Stell & Maran’s Head and Neck Surgery and Oncology 6th Edition

Review by L Flood
Middlesbrough, UK

I pride myself on offering publishers a speedy review, but this proved a lengthy exercise, if I was to do it justice. I sat down with this sixth edition, next to its predecessor from 2012, intending to turn each page in both for comparison. A glance at the contents showed me this is a transformation, and such a comparison was impractical. At random I then turned to a chapter on pathology. The publishers do, as is their house-style, acknowledge that each chapter, in turn, “may contain content from” the last edition. Well, if so, for this chapter all I found was a pair of histology slides carried over, with everything else brand new. In most new editions I rely on the Preface to tell me what is novel and justifies a purchase. For this sixth edition that proves to be the authorship to almost every chapter, the topics to be addressed, their text, the illustrations and the greatly expanded international contribution.

Only the cover illustration proved familiar, if puzzling. It struck me as a psychedelic rendering of a sagittal image with the characteristics of both an MRI and a CT scan, but the 5th Edition did credit this to one Mehau Lulyk, who specialises in such wall art. Do not confuse the two editions’ similar covers as, at the time of writing (May 2025), Google brings up the earlier version for sale far more often, and still at full price.

This book has been published now for 50 years (not the 70 suggested by John Watkinson in his Foreword). John and Ralph Gilbert expanded the original title in that fifth edition to include “and Oncology” and that remains a major feature now. As a result, the content has hugely increased appeal to the radiotherapist, the pathologist, the radiologist and especially the scientist.

This is a sizeable book of course and I was surprised that there proves to be fewer pages (948 as compared to 1156) than 12 years ago. The content actually seems greatly expanded and I am very grateful to Miranda Bromage and the publishers for a hard copy, despite the obvious expense. I soon abandoned any attempt to read this online as originally offered. Indeed, despite much advice from some nice people in North Carolina about apps etc. I simply could not get it to download onto my PC. I felt slightly less thick when I noticed that our reviewer of the fifth edition (far more tech savvy) had the same problem. It is doubtless simple to readers half my age and that was the impression given.

The text opens with a significantly expanded chapter by our own Pat Bradley, “The History of Head and Neck Surgery”. In practice, as throughout the book, it does also cover advances in pathology and radiotherapy, with a particularly interesting description of head and neck professional organisations worldwide and finally “the Present” and “the Future” (which is impressive for a history chapter). Part 1 then is “The Fundamentals”, comprising 21 chapters ranging from molecular biology, through reconstructive surgery, to pain management. Part 2 is the traditional coverage of tumours by anatomical site. Part 3 “Endocrine Disease” is much briefer than in the last edition and I note that Pituitary Tumours are dropped as a chapter topic. Clearly though, there has been huge progress in the associated basic science and, thumbing through the copious references, one finds few that predate 2012.

Instead, there is major expansion of “Future Perspectives” which I found fascinating. “The Surgical Innovation Continuum” (Chapter 45) introduced me to LRF, the Luck Recognition Factor, the art of recognising when one has stumbled onto something important, almost by accident. I was puzzled in that chapter to read on several occasions about the “bovine”, until I realised that the good Dr Bovie’s instrument was the intention.

Colour illustrations, diagrams and imaging are profuse and generally well reproduced. Curiously though, some scans are very stretched in the vertical plane and some have the blue, or even green, tint that we all recall as depending on the photographic 35mm film (those were the days) to copy off a viewing screen.

Watkinson and Gilbert were a hard act to follow and did impress with their work that went into the last edition, but it is encouraging to see just how much progress the intervening decade has seen. This book should have a huge international appeal (notably in India, with so many local contributors now) to all members of the interdisciplinary team and to the most senior practitioners, not just the trainees cramming for the next exam.

This is more like a totally new book than a revision and is a very important and quite remarkable addition to the specialist literature.

Amazon Link: Stell & Maran’s Head and Neck Surgery and Oncology 6th Edition
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