Prevention of chronic pneumonia in children with severe motor and intellectual disabilities by long-term tobramycin inhalation: Its benefits and limitations.

Aim: To determine the effect of long-term tobramycin (TOB) inhalation therapy on recurrent pneumonia among ventilator-dependent children with profound neurological disabilities.

Methods: TOB inhalation was performed in eight series of trials in seven ventilator-dependent children who had intratracheal Pseudomonas aeruginosa and suffered from recurrent pneumonia. Their age at the initiation of therapy was 68 ± 50 months (mean ± standard deviation), whereas the duration of treatment was 30 ± 22 months.

Effective screening methods to prevent surgical site infections in orthopedic surgery: an observational study.

Background: The bacterial source of surgical-site infections (SSIs) can have either endogenous and/or exogenous origins, and some studies have revealed that endogenous transmission is an important pathway for SSIs in orthopedic surgery. However, since the frequency of SSIs is low (0.5-4.

Lateral Bowing of Femur Associated With Older Age, Shorter Stature, and Lower Bone Mineral Density.

We often encounter elderly patients with femur bowing. According to literature, femoral bowing is correlated with patient characteristics such as aging, race, atypical femoral fracture (AFF), and osteoporosis. However, the clear relationships between these factors and femoral bowing are still unknown.

Cytokine/chemokine elevation during the transition phase from HSV encephalitis to autoimmune anti-NMDA receptor encephalitis.

A 3-year-old girl suffered from anti-N-methyl-d-aspartate (anti-NMDA) receptor encephalitis after resolution of herpes simplex virus encephalitis (HSE). Methylprednisolone pulse and immunoglobulin therapies showed little effect, but the patient completely recovered after six courses of monthly cyclophosphamide pulse therapy and successive maintenance on mycophenolate mofetil for one year. Anti-NMDA receptor antibody in the cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) was minimally detected during the prodromal febrile period and then was seen to be markedly elevated at the onset of second encephalopathy phase.

Bilateral Necrotizing Fasciitis of the Foot Associated with Group B Streptococcus.

Necrotizing fasciitis (NF) is a severe bacterial infection involving fascia and subcutaneous tissue. It generally affects upper or lower extremities unilaterally, and there are few reports of bilateral-extremity NF. Here, we report a case of a 43-year-old male with type 1 diabetes who had NF on the left foot and subsequently developed NF on the other foot 1 week later.

Pain-related behavior and the characteristics of dorsal-root ganglia in a rat model of hip osteoarthritis induced by mono-iodoacetate.

The principal aim of this study was to clarify the time course of pain-related behavior and pain-related sensory innervation in a rat model of hip osteoarthritis (OA) induced by intra-articular injection of mono-iodoacetate (MIA). Using 6-week-old male Sprague Dawley rats, 25 μl of sterile saline of 1% Fluoro-Gold solution (FG) (control group; n = 30) and 25 μl of sterile saline of 1% FG with 2 mg of MIA (MIA group; n = 30) was injected into the right hip joints. Gait function was evaluated using a CatWalk system after 7, 14, 28, 42, and 56 days (n = 5, respectively).

Intra-articular injection of mono-iodoacetate induces osteoarthritis of the hip in rats.

Background: The mechanism for hip pain has been unclear because of a lack of experimental animal models. We aimed to establish an intra-articular injection technique to the rat hip and to document the effect of intra-articular mono-iodoacetate (MIA) injection to the rat hip with radiography and histology.

Methods: Using 60 6-week-old male Sprague Dawley rats, 25 μl of sterile saline (control group; n = 30) and 25 μl of sterile saline with 2 mg of MIA (MIA group; n = 30) was injected into the right hip joints via posterior approach using a 27G needle.

Corticosteroids and low bone mineral density affect hip cartilage in systemic lupus erythematosus patients: Quantitative T2 mapping.

Background: The purpose of this diagnostic study was to quantify the effect of high-dose corticosteroid treatment on hip joint cartilage degeneration in patients with systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE), with and without osteonecrosis, using magnetic resonance imaging (MRI).

Methods: T2 mapping, with a 3.0 Tesla Discovery MR750 (GE Healthcare) MRI scanner, was performed in 12 volunteers without hip pathology (control group, 12 hips), in 11 patients with SLE without osteonecrosis, who were receiving corticosteroid therapy (corticosteroid-ON group, 17 hips), and in 15 patients with SLE receiving corticosteroids, who had noncollapsed and asymptomatic osteonecrosis (corticosteroid+ON group, 26 hips).

A novel rat model of hip pain by intra-articular injection of nerve growth factor-characteristics of sensory innervation and inflammatory arthritis.

Objectives: To determine the direct effects of intra-articular injection of nerve growth factor (NGF) into normal rat hips and the time course of pain-related mediator appearance.

Methods: Using 36 numbers of 8-week-old male Sprague-Dawley rats, 30 μl of 1% Fluoro-Gold solution (FG) (Sham-operated group; n = 12), 30 μl of 1% FG with 50 μg/ml NGF (NGF50 group; n = 12), and 30 μl of 1% FG with 100 μg/ml NGF (NGF100 group; n = 12) were injected into the left hip joints. Neurons in the dorsal root ganglion (DRG) labeled with FG, and FG and calcitonin gene-related peptide-immunoreactivity (CGRP-IR) were counted.

Transient up-regulation of P-glycoprotein reduces tacrolimus absorption after ischemia-reperfusion injury in rat ileum.

Ischemia-reperfusion injury is an unavoidable problem for organ transplantation including small bowel transplantation, and causes a large intra-individual variation of tacrolimus (FK506) pharmacokinetics. Little information is available about the regulation of the intestinal P-glycoprotein expression during tissue regeneration. In the present study, we have examined the molecular and functional variations of ileum P-glycoprotein using rats after ischemia-reperfusion treatment.