Cambridge Lectures In Neurosurgical Anatomy

… to make the delicate, awesome, and fateful work of the neurosurgeon more accurate, gentle, and safe.

Dr Albert L Rhoton, Jr

Excellent knowledge of three-dimensional surgical anatomy is fundamental for safe operating. This is especially true for neurosurgery where the surgical access routes are narrow, the brain and surrounding structures cannot be moved around, and the consequences of a mistake, disastrous. The surgeon just must know what is behind the corner.

The process of understanding of surgical anatomy is never complete. Neurosurgeons acquire most of their experience by observing and conducting operations. Cadaveric dissections are an excellent supplement. However, they are very expensive and not widely available.

In the year 2005 we established a course in three-dimensional (3D) anatomy for neurosurgical trainees and qualified neurosurgeons from the UK and overseas. The aim of the course is to spend a weekend in a pleasant environment meeting other neurosurgeons with enthusiasm for anatomically based operating while learning from world-class neurosurgical masters and teachers. The bases for this course are lectures with 3D projections. The projections offer excellent 3D vision of anatomical structures in a variety of surgical situations. Cambridge Lectures in Neurosurgical Anatomy are not an alternative to some excellent cadaveric dissection-based courses run in the United Kingdom (Leeds) and Europe (Braga, Portugal), but rather hope to complement them.