Introduction
The decade of the 1980s has seen a spectacular growth in the area of shoulder arthroscopy and there is no doubt that this trend will continue into the next decade. The reason for this parallels the growth of knee arthroscopy during the late 1960s, the decade of the 1970s and the early part of the 1980s. The initial reason that shoulder arthroscopy took off was that it revolutionized the diagnosis of shoulder disorders, previously a realm that could only be mastered by the elite few who had made shoulder surgery their superspecialty. One such expert was Cyriax who encapsulated the attitude of most physicians thus: 'Many doctors regard disorders of the shoulder as uninteresting, undiagnosable, and incurable, but tending to recover in the end. Nothing could be further from the truth.' The arthroscope gives the surgeon an extremely powerful tool which not only assists in diagnosis, but by a process of feedback hones the surgeon's own clinical diagnostic acumen, giving an ability to diagnose shoulder disorders more accurately than the superspecialists ever could from outside the joint.
This book aims to open up this inner world of the shoulder joint and to stimulate interest in conditions around the shoulder. The book is aimed both at surgeons in training and also those experienced surgeons who are either shoulder surgeons who would like to be able to arthroscope the shoulder, or experienced arthroscopists who would like to develop a special interest in the shoulder.
