Brain structural and psychometric alterations in chronic low back pain.

Purpose: Chronic low back pain (CLBP) is one of the most important pain disorders with increasing social and economic implications. Given that CLBP is a multidimensional process associated with comorbidities such as anxiety and depression, treatment of chronic low back pain is still a challenge. Advancement of in vivo brain imaging technologies has revealed increasing insights into the etiology and pathogenesis of chronic pain; however, the exact mechanisms of chronification of LBP remain still unclear.

Horizontal gaze palsy with progressive scoliosis: three novel ROBO3 mutations and descriptions of the phenotypes of four patients.

Purpose: Clinical and molecular characterization of patients with horizontal gaze palsy with progressive scoliosis (HGPPS) to extend existing knowledge of the phenotype caused by mutations in the Roundabout homolog of Drosophila 3 (ROBO3) gene.

Methods: Four patients (aged 6 months to 13 years), two of them siblings, with features of horizontal gaze palsy and their parents were examined clinically and by molecular testing of the ROBO3 gene. The three families were unrelated, but parents in each family were consanguineous.

Tuberculous spondylitis and paravertebral abscess formation after kyphoplasty: a case report.

Study Design: Case report.

Objective: To report a patient with spinal tuberculosis (TB) and paravertebral abscess formation after kyphoplasty of L1. The literature is reviewed, and diagnostic options are discussed.

Human knee joint anatomy revisited: morphometry in the light of sex-specific total knee arthroplasty.

This study investigates differences in the anatomy of male and female knee joints to contribute to the current debate on sex-specific total knee implants. Morphometric data were obtained from 60 human cadaver knees, and sex differences were calculated. All data were corrected for height, and male and female specimens presenting with an identical length of the femur were analyzed as matched pairs.

Treatment of chronically unreduced complex dislocations of the elbow.

Chronic dislocation of the elbow is an exceedingly disabling condition associated with severe instability, limitation of elbow function and significant pain. Due to the potentially conflicting goals of restoring elbow stability and regaining a satisfactory arc of motion, successful treatment is a challenge for the experienced trauma surgeon. We report our treatment strategy in three patients suffering from chronically unreduced fracture-dislocations of the elbow.

Spondylolisthesis caused by extreme pedicle elongation in osteogenesis imperfecta.

Although osteogenesis imperfecta is a well-known skeletal disorder, reports of spondylolisthesis in osteogenesis imperfecta are rare. Only very few cases of spondylolisthesis caused by elongation of lumbar pedicles have been described in the literature. Here we report three patients suffering from osteogenesis imperfecta showing a severe form of hyperlordosis caused by lumbar pedicle elongation and consecutive spondylolisthesis.

Monoamine related functional gene variants and relationships to monoamine metabolite concentrations in CSF of healthy volunteers.

Background: Concentrations of monoamine metabolites in human cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) have been used extensively as indirect estimates of monoamine turnover in the brain. CSF monoamine metabolite concentrations are partly determined by genetic influences.

Methods: We investigated possible relationships between DNA polymorphisms in the serotonin 2C receptor (HTR2C), the serotonin 3A receptor (HTR3A), the dopamine D4 receptor (DRD4), and the dopamine beta-hydroxylase (DBH) genes and CSF concentrations of 5-hydroxyindolacetic acid (5-HIAA), homovanillic acid (HVA), and 3-methoxy-4-hydroxyphenylglycol (MHPG) in healthy volunteers (n = 90).