Total release of the hamstrings of the knee from their origin was performed In nine cerebral plasied children. Eighteen procedures were performed in nine patients whose age ranged from three to sixteen years with an average of ten years. The average follow-up period was twenty one months from ten to thirty-six months. The spastic knee flexion was correction adequately; in mest instances the crouch posture was corrected, gait was improved, and a long stride was possible. The power of the hamstrings was assessed in the fourteen limbs of the children who could walk or cooperate in musicle testing. The power was graded as good in six knees and as normal in one. Seven showed improvement in gait; six patients who had never walked were able to do so after hamstring release; and one patient was able to stand up for the first time in his life after the operation. Eight out of nine cases are now able to stand up with or without support of a brace, and to walk with a brace in five cases and without support in two. However, increased lumbar lordosis and genu recurvatum has occurred in two cases each.
Animals ; Braces ; Cerebral Palsy ; Child ; Extremities ; Follow-Up Studies ; Gait ; Humans ; Knee ; Lordosis ; Muscle Spasticity ; Posture

Pilomatrix carcinoma is an extremely rare tumor of hair matrix origin and its definite biological behavior of malignancy has remained inconclusive. We report a case of a huge pilomatrix carcinoma arising in the lateral neck skin from an elderly woman, who eventually
Female ; Humans

No abstract available.

No abstract available.

No abstract available.
Thyroid Gland* ; Thyroid Neoplasms*

Debonding of cement-femoral stem interface has been suggested as a initial focus of loosening mechanism in many previous studies of cemented total hip replacement. The purpose of this study was to investigate the effect of debonding of cement-femoral stem interface to the cement-bone inter- face by using three-dimensional non-linear finite element analysis. Three cases of partial debonded, full debonded, and full bonded cement-bone interface were modelled with partial bonding of distal 70mm from the tip of femoral stem. Each situation was studied under loading simulating one-leg stanced gait of 68kg patient. The results showed that under partial and full debonded cement-stem interface conditions the peak von Mises stress (3.1 MPa) were observed at the cement of cement-bone interface just under the calcar of proximal medial of femur, and sudden high peak stresses (3.5 MPa) were developed at the distal tip of femoral stem at the lateral bone-cement interface in all 3 cases of bonding. The stresses were transfered very little to the cement of upper lateral bone-cement interface in partial and full debonded cases. Once partial or full debonded cement-femoral stem interface occured, 3 times higher stress concentration were developed on the cement of proximal medial cement-bone interface than full bonded interface, and these could cause loosening of cemented total hip replacement. Clinically, preservation of more rigid cement-femoral stem interface may be important factor to prevent loosening of femoral stem.
Arthroplasty, Replacement, Hip ; Femur ; Finite Element Analysis* ; Gait ; Humans

Recently we performed arthrography in 10 cases of ankle injuries and obtained abnormal findings roentgenographically suspected to be ligamentous injury in only 8 cases. In two cases surgical exploration was done. Although two arthrographys is not completely reliable and sufficiently specific to justify the use of this technique in elucidating injuries to the lateral ligament complex, it has value in the diagnosis of diastasis (hidden sprains of the anterior or posterior tibio-fibular ligament), in distinction between old and recent lesions and in diagnosing some sprains of the deltoid and lateral ligaments of the ankle.
Ankle Injuries ; Ankle Joint ; Ankle ; Arthrography ; Collateral Ligaments ; Diagnosis ; Ligaments ; Sprains and Strains

BACKGROUND: Respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) is the most common cause of lower respiratory infection in infants and young children, but the pathogenesis of RSV-induced inflammation is not well defined. MATERIAL AND METHOD: In order to examine the potential interactions between virus-infected airway epithelial cells and neutrophils, we studied the ability of neutrophils to adhere to yirus-infected airway epithelial cell monolayers by myeloperoxidase assay. Also we measured the ability of airway epithelial cells to secrete interleukin-8(IL-8) and inter-cellular adhesion molecule-1(ICAM-1) in virus-infected airway epithelial cell cultures by enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay(ELISA). The degree of IL-8 and ICAM-1 gene expression in the RSV-infected BEAS-2B cell cultures were analyzed by reverse transcription-polymerase chain reaction(RT-PCR). RESULTS: The RSV-infected BEAS-2B cell resulted in significantly enhanced level of neutrophil adherence compared to the uninfected control(p (0.001). IL-8 and ICAM-1 production significantly increased by RSV infection(p<0.05). There was a significant positive correlation between neutrophil adherence and IL-8 level(r=0.73, p=0.002), and ICAM-1 level (r=0.843, p=0.001) in RSV-infected cells. The degree of both IL-8 and ICAM-1 mRNA expression increased in the RSV-infected cells compared with the uninfected ones. CONCLUSION: These results suggest that RSV infection significantly enhances the production of IL-8 and ICAM-1 in airway epithelial cells which then results in increased neutrophil adherence.
Cell Culture Techniques ; Child ; Epithelial Cells* ; Gene Expression ; Humans ; Infant ; Inflammation ; Intercellular Adhesion Molecule-1 ; Interleukin-8 ; Neutrophils* ; Peroxidase ; Respiratory Syncytial Viruses* ; RNA, Messenger

PURPOSE: Recently, two tests are commercially available for the identification of latent tuberculosis infection (LTBI): tuberculin skin test (TST) and interferon-gamma release assay (IGRA). Due to its false positiveness, TST tends to be preferred by IGRA until now. In our study, we simultaneously performed both TST and QuantiFERON(R)-TB Gold In-Tube (QFT-GIT) and compared their results. METHODS: TST and QFT-GIT were done for the diagnosis of LTBI among children who visited pediatric out-patient clinic at St. Vincent's Hospital, The Catholic University of Korea from February of 2007 to May of 2008. The study group was stratified into two groups in terms of whether there was intrafamilial contact or not. RESULTS: Out of total 35 children, 29 were tuberculosis (TB)-exposed cases and the remainders were diagnosed as clinical pulmonary TB. Among these 29 children, TST was positive 38.9% (7/18) for the intrafamilial and 45.5% (5/11) for the non-intrafamilial, and at the same time, the result for QFT-GIT was positive 5.6% (1/18) and 9.1% (1/11), respectively which implies that TST was more sensitive than QFT-GIT. Among 29 TB-exposed cases, 26 initially went through TST and QFT-GIT together on their first visit to out-patient clinic, and 15 continued the follow-up tests. Out of total 41 cases collected, the agreement (known as kappa value) was 0.063 which was relatively low. Including 6 cases with pulmonary TB who were all positive for TST and only 5 being positive for QFT-GIT, the final kappa value was 0.334. CONCLUSION: In our study, the agreement for TST and QFT-GIT was low, and the majorities were almost the cases of positive TST. In current situation with lacking a gold standard test and limited data on children to adolescents, this result is quite alarming that the recent trend tends to replace TST by QFT-GIT when diagnosing LTBI.
Adolescent ; Child ; Follow-Up Studies ; Humans ; Interferon-gamma Release Tests ; Korea ; Latent Tuberculosis ; Outpatients ; Skin ; Skin Tests ; Tuberculin ; Tuberculosis

No abstract available.
Education* ; Humans ; Students, Medical*