Total elbow arthroplasty with the Coonrad/Coonrad-Morrey prosthesis. A 10- to 31-year survival analysis.

There have been few reports in the literature of total elbow arthroplasty extending beyond 10 to 15 years. We reviewed 40 patients (41 elbows) with a mean age of 56 years (19 to 83) who had undergone a Coonrad/Coonrad-Morrey elbow arthroplasty by one surgeon for various diagnoses between 1974 and 1994. Surgical selection excluded patients with previous elbow infection or who refused to accept a sedentary level of elbow activity postoperatively.

The drop sign, a radiographic warning sign of elbow instability.

Persistent instability or redislocation is uncommon but of significant concern in treating elbow dislocations. Finding an objective, static radiographic sign that might correlate with the presence of instability was the purpose of this study. Pre- and post-reduction radiographs of 10 consecutive simple and complete adult elbow dislocations were reviewed and compared with radiographs of 20 consecutive adult elbows without any trauma history.

A logical coronal pattern classification of 2,000 consecutive idiopathic scoliosis cases based on the scoliosis research society-defined apical vertebra.

Study Design: Two thousand consecutive idiopathic scoliosis records and radiographs were reviewed for coronal pattern typing and categorization, based on Scoliosis Research Society definitions of the apical vertebra. Apical frequency was determined for each of the patterns identified, and represents a database from a large series of cases for the already accepted Scoliosis Research Society definitions.

Objectives: To identify and numerically pattern-type a large series of idiopathic coronal curves, for the basic purpose of written and oral communication.

An assessment of the reliability of the Scoliometer.

Accurate noninvasive measurements of spinal curvature are crucial in planning treatment and assessing curve progression in adolescent idiopathic scoliosis. An inter-rater agreement trial and an intrarater agreement trial were undertaken to estimate the reliability of axial rotation measurement using the Scoliometer (Orthopedic Systems, Inc., Haywood, California).

Microscopic histopathology of chronic refractory lateral epicondylitis.

The histopathologic features from 11 patients who were treated surgically for lateral epicondylitis were graded and compared to similar tissue from 12 cadaveric specimens. All studies were done by a single pathologist who had no knowledge of the origin of the specimen. The surgical specimens were interpreted as abnormal in all 11 specimens, and all 12 of the control specimens were reported as being without histologic abnormality.

Choosing fusion levels in progressive thoracic idiopathic scoliosis.

The selection of fusion levels in thoracic idiopathic scoliosis was subjected to multicenter retrospective review to test the validity of the classification system and recommendations of King et al. The 253 patients reviewed were treated by posterior fusion and Harrington instrumentation. Bending films were of little help in selecting fusion levels.

Degenerative adult onset scoliosis.

There are people who have no history of scoliosis who develop spinal deformity of a progressive nature as adults, associated with severe degenerative disc disease. The clinical syndrome associated with this deformity is not well documented. In an attempt to describe this clinical syndrome more precisely, 21 patients with the diagnosis of degenerative scoliosis were identified and reviewed.

Spinous process segmental instrumentation for scoliosis.

Spinous process segmental instrumentation (SPSI) for spinal fusion was devised in 1983 by Drummond et al. in an attempt to achieve the stability of segmental fixation without the known neurologic risks of passing sublaminar wires. We used SPSI in 75 scoliosis patients.