By C. Sainte-Rose As we stand at the dawn of the 21st century, one may ponder the rationale of writing a book on spina bifida. Once commonplace in European countries prior to the era of ultrasonography, this disease became increasingly rare in developed countries as a - sult of improvements in antenatal diagnosis, to the point that we believed it to be d- appearing. Knowledge of spina bifida and of its treatment, once so richly diffused - ly 30 years ago, began to fade. Young neurosurgeons who had never seen such a m- formation at its initial presentation were hesitant, and did not understand...