Pub-Med indexed journals total 1554, with 274 of them being surgery-related ones. Fifteen of them have high Impact Factor ranging from 1.40 to 7.67. The wealth of content available in those journals is beyond any given reader’s grasp, ultimately limiting readers to being able to select perhaps several dozen papers to read at best, as has also been the case here. Authors of 8 “Progress in Medicine” papers published in this issue set out to present and explore the particularly interesting and relevant news from their surgical specialties.

“What’s new in general surgery?” tackles a range of issues, such as evaluation of surgical risk, selected aspects of gastric, pancreatic, and colorectal cancer treatment, the importance of ERAS care pathway, intra-abdominal sepsis, and blood transfusion as a risk factor for perioperative septic complications.

Professor W. Tarnowski MD, PhD and Doctor Karolina Wawiernia discuss the progress in minimally invasive surgery, including techniques such as NOTES, laparoscopy, and robot-assisted surgery used for treating rectal cancer, obesity, gastroesophageal reflux disease, and fecal incontinence. Makes for a truly interesting article, take time to read.

Professor W. Polkowski MD, PhD and his team present a new outlook on concomitant therapies in the treatment of breast cancer, gastric cancer (the necessity for preoperational chemotherapy), and peritoneal cancer (indications for radical resection of the neoplastic lesions and application of HIPEC). The paper abounds in new information, make sure not miss any of it.