The importance of anatomical reduction in the functional outcome of open ankle fractures.

Introduction: Whilst closed ankle fracture injuries are common, well characterized and have treatment guidelines derived from the literature, open ankle fractures are rare and are not well studied. The few studies that exist are from the developed First World and these well resourced circumstances are not available in most parts of the world. The purpose of this prospective study was to assess the functional outcomes of open ankle fractures and the factors associated with their outcome in an adult population in rural South Africa.

Delayed implants sepsis in HIV-positive patients following open fractures treated with orthopaedic implants.

Background: There has been concern that HIV-positive patients may be more susceptible to delayed infection (>1 month) after treatment of open fractures with orthopaedic implants. To date, the longest published follow-up for such patients is 6 months.

Aim: Long-term follow-up to identify rates of delayed implant sepsis in open fractures treated with internal fixation, in HIV positive patients and controls.

Severity of upper-limb panga injuries and infection rates associated with early v. late tendon repair.

Background: Panga or machete attacks are a common cause of significant upper-limb trauma in South Africa. Pangas are a multipurpose household tool used predominantly for foraging and agricultural purposes and are highly contaminated. While some centres advocate immediate primary repair if no concern exists regarding the risk of infection, others delay definitive repair until satisfied there is no evidence of infection.

Does human immunodeficiency virus status affect early wound healing in open surgically stabilised tibial fractures?: A prospective study.

We compared early post-operative rates of wound infection in HIV-positive and -negative patients presenting with open tibial fractures managed with surgical fixation. The wounds of 84 patients (85 fractures), 28 of whom were HIV positive and 56 were HIV negative, were assessed for signs of infection using the ASEPIS wound score. There were 19 women and 65 men with a mean age of 34.

Chromosome 9 ALS and FTD locus is probably derived from a single founder.

We and others have recently reported an association between amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) and single nucleotide polymorphisms on chromosome 9p21 in several populations. Here we show that the associated haplotype is the same in all populations and that several families previously shown to have genetic linkage to this region also share this haplotype. The most parsimonious explanation of these data are that there is a single founder for this form of disease.