["While breathing, one will die"--descriptions of diseases in the writings of Carl Michael Bellman].

The Swedish poet Carl Michael Bellman (1740-1795) was one of the world's great song-writers. His exuberant characters include society's outcasts, many of them portrayed in great detail, with suffering and death frequently forming the backdrop for his often joyous poetry which gives unique glimpses of the living conditions in 17th-century Stockholm. The article is based on a study of the Swedish Bellman Society's "Standardupplaga", the complete edition in 19 volumes of the work of C.

[Occult spinal dysraphism].

Background: Spinal dysraphism is a group of congenital anomalies of the spine characterized by a midline defect affecting the nervous tissue and its bony and soft tissue coverings. Closed spinal dysraphism, spina bifida occulta, refers to skin-covered lesions. However, there are a number of cutaneous stigmata or other physical signs that serve as indicators of an underlying dysraphic malformation of the lower spinal canal.

[Frontoethmoidal meningoencephaloceles].

Frontoethmoidal meningoencephalocele is a rare congenital disease where intracranial masses protrudes through a midline defect at foramen coecum from the anterior cranial fossa into the facial skeleton. The patient presents at birth with a soft-tissue swelling at the nasal bridge. In the majority of cases, the cele is completely covered by skin.

[Neurosurgical shunt treatment of children with hydrocephalus].

Background: The aims of this study were to determine the ten-year outcome of hydrocephalic children, both in terms of academic results, social skills, physical functioning and surgical morbidity and mortality.

Material And Methods: A cohort of 128 children shunted for hydrocephalus at the National Hospital in Oslo between 1985 and 1988 were retrospectively analysed by registering their medical records and in a questionnaire survey.

Results: We found that 23 (18%) children died during the ten-year observation period.

[Life-saving hemicraniectomy in acute massive brain infarction].

Acute occlusion of the middle cerebral artery is an important cause of ischemic stroke. The resulting brain infarction is often very large, leading to massive brain oedema and intracranial hypertension. Despite intensive medical treatment, the mortality rate due to herniation and cerebral circulatory arrest remains very high.

[Vascular compression and cranial nerve diseases].

This paper offers a review of cranial nerve rhizopathies caused by vascular compression of cranial nerves in the posterior cranial fossa. We present our results of microvascular decompression for trigeminal neuralgia, hemifacial spasm, and glossopharyngeal neuralgia caused by compression of the 5th, 7th and 9th cranial nerves, respectively. After a median observation time of 38 months, 20 of 25 patients with trigeminal neuralgia were completely free of pain, and one patient reported more than 50% pain relief.

[Spinal puncture in suspected purulent meningitis].

Today, CT scan of the brain is performed as a routine a the first diagnostic procedure in cases of suspected acute subarachnoid haemorrhage. Subarachnoid blood is demonstrated in a high percent of these cases provided that the scan is carried out within the first few days after the bleeding. Furthermore, the scan may also disclose localised intracranial haematoma or other expansive lesions with brain shift.