J Trauma
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Comparative Study
Femoral shortening after surgical treatment of trochanteric fractures in nongeriatric patients.
Femoral shortening is a well-known clinical finding after surgical treatment of per- and intertrochanteric fractures. Particularly, in geriatric patients with poor bone quality and unstable fracture types, secondary compression of these fractures often leads to length inequality of the lower limbs. In younger patients with good bone quality and mobilization with delayed weight bearing, limb length shortening is expected to be a rare complication. The purpose of this study was to analyze incidence and degree of femoral shortening in patients younger than 60 years of age after fixation of different types of per- and intertrochanteric fractures. In addition, we compared the results of two different implants, which were used for operative treatment. ⋯ Femoral shortening after operative treatment of per- and intertrochanteric fractures was found to be a common clinical finding in nongeriatric patients. Nearly half of them showed a lower limb length inequality after fracture fixation. The degree of the shortening was rather low and depended mainly on the fracture type. Comparing the two different implants used for operative treatment, a cephalomedullary nail was more successful in preventing limb length discrepancy in unstable fracture types than dynamic hip screw.
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The evolving discipline of acute care surgery as an expansion of trauma surgery is undergoing intense critique. As we envision this new paradigm of surgical practice, an evaluation of our current status across the nation's trauma centers is an essential step. The purpose of this study is to determine the practice patterns of trauma surgeons at major trauma centers throughout the United States. ⋯ The model of the acute care surgeon is attractive and timely, but only a limited number of trauma surgeons currently practice this proposed range of operative procedures; even fewer surgeons have an elective surgical practice to maintain key operative skills. Fellowship training programs need to incorporate vascular and thoracic procedures to enable the specialty of acute care surgery.
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An epidemiologic profile of traumatic brain injury (TBI) in Australia and New Zealand was obtained following the publication of international evidence-based guidelines. ⋯ In Australia and New Zealand, mortality and favorable neurologic outcomes after TBI were similar to published data before the advent of evidence-based guidelines. A high incidence of prehospital secondary brain insults and an ageing population may have contributed to these outcomes. Strategies to improve outcomes from TBI should be directed at preventive public health strategies and interventions to minimize secondary brain injuries in the prehospital period.
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The role of air medicine in traumatic brain injury (TBI) has been studied extensively using trauma registries but remains unclear. Learning algorithms, such as artificial neural networks (ANN), support vector machines (SVM), and decision trees, can identify relationships between data set variables but are not empirically useful for hypothesis testing. ⋯ Air medical response in TBI seems to confer a survival advantage, especially in more critically injured patients.
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Effective resuscitation is critical in reducing mortality and morbidity rates of patients with acute burns. To this end, guidelines and formulas have been developed to define infusion rates and volume requirements during the first 48 hours postburn. Even with these standardized resuscitation guidelines, however, over- and under-resuscitation are not uncommon. ⋯ Because the system can self-adjust based on monitoring inputs, the technology can be pushed to environments such as combat zones where burn resuscitation expertise is limited. A closed-loop system can also assist in the management of mass casualties, another scenario in which medical expertise is often in short supply. This article reviews the record of fluid balance of contemporary burn resuscitation and approaches, as well as the engineering efforts, animal studies, and algorithm development of our most recent autonomous systems for burn resuscitation.