did the endoscopic method. A prospective randomized study using the MicroAire system was conducted in 2002 by Trumble and Diao et al. and revealed that good clinical outcomes and patient satisfaction are achieved more quickly when the endoscopic method of carpal tunnel release is used. Their study concluded that single-portal Endoscopic carpal tunnel release surgery is a safe and effective method of treating carpal tunnel syndrome. There was no significant difference in the rate of complications or the cost of surgery between the two groups. However, the open technique resulted in greater scar tenderness during the first three months after surgery as well as a longer time until the patients could return to work. Safety It has been shown in recent literature that there is a learning curve for a hand surgeon who begins to use an endoscopic technique to release the transverse carpal ligament. However this same recent study also showed no significant morbidity associated with the endoscopic method. Research Brown et al. conducted a prospective, randomized, multi-center study and found no significant differences between the two groups with regard to secondary quantitative outcome measurements. However, the open technique resulted in more tenderness of the scar than the endoscopic method. A prospective randomized study done in 2002 by Trumble revealed that good clinical outcomes and patient satisfaction are achieved more quickly with the endoscopic method. Single-portal endoscopic surgery is a safe and effective method of treating carpal tunnel syndrome. There was no significant difference in the rate of complications or the cost of surgery between the two groups. However, the open technique caused greater scar tenderness during the first three months after surgery, and a longer time before the patients could return to work. In addition, in patients without workers compensation issues, the single-incision endoscopic carpal tunnel release led to less palmar tenderness and a quicker return to work compared to the two-incision endoscopic carpal tunnel release Despite these views, some surgeons have suggested that in their own hands endoscopic carpal tunnel release has been associated with a higher incidence of median nerve injury, and for this reason, it has been abandoned at several centers in the United States. At the 2007 meeting of the American Society for Surgery of the Hand, a former advocate of endoscopic carpal tunnel release, Thomas J. Fischer, MD, retracted his advocacy of the technique, based on his own personal assessment that the benefit