The subject of mutilating injuries of the hand does not lend itself to an organized and concise approach. Nevertheless, this text does not improve on the situation by presenting a group of case reports, essays, series, and reviews.
This is an English translation of what was originally a French text; it is now in its second edition. One would think that a second edition would allow for correction of some of the problems associated with multiple-author texts; however, there remains a great deal of redundancy, variation in the depth of coverage, and much that is outdated or primarily of historic interest. This results in a collection of articles within the subject of significant hand injuries, but without logical development or evenly weighted coverage of a given subject. To use this text, one may occasionally refer to a given chapter when investigating a particular type of problem; however, one interested in