No abstract available.
Humans

Fractures of lumbo-sacral junction involving bilateral sacral wings are rare. Posterior lumbo-sacral fixation does not always provide with sufficient stability in such cases. Various augmentation techniques including divergent sacral ala screws, S2 pedicle screws and Galveston rods have been reported to improve lumbo-sacral stabilization. Galveston technique using iliac bones would be the best surgical approach especially in patients with bilateral comminuted sacral fractures. However, original Galveston surgery is technically demanding and bending rods into the appropriate alignment is time consuming. We present a patient with unstable lumbo-sacral junction fractures and comminuted U-shaped sacral fractures treated by lumbo-sacro-pelvic fixation using iliac screws and discuss about the advantages of the iliac screws over the rod system of Galveston technique.
Humans

No abstract available.
Humans

No abstract available.
Humans

No abstract available.
Humans

No abstract available.
Humans

No abstract available.
Humans

No abstract available.
Humans

1,25-Dihydroxyvitamin D3(1,25(OH)2D3) and interferon-gamma(IFN-gamma) are capable of regulating cells in immune system and are representative differentiation inducer/activator of monocyte/macrophage lineage cells. They may affect the proinflammatory and immune effector functions of monocyte/macrophage activated with immunostimulants such as bacterial endotoxin. The expression of HLA-D, costimulatory adhesion molecules such as ICAM-1(CD54) and Mac-1(CD11b), and secretion of IL-1betawere used to evaluate the influence of 1,25(OH)2D3 and IFN-gammaon human promyelocytic cell line THP-1 cells. IFN-gammamarkedly induces the expression of ICAM-1 and HLA-D, and 1,25(OH)2D3 induces the expression of Mac-1 to a lesser extent. LPS alone markedly induces the expression of ICAM-1 molecule without any increase of HLA-D expression. LPS-induced ICAM-1 expression is synergistically increased by IFN-gammapriming, but fail to increase Mac-1 and HLA-D expression. IFN-gamma, 1,25(OH)2D3, and LPS separately do not induce the secretion of IL-1betaby THP-1, however, IL-1betasecretion is synergistically increased when THP-1 is exposed to the combination of IFN-gammaand LPS. LPS-induced IL-1betaproduction by IFN-gamma-primed cell is much higher when THP-1 have been previously exposed to 1,25(OH)2D3. In conclusion, these results show that expression of MHC class II and costimulatory adhesion molecules, and production of IL-1betaby cells of monocyte/macrophage lineage is highly regulated and monocyte /macrophage differentiation is required for optimal proinflammatory and immune reaction in response to exposure of bacterial endotoxin.
Humans

The purposes of this study were to develop the computer program for the contrast and geometric correction in digital subtration radiography with the IDL(Interactive Data Language) and compare the results with this program for the correction of the non-standardized radiographs to those of standardized radiographs and those with "Emago" software, the commercial program for the correction. The procedures were written for the contrast correction and subtraction with the geometric correction, using IDL. 32 pairs of periapical radiographs of premolar and molar portion of two dry human mandibles were taken at two different occasions with XCP film holder(non-standardized films) and another 32 pairs with customized XCP film holder(standardized films). Subtraction of standardized film pairs was performed. Subtraction after the contrast and geometric correction of non-standardized films was performed using the newly developed program and Emago software. Standard deviations of grey levels of the subtracted images by the newly developed program were compared with those of the standardized group and Emago-corrected group. Standard deviations of grey levels of new programcorrected group were much smaller than those of the Emago-corrected group(p<0.001) and slightly larger than those of standardized group(p<0.05). However, the difference was very minute. This study indicates that the newly developed program written with IDL may substitute the mechanical standardization for digital subtraction radiography.
Humans