Since the first edition appeared 24 years ago, "Orr's" has been a reliable operative manual for residents and young general surgeons. The new fourth edition, edited by George Higgins, will be no exception.
This book is more of an operative atlas than a textbook, but has some features of both. It is a manual of ordinary operations performed by general surgeons. This volume has no pretensions for covering indications, alternatives, and preoperative and postoperative care. The style, in general, is that of a dictated operative note—pithy, but not very inspiring reading.
Orr's original text was fresh, personal, and contained new illustrations. Subsequent editors have in general reprinted illustrations from an original article and paraphrased the original text. Fully one half of the illustrations in the fourth edition are such reproductions from journals or even from other texts! The quality of such a mixed bag of illustrations is understandably uneven. Indeed,