Authors: Robert Loddenkemper, MD; Praveen N. Mathur, MD; Marc Noppen, MD; and Pyng Lee, MD
Publisher: Thieme – 178 pages, with 241 images.
Book Review by: Nano Khilnani

This book was written for established practitioners as well as fellows and medical residents pursuing specialist training in pulmonology (or pneumology as it is known in some countries).   It is a guide to endoscopic techniques, with instructions as contained in a manual and visuals as found in an atlas.

In the Manual section, indications, techniques, and results are described; whereas in the Atlas section, full-color endoscopic photographs are shown on how to apply this minimally invasive technique to a variety of common and rare pathologies, from pleural effusion of various origins to empyema, pneumothorax, and diffuse lung diseases.

Four specialists named above – two from Europe and one each from America and Asia – explain current methodology as well as demonstrate approaches for the use of medical thoracoscopy / pleuroscopy (MT/P) in the diagnosis and treatment of various respiratory diseases. Below is an overview of what you will find covered in the two sections of this book:

  1. Section A: Manual
  2. Introduction
  3. Difference Between Medical Thoracoscopy/Pleuroscopy and Surgical Thoracoscopy/Video-assisted Thoracic Surgery
  4. Indications for and Results of Medical Thoracoscopy/Pleuroscopy
  5. Medical Thoracoscopy/Pleuroscopy in Children
  6. Medical Thoracoscopy/Pleuroscopy inAnimals
  7. Medical Thoracoscopy/Pleuroscopy inResearch
  8. Clinical Prerequisites for Medical Thoracoscopy/Pleuroscopy
  9. Contraindications
  10. Complications and their Prevention
  11. Knowledge and Skills Required
  12. Techniques of Medical Thoracoscopy/Pleuroscopy
  13. Documentation
  14. Teaching Methods
  15. Section B: Atlas
  16. Malignant Pleural Effusions due to Lung Cancer
  17. Pleural Effusions due to Diffuse Malignant Mesothelioma and Asbestos
  18. Malignant Pleural Effusions Secondary to Metastatic Neoplasms
  19. Pleural Effusions due to Malignant Lymphoma | Myeloproliferative Neoplasm
  20. Tuberculous Pleural Effusions
  21. Pleural Effusions of Other Origin
  22. Pneumothorax
  23. Diffuse Lung Diseases
  24. Other Indications

Included in the purchase of this book is a DVD that contains video clips of eight typical clinical cases, practical information on the use of talc poudrage, the induction of a pneumothorax, and other information in visual form.

Among the features offered in this book are:

  • Fully up-to-date diagnostic and therapeutic indications reflecting technological advances, including the semi-rigid, semi-flexible pleuroscope, and delineating the differences to video-assisted thoracoscopic surgery (VATS).
  • Hundreds of endoscopic photographs and illustrations
  • An accompanying DVD

Dr. John F. Murray, professor emeritus of medicine at University of California San Francisco writes in the Foreword that medical thoracoscopy / pleuroscopic is “a resurgent procedure that is both underappreciated and underutilized in many countries, including the United States,” but adds the good news that “it is gaining importance in the diagnosis and treatment of pleuropulmonary diseases.”

Being over 80 years old, Dr. Murray recalls that at the beginning of his career in the 1950s, tuberculosis was a prevalent disease, but it later became curable and its incidence decreased greatly. What followed were increasing numbers of cases of asthma, cancer of the lung, and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), and these persist until today.

He remembers how diagnosis of various diseases pertaining to the lung and other organs and anatomic structures were quite difficult, but with the development of imaging methods (CT, MRI, PET, ultrasound, sonography, etc.) both patients and physicians have greatly benefited.

The authors meanwhile point out in the Preface that about a hundred years ago, Hans-Christian Jacobaeus published an important article on the use of the cytoscope for examining serous cavities which he termed thoracoscopy and laparoscopy. While initially he developed thoracoscopy as a diagnostic method, he later used it for lysis of pleural adhesions, by means of thoracocautery to accomplish an artificial pneumothorax. These and many other innovations are described in The Atas of Diagnostic Thoracoscopy published in 1985.

This is a great book on medical and surgical thoracoscopy and pleuroscopy.

Authors:

Robert Loddenkemper, MD is a Professor and former Head of the Department of Pneumology II at Lungenklinik Heckeshorn, HELIOS-Klinikum Emil von Behring in Berlin, Germany.
Praveen N. Mathur, MD is Professor of Clinical Medicine at Indiana University School of Medicine in Indianapolis, Indiana.
Marc Noppen, MD, PhD is Associate Professor at Free University of Brussels, VUB, Chief Executive Officer and Head of Interventional Endoscopy Clinic at University Hospital UZ Brussels in Brussels, Belgium.
Pyng Lee, MD is Associate Professor in the Division of Respiratory and Critical Care in the Department of Medicine at National University Hospital in Singapore.

 

Foreword:

John F. Murray is Professor Emeritus of Medicine at University of California San Francisco in San Francisco, California.