dropped knitting stitches

Dear users, dear authors,
How can you fix dropped knitting stitches without having to unravel everything right away? But drop stitches aren’t the same as accidentally dropped stitches, are they?

For patterns that aren’t too complicated, you can pick up the dropped stitches with a crochet hook and crochet them back up. 
However, I can’t do this with lace patterns that involve yarn overs.  In that case, the only solution is to unravel the work or, even better, knit back stitch by stitch.

In a dropped-stitch pattern, yarn overs are made on the right-side row,  and then dropped on the wrong-side row.
This creates an airy pattern.

I do it the same way Ruth does.

Yes, a crochet hook works best. It works really well even when I have to pick up a lot of dropped stitches because I wasn’t paying attention while working the knit/purl pattern. 

Exactly—the best way to pick up dropped stitches is with a crochet hook.

Drop stitches are actually the same as dropped stitches, except you drop them deliberately to achieve a special effect.

And as Petra already wrote, drop stitches are a way to fix mistakes in your knitting.

Sometimes a stray stitch sneaks into your work. In that case, you drop it and adjust the other stitches slightly so that no unwanted hole appears in the pattern.

Most stitches can be picked up again; I also use a crochet hook for this. 
With lace patterns, it’s usually a bit more involved. The best way to do this is to secure the dropped stitches, carefully lay the knitted piece flat, and ideally pin it in place a little. Then work row by row according to the knitting chart. 
However, I do have to rip back if the pattern is worked on both the right-side and wrong-side rows. “Normally,” you work the pattern on the right-side row, and the wrong-side row is purled. In some projects, though, the pattern is also worked on the wrong-side row, and that’s when I’m out. 
I once had to rip back an underskirt for a christening gown, about 10 rounds before it was “finished”.... I had still tried to save it, but there was no chance....