J Trauma
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Seventeen patients with deep second- and third-degree burn wounds have been grafted with cultured autologous epidermis. These epidermal cell sheets were cultivated according to the feeder layer technique as described by Rheinwald and Green. After dispase treatment and detachment from the culture vessel, the cell sheets, mounted on a polyamide mesh, were ready for grafting. ⋯ Hypertrophic scar formation was less than observed in comparable areas treated with meshed grafts. Wound contraction occurred approximately to the same extent as in split-thickness skin grafts. We emphasize that by a better control of wound infection the graft take, also in secondary-stage procedures, can significantly improve.
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The aim of the present study was to investigate if distant effects could be detected within the central nervous system after impact of a high-energy missile in the left thigh of young pigs. Pressure transducers implanted in various parts of the body of the animal, including the brain, recorded a short-lasting burst of oscillating pressure waves with high frequencies and large amplitudes, traversing the body tissue with a velocity of about that of sound in water (1,460 m/s). The distance between the point of impact and the brain and cervical spinal cord is in the range of 0.5 m. ⋯ Changes could also be observed in the cervical spinal cord and, at reduced frequency and extent, in the optic nerve and in other parts of the brain. These effects were evident within a few minutes after the trauma and persisted even 48 hr after the extremity injury. It is concluded that distant effects, likely to be caused by the oscillating high-frequency pressure waves, appear in the central nervous system after a high-energy missile extremity impact.