The first edition of this small volume, The ABC of Ear, Nose and Throat, was derived 25 years ago from a series of articles published at that time in the British Medical Journal to present the substance of this important speciality in an easily assimilable form for a wide readership of general practitioners, medical students, nurses and all those many sprouting paramedical specialties involved with speech, hearing, and head and neck disorders.
This target readership has not changed, but the specialty, like most others, has expanded and developed subspecialties in all its divisions.
Otology has changed from the exciting renaissance of microscopic middle ear work that began in the 1960s at the start of my personal ontological career, to the amazing developments that include cochlear implantation for inner ear deafness, and neuro-otology has extended from the management of peripheral labyrinthine disorders to embrace surgery within the base of the skull.
Rhinological change has brought us the endoscopic techniques that have revolutionized treatment for paranasal sinus diseases, while the management of throat malignancy has evolved out of all recognition into today’s comprehensive management of head and neck tumors.
It is entirely appropriate therefore that, for this expanded fifth edition, Patrick Bradley FRCSIr, FRCSEd, FRCSEng, MBA, as an internationally recognized authority on head and neck diseases and their treatment, should have become the joint editor, and that several specialists, recognized as experts in various subspecialties, have been enlisted to write about them.
The title has appositely reverted to its briefer, earlier one of ENT, which is so quintessentially British and which trips much more readily off the tongue than does otolaryngology.
