METHODS: A detailed, retrospective clinico-pathological review of treatment resistant potentially malignant lesions, from a 590 patient cohort treated by CO2 laser surgery and followed for a mean of 7.3 years, was undertaken. Clinical outcome was determined at study census date (31 December 2014).
RESULTS: A total of 87 patients (15%) exhibited PMD disease resistant to treatment: 34 (6%) became disease free following further treatment, whilst 53 (9%) had persistent disease despite intervention. Disease-free patients were younger, changed lesion appearance from erythroleukoplakia to leukoplakia (P = .004), developed further lesions at new sites, demonstrated reduction in dysplasia severity with time and required multiple treatments to achieve disease-free status (P = .0005). In contrast, persistent disease patients were older, male, often presented with proliferative verrucous leukoplakia (PVL) on gingival and alveolar sites, displayed less severe dysplasia initially and underwent laser ablation rather than excision (P = .027).
CONCLUSION: Despite clinico-pathological profiling of treatment resistant patients, the precise inter-relationship between the inherent nature of potentially malignant disease and the external influence of treatment intervention remains obscure.
METHODS: An observational cross-sectional study of 964 archived datasets of women seen for symptoms and signs of lower urinary tract and pelvic organ dysfunction between September 2011 and February 2014 at a tertiary urogynaecology centre in Australia was carried out. An in-house standardised interview, the International Continence Society Pelvic Organ Prolapse Quantification (ICS POP-Q) and 4-D translabial ultrasound, followed by analysis of ultrasound volumes for pelvic organ descent and hiatal area on Valsalva, were performed, blinded against other data.
RESULTS: There is a positive association between BMI and posterior compartment prolapse on clinical examination and ultrasound imaging, but not for the anterior and central compartments. There was no association with prolapse symptom bother and a negative association with symptoms of prolapse.
CONCLUSIONS: In this observational study, we found a strong association between all tested measures of posterior compartment descent and BMI, both clinical and on imaging.
PURPOSE: To report the clinical profile of 34 ocular TB cases observed during 6 years period in Hospital Universiti Sains Malaysia (HUSM).
METHOD: A retrospective review of medical records from 34 patients diagnosed with ocular TB in HUSM from January 2011 until December 2016.
RESULTS: The mean age was 43 ± 14.6 years old. Both male and female affected in about 1:1 ratio. The majority of subjects were local Malays (91.2%). Risk factors included previous contact with pulmonary TB patients (38.2%), and patients with underlying diabetes mellitus (26.5%). Most patients showed normal chest radiography (79.4%). However they had positive Mantoux test (94.1%) and raised erythrocyte sedimentation rate (ESR) value (58.8%). Uveitis was the most common ocular manifestation of ocular TB (70.6%) while the rare ocular manifestations included optic perineuritis and optic neuritis, orbital apex syndrome, orbital cellulitis, sclerokeratitis, corneal ulcer and conjunctival abscess. All patients responded well to anti-TB treatment, but visual outcome was variable.
CONCLUSIONS: This review shows the diverse entity of ocular TB spectrum in an endemic area. Good clinical response to anti-tuberculous therapy supported the presumed diagnosis of ocular TB in majority of the cases.
METHODS: Records of patients treated from 2009 to 2016 were analysed retrospectively. Data from the records were indexed based on age, gender, clinical presentations, symptom duration, clinical signs and mycological growth.
RESULTS: Of 80 samples, 27 (33.75 per cent) had fungal growth. Sixteen patients were classified as having non-invasive fungal rhinosinusitis and 11 as having invasive fungal rhinosinusitis. The commonest clinical presentation was nasal polyposis in non-invasive fungal rhinosinusitis patients (p < 0.05) and ocular symptoms in invasive fungal rhinosinusitis patients (p < 0.05). The commonest organism was aspergillus sp. (p < 0.05) in non-invasive fungal rhinosinusitis and mucorales in invasive fungal rhinosinusitis.
CONCLUSION: There is an almost equal distribution of both invasive and non-invasive fungal rhinosinusitis, as seen in some Asian countries. Invasive fungal rhinosinusitis, while slightly uncommon when compared to non-invasive fungal rhinosinusitis, is potentially life threatening, and may require early and extensive surgical debridement. The clinical presentation of nasal polyposis was often associated with non-invasive fungal rhinosinusitis, whereas ocular symptoms were more likely to be associated with invasive fungal rhinosinusitis.
METHODS: Data for 66 adult HPVG patients who visited the EDs of 2 research hospitals between October 1999 and April 2016 were analyzed. REMS, RAPS, and MEWS were calculated based on data in the ED, and probability of death was calculated for each patient based on these scores. The ability of REMS, RAPS, and MEWS to predict group mortality was assessed by using receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curve analysis and calibration analysis.
RESULTS: The sensitivity, specificity, and accuracy for each scoring system were 92.1%, 89.3%, and 90.9% for REMS, 86.8%, 82.1%, and 84.8% for RAPS, and 78.9%, 89.3%, and 83.3% for MEWS respectively. In the ROC curve analysis, the areas under the curve for REMS, RAPS, and MEWS were 0.929, 0.877, and 0.856 respectively.
