymphatic disease, then we will have accomplished our aim.