Comparison of fluoroscopic Guided Transforaminal Epidural Injections of Steroid and Local Anaesthetic with Conservative Management in Patients with Chronic Lumbar Radiculopathies.

Background: Chronic lumbar radiculopathy is a common medical problem and the treatment modalities used over years have been many ranging from conservative or symptomatic management to open decompression surgery. This study was aimed at to compare two modalities of treatment, i.e.

An Interventional Study on the Clinical Usefulness and Outcomes of Electroconvulsive Therapy in Medication-Resistant Mental Disorders.

Background: Resistance to recommended medications has been an issue in dealing with a number of psychiatric ailments, and it is showing up as an ongoing challenge for contemporary mental health experts. Resistant psychiatric disorders not only increase the morbidity of patients suffering from such severe conditions but also intensify the problems of their caretakers. This has vigorously started to cause the costs to increase for healthcare services.

Correction: Generalized Tetanus Initially Presenting with Dysmasesis.

[This corrects the article DOI: 10.7759/cureus.644.

Is there a link between Depressive Disorders and Tryptophan Hydroxylase 1 (TPH1) Gene Polymorphism? - Study from a Distressed Area, Kashmir (India).

Background: The progress that man has made in all domains of life, during all these years of reign over the earth, is utterly remarkable. However, it always came at a price. Each epoch of progress has seen human beings inflicted with trauma and cynical consequences.

Comparative evaluation of probing depth and clinical attachment level using a manual probe and Florida probe.

Background: To compare and evaluate the intra- and inter-examiner efficacy and reproducibility of the first-generation manual (Williams) probe and the third-generation Florida probe in terms of measuring pocket probing depth (PD) and clinical attachment level (CAL).

Materials And Methods: Forty subjects/4000 sites were included in this comparative, cross-sectional study. Group- and site-wise categorizations were done.

Neurological Manifestations of Brucellosis in an Indian Population.

Brucellosis is a zoonotic disease causing serious public health problems in countries of the Middle-East and developing countries like India. Neurobrucellosis is one of the devastating complications of this re-emerging zoonosis. The objective of this review was to identify the neurological manifestations of Brucellosis in an Indian population and bring into light the effective modalities used for treating neurobrucellosis.

An Innovative and Portable Multimodal Pain Relief Device for the Management of Neuropathic Low Back Pain - a Study from Kashmir (Southeast Asia).

We developed a portable multimodal system with seven different mechanisms of pain relief incorporated into a lumbar belt called the Comfort-N-Harmony Belt (C&H belt). Here, we describe the technical details of the system and also summarize the effects of this multimodal pain relieving technology as an adjuvant to analgesics versus analgesics alone, on the level of pain, improvement of psychological status, disability, and the quality of life in the patients with neuropathic low back pain (LBP). We tracked the volunteers who were following up at a tertiary health care center for the complaints of neuropathic LBP of minimum three months duration and were on analgesics alone with no relief in the severity of the pain.

Generalized Tetanus Initially Presenting with Dysmasesis.

A 58-year-old male farmer, with no significant history of any chronic morbidity, was admitted via the Emergency Department of SMHS Hospital, Srinagar, with a history of an injury to the hand 20 days earlier followed by a three-day history of dysmasesis (difficulty chewing), progressing to trismus and generalized stiffness interfering with his daily activities. The patient was clinically managed as tetanus on grounds of high clinical suspicion. The patient was treated for a week and discharged without any sequelae to follow-up in the Neurology Outpatient Department of the SMHS Hospital and is currently doing well.

A Comparison of the Behavioral and Psychological Symptoms of Dementia (BPSD) in Early-Onset and Late-Onset Alzheimer's Disease - A Study from South East Asia (Kashmir, India).

Background: A gradual increase in the longevity due to advancement of treatment modalities and a subsequent surge in elderly population in India have led to a growing curiosity in the geriatric age group with Alzheimer's disease (AD). Behavioral and psychological symptoms of dementia (BPSD) represent epiphenomena of AD. However, no comprehensive study has been carried out in South East Asia (Kashmir, India), to assess the behavioral and psychological symptoms in subtypes of AD.

Thoracic combined spinal epidural anesthesia for laparoscopic cholecystectomy: A feasibility study.

Background And Aims: The use of regional anesthesia for laparoscopic cholecystectomy has been reserved for patients who are at high-risk under general anesthesia (GA). The aim of this study was to assess whether thoracic combined spinal epidural (CSE) anesthesia is a feasible option for American Society of Anesthesiologists (ASA) physical status I and II patients undergoing elective laparoscopic cholecystectomy.

Material And Methods: Thirty ASA physical status I and II patients undergoing elective laparoscopic cholecystectomy received thoracic CSE anesthesia at T9-T10 or T10-T11 interspinous space using the midline approach.

Childhood obesity: prevention is better than cure.

Obesity and its associated comorbidities have emerged as a major health problem garnering interests from both public health agencies and mainstream media consumers. With increasing awareness on its impact on health, finances, and community at large, it has come to the forefront for scientific research and development of health plans. The need for better strategies and novel interventions to manage obesity is now being recognized by the entire health care system.

Gender differences in insulin and C-peptide concentrations at birth using cord blood collection.

Objective: To study gender differences in insulin and C-peptide concentrations at birth using cord blood collection.

Subjects And Methods: This study was conducted in a maternity hospital, in Jammu province of Jammu and Kashmir, India. All women with pregnancy who were hospitalized for delivery were followed.

