The preceding monograph: ''Vagotomy - latest advances," Springer-Verlag, 1974 ed. by F. Holle and S. Andersson reported an innovation in surgery: the so-called "selective proximal vago tomy (spv) with pyloroplasty (pypl)." The usefulness of the method was put to the test in cases of peptic ulcer disease and in dog experiments. No claim was made - as some reviewers erroneously supposed - that the method was a comprehensive presentation of the surgery of peptic ulcer disease or even that it offered a patent solution to this subject Instead, it should be regarded as the initial step towards this...

This monograph is a summary of observations collected over the past ten years on vagal denervation of the stomach and the functional pathology of the vagotomized stomach. It is primarily a continuation of the work we (Holle and Heinrich, 1954) began with fundectomy - the prototype of proximal dener vation of the stomach. This was the starting point for the develop ment of selective proximal vagotomy (SPV). Between 1961 and 1964 the SPY technique was developed to the extent that it could be applied clinically from January 1,1964. Like most clinical innovations, the development took place in...