Neurosurg Focus
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Historical Article
The development of military medical care for peripheral nerve injuries during World War I.
Although the clinical and electrical diagnoses and treatments of peripheral nerve injuries (PNIs) had been described prior to World War I, many reports were fragmented and incomplete. Individual physicians' experiences were not extensive, and in 1914 the patient with a PNI remained a subject of medical curiosity, and was hardly a focus of comprehensive care. World War I altered these conditions; casualties with septic wounds and PNIs swamped the general hospitals. ⋯ Records were lost, personnel transferred, and patients discharged from the system. The lack of a standardized grading system seriously impaired the ability to record clinical changes and compare outcomes. Nevertheless, specialized treatment of a large number of PNIs during World War I established a foundation for comprehensive care that influenced military medical services in the next world war.
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Traumatic brain injury contributes significantly to military combat morbidity and mortality. No longer maintaining comprehensive medical care facilities throughout the world, the US military developed a worldwide trauma care system making the patient the moving part of the system. ⋯ Patients then proceed successively through increasingly capable levels of care culminating with arrival in the US. Proper patient selection and thorough mission preparation are crucial to the safe and successful intercontinental aeromedical evacuation of critical brain-injured patients during Operations Iraqi Freedom and Enduring Freedom.
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Biography Historical Article
Combat surgeons before, during, and after war: the legacy of Loyal Davis.
By 1942, Loyal Davis had firmly established himself as a preeminent civilian neurosurgeon. With military operations rapidly escalating, he was recruited to serve in the European Theater of Operations as a consultant to the Surgeon General. Davis brought tremendous experience, insight, and leadership to this position; however, he found the military system in which he was suddenly immersed inefficient and impassive. ⋯ Others like Davis have contributed greatly to the advancement of combat casualty care both during active service and long after their time in uniform. This paper examines the lessons from Davis's experiences as a military neurosurgeon and his continued advocacy for change in the medical corps along with additional recent examples of change effected by former military surgeons. For those currently serving, these lessons illustrate the value of contributing wherever a need is recognized, and for those who have served in the past, they demonstrate the importance of having a continued voice with junior combat surgeons and the military leadership.
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Historical Article
An historical context of modern principles in the management of intracranial injury from projectiles.
The contemporary management of projectile head injuries owes much to the lessons neurosurgeons have distilled from their experiences in war. Through early investigation and an increasingly detailed account of wartime clinical experience, neurosurgeons--including the field's early giants--began to gain a greater understanding not only of intracranial missile pathophysiology but also of appropriate management. In this paper, the authors trace the development of the principles of managing intracranial projectile injury from the Crimean War in the 19th century through the Vietnam War to provide a context that frames a summary of today's core management principles.
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Review Comparative Study
Endocrinological and ophthalmological consequences of an initial endonasal endoscopic approach for resection of craniopharyngiomas.
The expanded endoscopic approach to craniopharyngiomas has recently been described in several small case series. The authors present their experience with this technique and review the available literature. ⋯ The endoscopic endonasal approach is a minimally invasive alternative to open transcranial approaches for select craniopharyngiomas. Similar to previous transcranial series, rates of endocrinopathy and gross-total resection were dependent upon the adherence of the tumor capsule to the hypothalamus, pituitary stalk, and associated vasculature. A review of the literature suggests that the results of the current series are similar to other published series on this topic.