Single-Incision Laparoscopic Cholecystectomy Using Conventional Laparoscopic Instruments and Comparison with Three-Port Cholecystectomy.

Single-incision laparoscopic surgery also known as laparo-endoscopic single-site surgery for cholecystectomy is performed using a single umbilical skin incision through which a laparoscope and two instruments are introduced. It is virtually a "scarless" surgery. The present study was undertaken to evaluate the efficacy of single-incision laparoscopic cholecystectomy using conventional instruments and compare it with three-port laparoscopic cholecystectomy.

Thoracic combined spinal epidural anesthesia for laparoscopic cholecystectomy in a geriatric patient with ischemic heart disease and renal insufficiency.

Older people undergoing any surgery have a higher incidence of morbidity and mortality, resulting from a decline in physiological reserves, associated comorbidities, polypharmacy, cognitive dysfunction, and frailty. Most of the clinical trials comparing regional versus general anesthesia in elderly have failed to establish superiority of any single technique. However, the ideal approach in elderly is to be least invasive, thus minimizing alterations in homeostasis.

Sodium glucose co-transporter inhibitors - A new class of old drugs.

Sodium glucose co-transporter (SGLT) inhibitors are a new class of drugs which are used in the pharmacotherapy of Type-II diabetes, which happens to be a major risk factor for developing both micro as well as macro-vascular complications. These drugs inhibit the glucose reabsorption by inhibiting SGLT, which exhibits a novel and promising mechanism of action by promoting the urinary glucose excretion hence providing a basis of therapeutic intervention. Results of SGLT-II inhibitors are very encouraging as there is a significant elevation of GLP-1 level, which forms the basis of relevance in treatment of diabetes.

Tenofovir induced lichenoid drug eruption.

Cutaneous adverse reactions are a common complication of anti-retroviral therapy. Tenofovir is a newer anti-retroviral drug belonging to the nucleotide reverse transcriptase inhibitor group. Systemic adverse effects like nausea, vomiting, diarrhea, hepatotoxicity and renal toxicity are common with tenofovir but cutaneous adverse effects are rare.

Inflammatory myofibroblastic tumor of the urinary bladder: A diagnostic challange and therapeutic dilemma.

Inflammatory myofibroblastic tumor (IMT) is a rare, aggressive tumor of indeterminate malignant potential with myofibroblastic differentiation. Though bladder location is very uncommon, it arises from the bladder submucosal stroma as a polypoidal growth and is easily mistaken for a malignant neoplasm- clinically, radiologically and histologically. Essential criteria for the diagnosis of IMT are: spindle myoepithelial cell proliferation and lymphoplasmacytic infiltrate.

Fixed drug eruption to sitagliptin.

Fixed drug eruption is a common adverse effect seen with various drugs notably antibiotics, antiepileptics and non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs. Herein we report a case of Sitagliptin induced fixed drug eruption in a 46 year old female who developed circumscribed, erythematous macules all over the body within one week of initiation of Sitagliptin. The lesions resolved with residual hyperpigmentation on cessation of the drug.

First reported case of Lorazepam-assisted interview in a young Indian female presenting with dissociative identity disorder and improvement in symptoms after the interview.

Dissociative identity disorder (DID) is one of the most fascinating disorders in psychiatry. The arduous search to reveal the obscurity of this disorder has led to colossal research in this area over the years. Although drug-assisted interviews are not widely used, they may be beneficial for some patients that do not respond to conventional treatments such as supportive psychotherapy or psychopharmacotherapy.

Tryptophan hydroxylase 2 gene polymorphism in anxiety and depressive disorder in kashmiri population.

Background: The gene of tryptophan hydroxylase is widely recognized as a major candidate gene in many psychiatric disorders. However, no study has been done which investigates tryptophan hydroxylase 2 gene polymorphism in anxiety and depressive disorders in Kashmiri population (India).

Objectives: To study tryptophan hydroxylase 2 (TPH2) C 11993 A gene polymorphism in anxiety and depressive disorders.

Liver abscess in the tropics: an experience from Jammu.

Objective: To study the various types of liver abscesses. This prospective study was conducted over a period of one year, from November 2011 to October 2012, at the Department of General Surgery in Acharya Shri Chander College of Medical Sciences and Hospital Sidhra, Jammu.

Materials And Methods: The patients in this study were admitted from the emergency wing, and from indoor and outdoor departments of surgery and medicine over a period of one year (November 2011 to October 2012) to the Department of General Surgery in Acharya Shri Chander College of Medical Sciences and Hospital Sidhra, Jammu.

Increased preoperative collection of autologous blood with recombinant human erythropoietin therapy in tertiary care hospitals of Jammu.

Introduction: To study whether the administration of recombinant human erythropoietin increases the amount of autologous blood that can be collected before orthopaedic surgery.

Materials And Methods: We conducted a randomized controlled trial of recombinant human erythropoietin in 68 adults scheduled for elective orthopedic procedures. The patients received either erythropoietin 600 units/kg of body weight or placebo intravenously every 5(th) day prior to each phlebotomy for 21 days during which time up to 5 units of blood was collected.

Outcome of bilateral ureteroscopic retrieval of stones in a single session.

Aim: Evaluation of bilateral ureteroscopic retrieval of stones as a single-stage procedure in terms of clearance of the stones, complications of the procedure and duration of hospital stay. A successful outcome was considered when both ureters were free of stones without any major complications.

Materials And Methods: A total of 60 patients with bilateral ureteric stones were treated ureteroscopically from March 2006 to September 2009 in the department of Surgery (Urology unit).