The term minimally invasive surgery conjures up an image of innovation and cutting-edge technology that differs in a fundamental way from conventional surgical methods. Novel procedures have been introduced that have a spectrum of complications and contraindications that differs distinctly from that of the conventional method and requires a modification of standard anaesthetic management. These, obviously, deserve to be dealt with in detail in a book on perioperative management from the more comprehensive viewpoint of the anaesthetist. But all attempts at a general definition of which procedures should be included show how elusive the term actually is. If one takes it to describe procedures that do not require large incisions or extensive tissue destruction, it would include such diverse operations as circumcisions, cataract extractions or transurethral bladder surgery – none of which belong in this book. What then is the characteristic, the common denominator of what we generally refer to as “minimally invasive”? The answer lies in the context: minimally invasive does not refer to the magnitude of invasiveness as an absolute measure, but rather to the invasiveness compared with that of the conventional procedure. Add to this the element of novelty and a particular relevance for anaesthesia and one has a fairly good description of the scope of this book.

Minimally invasive surgery has virtually revolutionized the surgical therapy of a large variety of diseases in the space of just a few years.