Schwannoma, also known as neurilemmoma, is a benign neoplasm that originates from any nerves wrapped with a sheath made of Schwann cells. Schwannoma occurring in the head and neck region is not rare, but schwannomas of the anterior neck, especially ansa cervicalis, are extremely rare that only 7 cases have been reported to date worldwide. Although rare, it should be considered in differential diagnosis of anterior cervical mass and may be confused with other cervical and thyroid mass. We report a case of intramuscular schwannoma in the sternohyoid muscle. Preoperative diagnosis was established with an ultrasound-guided core needle biopsy. Although it was removed entirely without connection to any other nerves identified or any complication, clinically, the mass was thought to be derived from the nerve. To our knowledge, this is the first case of the intramuscular schwannoma occurring from ansa cervicalis reported in the literature.

PURPOSE: Extrathyroidal extension (ETE) is one of the risk factors to be considered when deciding on operation extent and radioiodine ablation in differentiated thyroid carcinoma. Ultrasonography (USG) is the most widely used imaging modality in preoperative evaluation of thyroid carcinoma; however, few studies regarding accuracy of USG in preoperative evaluation of ETE have been reported. In this study, we investigated the accuracy of preoperative USG in detection of ETE and evaluated other risk factors associated with permanent ETE. METHODS: We reviewed the medical records of 349 consecutive patients who underwent curative thyroidectomy for differentiated thyroid carcinoma. Preoperative USG findings according to percent of contact and disruption of thyroid capsule were evaluated and compared with the permanent pathology. Clinicopathologic characteristics were investigated for assessment of the risk factors associated with ETE. RESULTS: ETE was identified in permanent pathology of 68 (19.5%) patients. When we defined the ETE on preoperative USG as more than 25% contact with the adjacent capsule, the positive predictive value (PPV) and negative predictive value (NPV) were 43.03% and 90.73%, respectively. Size of the nodule and preoperative USG findings with the percent of contact with adjacent capsule and capsule disruption showed an association with ETE on permanent pathology. However, in multivariate analysis, only size of the nodule and capsule disruption on USG were identified as risk factors for prediction of ETE on permanent pathology. CONCLUSION: Capsule disruption on preoperative USG can provide useful predictive information about permanent ETE. Another risk factor associated with ETE was size of nodule in differentiated thyroid carcinoma.
Humans ; Medical Records ; Multivariate Analysis ; Pathology ; Risk Factors* ; Thyroid Gland* ; Thyroid Neoplasms* ; Thyroidectomy ; Ultrasonography

Objective: This study explored the efficacy of group reminiscence therapy, incorporating traditional plays, for individuals with mild cognitive impairment (MCI) and dementia patients. Methods: We provided 10 sessions of group reminiscence therapy to 25 MCI and dementia patients. We conducted assess-ments, both before and after the program, encompassing a range of tests, namely the Mini-Mental Status Examination (MMSE), Dysexecutive Questionnaire, Zarit Burden Interview (ZBI-K), Dementia Care Assessment Packet-Instrumental Activities of Daily Living, Geriatric Depression Scale (GDS-K), and Neuropsychiatric Inventory (NPI-K). Results: Following the program, there was a significant improvement in MMSE scores for MCI patients (19.17 to 22.33, p=0.027). There was a significant improvement in NPI-K scores for dementia patients (8.05 to 3.74, p=0.006). There was a sig-nificant improvement in GDS-K scores for MCI patients (17.00 to 14.00, p=0.043). There was a significant improvement in ZBIK scores for dementia (28.53 to 17.68, p=0.001) and MCI patients (29.17 to 16.33, p=0.046). Conclusion Our study suggested that group reminiscence therapy based on traditional play might be effective in global cog-nition of MCI patients, neuropsychological symptoms of dementia patients, depression of MCI patients, and caregiver burden of all subjects.