Irish journal of medical science
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Randomized Controlled Trial
Non-attendance at counselling therapy in cocaine-using methadone-maintained patients: lessons learnt from an abandoned randomised controlled trial.
Recently, the authors commenced a randomised controlled trial to study the effectiveness of cognitive behavioural coping skills (CBCS) to reduce cocaine usage in methadone-maintained patients' in a clinical setting by assessing attendance at treatment sessions and outcomes in terms of cocaine use. However, recruitment into the study stopped when it became apparent that attendance at counselling sessions was poor. ⋯ Selecting opiate-dependent methadone-maintained cocaine abusers on the basis of their urine toxicology and offering them counselling as a way of reducing their harmful drug use did not prove efficacious. Attempting to address cocaine misuse within this cohort may need a more stepped approach including brief interventions, such as motivational interviewing, or other enhancers of motivation before we can test the effectiveness of CBCS in this population.
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Review Case Reports
Use of Gamma locking nail(®) in tri-planar osteotomy in bilateral severe slipped upper femoral epiphysis: a case study and literature review.
Slipped upper femoral epiphysis (SUFE) is a common condition affecting adolescent boys and girls. It is classified as acute, chronic or acute on chronic. The slip can be mild, moderate or severe. ⋯ The purpose of this paper is to describe the results of our fixation method and also to increase the awareness in orthopaedic surgeon about the usefulness of Gamma locking nail(®) in these difficult situations.