Surgical anatomy of the foot and ankle

Any operative intervention consists of two elements: the approach and the actual procedure itself. The actual procedure can be practised on sawbones or joint models [8], but the approach is mostly practised on patients. The learning curve for the approach is steep. In the past, surgeons made wide exposures and thus practised their anatomical skills on a day-to-day basis. With the introduction of minimally invasive and arthroscopic surgery, we learned to avoid the anatomy. We go straight to the bone and feel comfortable once inside a joint. Our incisions for open procedures get smaller and smaller. The patients like it if their surgical scars are very small, and there is some evidence that minimally invasive approaches can lead to shorter stays in hospital and to more rapid restoration of function, but our knowledge of the anatomy thus gets more and more forgotten. Our knowledge dates from anatomy books, which are, however, not specifically designed for surgical approaches.