Ryan’s Retina (seventh edition) is edited by SriniVas Sadda

Ryan’s Retina (seventh edition) is edited by Professors SriniVas Sadda, Andrew Schachat, Charles Wilkinson, David Hinton, Peter Wiedemann, Bailey Freund and David Sarraf

Coming in at three volumes, 2,846 pages and 6.8kg on my home scales, the latest edition of Ryan’s Retina maintains its position as the comprehensive text for all things vitreoretinal. It is all-encompassing and falls within the reference category of textbooks rather than light reading. However, there is a certain pleasure in flicking through crisp new pages filled with tiny text that smell like old libraries.

As with previous editions, the seventh is very practically divided into three volumes. Volume one includes retinal imaging diagnostics and basic science/translation to therapy. It has all the usual chapters, including OCT angiography, which many general ophthalmologists and optometrists will find interesting. The B-scan videos in the digital section are great and very useful. There is also a nice section on artificial intelligence (AI) and advanced imaging analysis, written for us non-code-writers. I know Dr Aaron Lee, who co-wrote this chapter, from when we did our fellowship together. He has obviously taught a few people about AI over the last decade, since I was better able to follow this chapter than any AI modelling he spoke about back in the day – a testament to how well written and edited these books are. The whole basic science section is fascinating, but I particularly enjoyed the teaser on microbiome and retinal disease.

A whole volume is dedicated to medical retina, and what’s not to like there! I found it so extensive that even as a medical retina specialist, there were moments where little gaps in my knowledge I’d been unaware of were neatly plugged. As I said, it is not light reading, so perhaps not as user friendly to the non-retinal specialist, but it's all there if you want it. That said, the uveitis section was not comprehensive enough and neither did it appear to have been updated from the previous edition. 

Volume three incorporates surgical retina and tumours of the vitreous, retina and choroid. The former, I can't comment too much on, but it seems well put together. I enjoyed the section on tumours of the retina, choroid and vitreous and think many will find it useful. 

The negatives? I hated the ‘enhanced digital version’. The only thing it enhanced was my blood pressure. It is on the Elsevier eBooks+ platform and was clunky and infuriating. I found it difficult to navigate the videos and gave up part way through, which is a shame because what I did see was very good. 

Ryan’s Retina is the go-to textbook for any retinal subspecialty or a generalist who wants an update on a particular retinal pathology. It is largely user friendly but the digital version may have you wishing you’d walked to the library instead. 

Dr Narme Deva is a consultant ophthalmologist at Eye Institute, Greenlane Clinical Centre and Retina Specialists in Auckland. She spent several years at Moorfields Eye Hospital and holds a doctorate of medicine from the University of Auckland for research into ocular wound-healing modification.