CONCLUSION: Our study is the largest series performed in a population of adult HPVG patients in the ED. The results from this study demonstrate that REMS is superior in predicting the mortality of these patients compared to RAPS and MEWS. We therefore recommend that REMS be used for outcome prediction and risk stratification of adult HPVG in the ED.
OBJECTIVE: To investigate the effect of the neutrophil-lymphocyte ratio on prognosis in non-metastatic primary nasopharyngeal carcinoma patients and to further refine the cut off between high and low neutrophil-lymphocyte ratio values.
METHODS: The medical charts of patients with histologically confirmed nasopharyngeal carcinoma from 1st January 2005 until 31st December 2009 were reviewed retrospectively and theneutrophil-lymphocyte ratio was calculated to see if there was any association between their higher values with higher failure rates.
RESULTS: Records of 98 patients (n=98) were retrieved and reviewed. Only neutrophil-lymphocyte ratio (p=0.004) and tumor node metastasis staging (p=0.002) were significantly different between recurrent and non-recurrent groups, with the neutrophil-lymphocyte ratio being independent of tumor node metastasis staging (p=0.007). Treatment failure was significantly higher in the high neutrophil-lymphocyte ratio group (p=0.001). Disease free survival was also significantly higher in this group (p=0.000077).
CONCLUSION: High neutrophil-lymphocyte ratio values are associated with higher rates of recurrence and worse disease free survival in non-metastatic nasopharyngeal carcinoma patients undergoing primary curative treatment.
METHODS: All patients diagnosed with FBPase deficiency from 2010 to 2015 were included in this study. Their clinical and laboratory data were collected retrospectively.
RESULTS: All the patients presented with recurrent episodes of hypoglycemia, metabolic acidosis, hyperlactacidemia and hepatomegaly. All of them had the first metabolic decompensation prior to 2 years old. The common triggering factors were vomiting and infection. Biallelic mutations in FBP1 gene (MIM*611570) were identified in all seven patients confirming the diagnosis of FBPase deficiency. In four patients, genetic study was prompted by detection of glycerol or glycerol-3-phosphate in urine organic acids analysis. One patient also had pseudo-hypertriglyceridemia. Seven different mutations were identified in FBP1, among them four mutations were new: three point deletions (c.392delT, c.603delG and c.704delC) and one splice site mutation (c.568-2A > C). All four new mutations were predicted to be damaging by in silico analysis. One patient presented in the neonatal period and succumbed due to sepsis and multi-organ failure. Among six survivors (current age ranged from 4 to 27 years), four have normal growth and cognitive development. One patient had short stature and another had neurological deficit following status epilepticus due to profound hypoglycemia.
CONCLUSION: FBPase deficiency needs to be considered in any children with recurrent hypoglycemia and metabolic acidosis. Our study expands the spectrum of FBP1 gene mutations.
METHODS: The records of one hundred and thirty-four NPC cases confirmed by histopathology in Hospital Universiti Sains Malaysia (USM) between 1st January 1998 and 31st December 2007 that fulfilled the inclusion and exclusion criteria were retrospectively reviewed. Simple and multiple Cox proportional hazard regression analyses were performed to determine the significant prognostic factors affect the survival of NPC patients.
RESULTS: The mean (SD) age of patients diagnosed with NPC was 48.12 (15.88) years with Malay was the largest ethnic group compared to other ethnicities. Most of patients had locally advanced stage IV (40.6%) and stage III (39.1%) of NPC. The overall median survival time of NPC patients was 31.30 months (95% CI 23.76, 38.84). The significant prognostic factors that influenced the survival of NPC patients were older age (HR 1.03, 95% CI 1.01, 1.04), metastases (HR 2.52, 95% CI 1.01, 6.28) and stage IV disease (HR 4.50, 95% CI 1.66, 9.88).
CONCLUSION: Older age, the presence of metastases and late stage are significant prognostic factors that influence the survival of NPC. Therefore, it is important to provide education to public and to raise awareness to diagnose NPC at an earlier stage and before the presence of metastases.
MATERIALS AND METHODS: It is a retrospective cross sectional study. Dental models were collected from archives of two cleft referral centers in Pakistan. Five blinded examiners scored 101 models twice at two week interval. The primary outcome was mean EUROCRAN scores based on dental arch relationships and palatal surface morphology.
RESULTS: A mean(SD) score of 2.72 (0.76) and 2.20 (0.73) was determined based on dental arch relationships and palatal surface morphology, respectively. According to the final logistic regression model, modified Millard technique (cheiloplasty) and Veau-Wardill-Kilners' method (palatoplasty) had higher odds of producing unfavorable treatment outcome.
CONCLUSIONS: Present study determined a fair and a fair to poor treatment outcome based on dental arch relationships and palatal surface morphology, respectively. Our study suggests a significant association between treatment outcome and primary surgical techniques for lip and palate. These findings could warrant a modification of management protocols to ensure improvement in future cleft outcomes.
