The textbook "The brainstem: the anatomic and physiological characteristics and clinical features of lesions" by professor Olena Tkachenko, head of the Department of Neurology No. 2, National Medical Academy of Postgraduate Education, came out for neurologists, interns and medical university students last week.

The brainstem anatomical and physiological characteristics, essential in clinical practice while making topical diagnosis of its damage, are reviewed in the book.

A creative approach to the diagnostic process based on the data presented in this book can be useful as it attends to making a topical diagnosis for the lesions of the brainstem – a complex nervous system topographic and anatomical structure. The book’s leading idea is that a possible usage of additional advanced examination techniques, both instrumental and laboratory, leads a trend to substitute a clinical thinking for the "paraclinical" one, in particular extrapolating from instrumental and laboratory data only. At the same time interpreting paraclinical results should be based on a clinical assumption made by a doctor while examining neurological patients in detail.

The book systematizes and sets out the basic details of anatomical and physiological specific structures which are part of the concept of the brainstem; it also schematizes certain data by means of mnemonic codes that contributes both to studying the chosen subject and improving its practical performance.