Is Using Closed Incision Negative Pressure Therapy in Reconstructive and Oncoplastic Breast Surgery Helpful in Reducing Skin Necrosis?

Introduction Skin necrosis is a major concern of morbidity in patients undergoing reconstructive and oncoplastic breast surgery (ROBS) as it may lead to a poor aesthetic outcome, necessitate further surgery, and delay adjuvant chemotherapy and radiotherapy if required postoperatively. Some studies have reported that closed incision negative pressure therapy (ciNPT) immediately after surgery can reduce the incidence of wound complications. Our study aimed to investigate the effect of ciNPT on skin necrosis rate after ROBS.

Comparative Efficacy and Safety Study of Darbepoetin Alfa Epoetin Alfa in Management of Anemia Associated with ESRD in Egyptian Hemodialysis Patients.

Background: Anemia is one of the most common complications of Chronic Kidney Disease (CKD). The vast majority of Egyptian CKD patients are interchangeably treated with Darbepoetin Alfa (DPA) and Epoetin Alfa (EPA) to achieve and maintain target hemoglobin levels. Our study aimed to compare the efficacy and safety of DPA versus EPA for managing anemia amongst Egyptian patients with CKD undergoing dialysis.

Outcome of complete acellular dermal matrix wrap with polyurethane implant in immediate prepectoral breast reconstruction.

Background: Polyurethane implants have been used on and off in breast reconstruction since 1991 while prepectoral breast reconstruction has gained popularity in recent times. In this study, we present our outcomes from the use of acellular dermal matrix (ADM) complete wrap with polyurethane implants in prepectoral breast reconstruction.

Methods: This is a retrospective review of prospectively maintained database from 41 patients receiving complete ADM wrap with prepectoral polyurethane implants over a 3-year period.

Management based on grading of animation deformity following implant-based subpectoral breast reconstruction.

Subpectoral breast reconstruction using implants and meshes have been used widely in Europe, the United States and the United Kingdom. Although this technique has several advantages, animation deformity is a well-documented problem. We propose a new grading system to classify breast animation in patients undergoing subpectoral implant based breast reconstruction.

Feeling blue, going green and finding other attractive alternatives: a case of biphasic anaphylaxis to patent blue and a literature review of alternative sentinel node localisation methods.

Patent blue dye is used for sentinel lymph node localisation in order to stage the axilla in patients with breast cancer. Patent blue is one of the most common dyes used across the UK, however, the incidence of adverse effects seems to be increasing. This case highlights our experience of a biphasic anaphylactic reaction to patent blue dye, and we conduct a brief literature review of alternative and more novel methods to adequately visualise the lymphatics for sentinel lymph node biopsy.

An integrated open-cavity system for magnetic bead separation and manipulation.

Superparamagnetic beads are generally used in biomedical assays to manipulate, maneuver, separate, and transport bio-materials. We present a low-cost integrated system designed in bulk 0.5 μm process to automate the manipulation and separation process of magnetic beads.

Sensing and feedback stimulation via the wireless ZigBee protocol.

The aim of this work is to implement a feedback sensing and control mechanism via wireless sensor nodes for medical sensing and actuation. To that end, we employ the Zigbee protocol in sensing and precisely commanding an analog signal to a probe. We employ a user application upon the layer available in the Zigbee stack to achieve our goal.

Integrated CMOS electronic system-on-chip for medical sensors and actuators.

We present an overview of an integrated low-power, lightweight, compact computing platform dedicated to addressing specific needs in sensing and actuation. The architecture includes an adaptive computing electronic design (Chip) that supersedes the capabilities of present microcomputing paradigms (micro-processors, micro-controllers, and DSPs) in the application domains of process identification, modeling, prediction, and real-time control. In particular, a domain of prominent applications is biological and medical measurements and stimulation.

Blind information-theoretic multiuser detection algorithms for DS-CDMA and WCDMA downlink systems.

Code division multiple access (CDMA) is based on the spread-spectrum technology and is a dominant air interface for 2.5G, 3G, and future wireless networks. For the CDMA downlink, the transmitted CDMA signals from the base station (BS) propagate through a noisy multipath fading communication channel before arriving at the receiver of the user equipment/mobile station (UE/MS).