METHODS: This is a single-center retrospective observational study in a Malaysian tertiary referral center. Children with intussusception admitted between year 2012 and 2016 were included and medical records reviewed. Factors associated with success or failure of USGHR were identified using multivariable logistic regression.
RESULTS: Of the 172 cases included, 151 cases (87.8%) underwent USGHR, of whom 129 cases were successfully reduced (success rate of 85.4%). One perforation (0.7%) was reported. Age more than 3years old (aOR=7.16; 95% CI=1.07-47.94; p=0.042), anemia (aOR=10.12; 95% CI=1.12-91.35; p=0.039), thrombocytosis (aOR=11.21; 95% CI=2.06-64.33; p=0.005) and ultrasound findings of free fluid (aOR=9.39; 95% CI=1.62-54.38; p=0.012) and left-sided intussusception (aOR=8.18;95% CI=1.22-54.90, p=0.031) were independently associated with USGHR irreducibility. Symptom duration, blood in stool, vomiting and other clinical presentations, however, showed no association.
CONCLUSIONS: USGHR with water is effective in the non-operative management of pediatric intussusception. Prolonged symptom duration need not necessarily preclude USGHR. The findings of anemia and thrombocytosis as independent predictors of USGHR irreducibility deserve further study.
TYPE OF STUDY: Treatment study LEVEL OF EVIDENCE: III.
METHODS: Thirty patients who underwent distal volar locking plate for distal radius fracture were included in a retrospective study. In all 30 patients no dorsal and intra-articular screw penetration were detected on standard AP and lateral views of a plain radiograph. CT scan of the operated wrist was performed to determine the number of intra-articular and dorsal screw penetrations. Clinical examination was performed to determine the wrist functions in comparison to the normal wrist.
RESULTS: Nineteen wrists were noted to have screw penetration either dorsally or intraarticularly. The highest incidence is in the 2nd extensor compartment where 13 screws had penetrated with a mean of 2.46 mm. Six screws penetrated into the distal radial ulnar joint and five screws into the wrist joint with a mean of 2.83 mm and 2.6 mm, respectively. However, there was no incidence of tendon irritation or rupture.
CONCLUSIONS: This study demonstrated a high incidence of dorsal and intra-articular screw penetration detected by CT scan which was not apparent in plain radiograph. We recommend that surgeons adhere to the principle of only near cortex fixation and downsizing the locking screw length by 2 mm.
OBJECTIVE: The purpose of this study was to report the worldwide experience with successful retrieval of the Micra TPS.
METHODS: A list of all successful retrievals of the currently available leadless pacemakers (LPs) was obtained from the manufacturer of Micra TPS. Pertinent details of retrieval, such as indication, days postimplantation, equipment used, complications, and postretrieval management, were obtained from the database collected by the manufacturer. Other procedural details were obtained directly from the operators at each participating site.
RESULTS: Data from the manufacturer consisted of 40 successful retrievals of the Micra TPS. Operators for 29 retrievals (73%) provided the consent and procedural details. Of the 29 retrievals, 11 patients underwent retrieval during the initial procedure (immediate retrieval); the other 18 patients underwent retrieval during a separate procedure (delayed retrieval). Median duration before delayed retrieval was 46 days (range 1-95 days). The most common reason for immediate retrieval was elevated pacing threshold after tether removal. The most common reasons for delayed retrieval included elevated pacing threshold at follow-up, endovascular infection, and need for transvenous device. Mean procedure duration was 63.11 ± 56 minutes. All retrievals involved snaring via a Micra TPS delivery catheter or steerable sheath. No serious complications occurred during the reported retrievals.
CONCLUSION: Early retrieval of the Micra TPS is feasible and safe.
METHODS: The system typically consists of segmenting the calcium region from the CT scan into slices based on Hounsfield Unit-based threshold, and subsequently computing the summation of the calcium areas in each slice. However, when the carotid volume has intermittently higher concentration of contrast agent, a dependable approach is adapted to correct the calcium region using the neighboring slices, thereby estimating the correct volume. Furthermore, mitigation is provided following the regulatory constraints by changing the system to semi-automated criteria as a fall back solution. We evaluate the automated and semi-automated techniques using completely manual calcium volumes computed based on the manual tracings by the neuroradiologist.
RESULTS: A total of 64 patients with calcified plaque in the internal carotid artery were analyzed. Using the above algorithm, our automated and semi-automated system yields correlation coefficients (CC) of 0.89 and 0.96 against first manual readings and 0.90 and 0.96 against second manual readings, respectively. Using the t-test, there was no significant difference between the automated and semi-automated methods against manual. The intra-observer reliability was excellent with CC 0.98.
CONCLUSIONS: Compared to automated method, the semi-automated method for calcium volume is acceptable and closer to manual strategy for calcium volume. Further work evaluating and confirming the performance of our semi-automated protocol is now warranted.