There are two important reasons for publishing this new series entitled
"Advances and Technical Standards in Neurosurgery" 1. the lack of anyor-
ganized common European postgraduate training system for young
neurosurgeons and 2. the language barriers, which impede the exchange of
neurosurgical findings in Europe more than in other parts of the world.
The fact that the English language is well on the way to becoming the
international medium at European scientific conferences is a great asset
in terms of mutual understanding. Therefore the Editors have decided to
publish all contributions in English, regardless of the native language
of the authors. All contributions are submitted to the entire editorial
board before publi- cation of any volume. Our series is not intended to
compete with the publications of original scientific papers in other
neurosurgical journals. Our intention is, rather, to present fields of
neurosurgery and related areas in which important recent advances have
been made. The contributions are written by specialists in the given
fields and constitute the first part of each volume. In the second part
of each volume, we publish detailed descriptions of standard operative
procedures, furnished by experienced clinicians; in these articles the
authors describe the techniques they employ and explain the advantages,
difficulties and risks involved in the various procedures. This part is
intended primarily to assist young neurosurgeons in their postgraduate
train- ing. However, we are convinced that it will also be useful to
experienced, fully trained neurosurgeons.