This manual explains how to make the right decisions on the timing and selection of investigations and surgical procedures in emergency and urgent surgical settings and describes the most widely used procedures step by step with the aid of high-quality illustrations. The goal is to address the situations that can arise in almost any emergency department throughout the world, enabling the surgeon on call to acquire or sharpen the knowledge and skills needed to deal with acute surgical problems in the most appropriate way. The reader will gain a sound understanding of the most efficient diagnostic modalities, pre-, intra-, and postoperative decision-making, and surgical techniques and issues in particular circumstances. The manual stems from an initiative by members of the European Society of Trauma and Emergency Surgery (ESTES) and the American Association for the Surgery of Trauma (AAST) to set up and formalize Emergency Surgery Courses to provide specific training in emergency and acute care surgery. It represents a didactic accompaniment to the course that will guide the beginner and maintain a certain degree of standardization among the more experienced.

Abe Fingerhut, MD, is Past Chief of Surgery at the Centre Hospitalier Intercommunal, Poissy, France a post he held from 1987 until 2006. He was appointed Associate Professor of Surgery in the Department of Surgery at Louisiana State University, New Orleans, in 1993, Professor of the Collège des Médecins des Hôpitaux de Paris in 2000, and Visiting Professor in the University of Athens in 2009. He is Doctor Honoris Causa in the University of Graz (Austria) and University of China (Taichung, Taiwan). Dr. Fingerhut is a past president of the European Association for Endoscopic Surgery (EAES), founding member and past president of the International Association for Trauma and Surgical Intensive Care (IATSIC), and founding member and past president of the European Society of Trauma and Emergency Surgery (ESTES). As a surgeon, Dr. Fingerhut has focused especially on trauma, emergency and digestive surgery. He has also been heavily engaged in clinical research over the past 35 years and is the author of or has co-signed more than 400 articles or book chapters in peer-reviewed journals and major textbooks. He holds or has held positions on the editorial boards of various major journals, including the World Journal of Surgery (past European co-editor), the American Journal of Surgery (now senior member of the board), European Journal of Trauma and Emergency Surgery and the Journal of Trauma and Acute Care Surgery. Dr. Fingerhut is a Fellow of the American College of Surgeons (ACS) and Governor-at-Large representing the ACS Fellows of France (20122015). He is also a Fellow of the American Association for the Surgery of Trauma (AAST), the Royal College of Physicians and Surgeons of Glasgow, and the Royal College of Surgeons of Edinburgh.

Generalities: Intra-operative Strategy: Open Surgical Approach.- Leading Symptoms.- Management options: non-operative versus operative management.- Pathophysiology.- Post-operative complications.- When To Operate After Failed Non-operative Management. Techniques: Laparoscopy.- Laparotomy (Open surgery).- Lower gastrointestinal endoscopy.- Percutaneous interventions.- Upper gastrointestinal endoscopy. By organ: Appendix.- Biliary tree.- Colon& rectum.- Diaphragmatic Problems for the Emergency Surgeon.- Esophagus.- Female genital tract.- Liver.- Pancreas.- Proctology.- Small bowel.- Soft tissue (necrotizing).- Stomach and duodenum.- Surgical emergencies related to abdominal wall hernia.- Thorax.