MATERIALS AND METHODS: Results that are possible to be compared in more than two articles were presented as forest plots. A 95% confidence interval was calculated for each effect size, and we calculated the I 2 statistic, which presents the percentage of total variation attributable to the heterogeneity among studies. The random effects model was used to calculate the effect size.
RESULTS: Seven articles were included to the final analysis. Case groups were composed of HTO without concurrent procedures and control groups were composed of HTO with concurrent procedures such as marrow stimulation procedure, mesenchymal stem cell transplantation, and injection. The case group showed a higher hospital for special surgery score and mean difference was 4.10 [I 2 80.8%, 95% confidence interval (CI) - 9.02 to 4.82]. Mean difference of the mechanical femorotibial angle in five studies was 0.08° (I 2 0%, 95% CI - 0.26 to 0.43). However, improved arthroscopic, histologic, and MRI results were reported in the control group.
CONCLUSION: Our analysis support that concurrent procedures during HTO for medial compartment OA have little beneficial effect regarding clinical and radiological outcomes. However, they might have some beneficial effects in terms of arthroscopic, histologic, and MRI findings even though the quality of healed cartilage is not good as that of original cartilage. Therefore, until now, concurrent procedures for medial compartment OA have been considered optional. Nevertheless, no conclusions can be drawn for younger patients with focal cartilage defects and concomitant varus deformity. This question needs to be addressed separately.
METHODS: Ten healthy subjects (aged 19-44 years) received 3 consecutive daily doses of filgrastim followed by an apheresis harvest of mononuclear cells on a fourth day. In a clean room, the apheresis product was prepared for cryopreservation and processed into 4 mL aliquots. Sterility and qualification testing were performed pre-processing and post-processing at multiple time points out to 2 years. Eight samples were shipped internationally to validate cell transport potential. One sample from all participants was cultured to test proliferative potential with colony forming unit (CFU) assay. Five samples, from 5 participants were tested for differentiation potential, including chondrogenic, adipogenic, osteogenic, endoderm, and ectoderm assays.
RESULTS: Fresh aliquots contained an average of 532.9 ± 166. × 106 total viable cells/4 mL vial and 2.1 ± 1.0 × 106 CD34+ cells/4 mL vial. After processing for cryopreservation, the average cell count decreased to 331.3 ± 79. × 106 total viable cells /4 mL vial and 1.5 ± 0.7 × 106 CD34+ cells/4 mL vial CD34+ cells. Preprocessing viability averaged 99% and postprocessing 88%. Viability remained constant after cryopreservation at all subsequent time points. All sterility testing was negative. All samples showed proliferative potential, with average CFU count 301.4 ± 63.9. All samples were pluripotent.
CONCLUSIONS: Peripheral blood stem cells are pluripotent and can be safely harvested/stored with filgrastim, apheresis, clean-room processing, and cryopreservation. These cells can be stored for 2 years and shipped without loss of viability.
CLINICAL RELEVANCE: This method represents an accessible stem cell therapy in development to augment cartilage repair.
OBJECTIVES: The aims of this study is to investigate the capability of random walks as knee cartilage segmentation method.
METHODS: Experts would scribble on knee cartilage image to initialize random walks segmentation. Then, reproducibility of the method is assessed against manual segmentation by using Dice Similarity Index. The evaluation consists of normal cartilage and diseased cartilage sections which is divided into whole and single cartilage categories.
RESULTS: A total of 15 normal images and 10 osteoarthritic images were included. The results showed that random walks method has demonstrated high reproducibility in both normal cartilage (observer 1: 0.83±0.028 and observer 2: 0.82±0.026) and osteoarthritic cartilage (observer 1: 0.80±0.069 and observer 2: 0.83±0.029). Besides, results from both experts were found to be consistent with each other, suggesting the inter-observer variation is insignificant (Normal: P=0.21; Diseased: P=0.15).
CONCLUSION: The proposed segmentation model has overcame technical problems reported by existing semi-automated techniques and demonstrated highly reproducible and consistent results against manual segmentation method.