An Instrument for Assessment of Longitudinal Community Resocialization Through a Group Process Intervention

“The Family: People Helping People Project” is a community-based group process intervention involving personal sharing to confront social fragmentation in the Bahamas.

A preliminary study suggested that the family may influence gradual change in the Bahamian community, and was followed by a 3-year extension that examined aspects of resocialization in the community.

Participants reported several changes after Family enrollment, with increasing significance in some areas.

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Noninvasive Flap Monitoring using Sidestream Dark Field Microscan: A Method for Real-Time Observation of Submilimmetric Vessels

A timely diagnosis of vascular compromise improves free flap survival. The aim of this study was to determine the feasibility of monitoring flap vascular patency through noninvasive microcirculation monitoring using SDF.

An experimental study was performed in five volunteers. A radial forearm flap was simulated in both upper extremities and cutaneous microcirculation assessment devices were used (SDF and NIRS), and compared with clinical and doppler evaluation.

Conditions of venous occlusion (VO) and total vascular occlusion (TVO) were mimicked by using a cuff. The results of the Microscan SDF monitoring during VO and TVO showed a reduced microcirculatory flow at 16.5 (6-30) and 6 (2-11) seconds respectively.

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Portal Hypertension Model in Pigs

Every year in western countries millions of people are diagnosed with portal hypertension (PHT) which rapidly complicates hepatic cirrhosis and causes esophageal varices, ascites and encephalopathy.

This determines higher risk of morbidity and mortality and contributes to elevate costs for the Health Care System. PHT is defined as the elevation of the portal vein pressure gradient over 5-10 mmHg.

Common causes are: Pre-hepatic such as portal vein thrombosis or congenital atresia; intra-hepatic as liver cirrhosis, hepatic fibrosis and less commonly non-cirrhotic causes such as schistosomiasis, massive fatty change and granulomatous diseases; post-hepatic including obstruction that occurs at any level between liver and right heart (i.e., Budd Chiari syndrome and veno-occlusive disease VOD).

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Standard Formulae in Predicting Liver Volumes: A South East Asian Series of Adult Living Donors

Historically Urata et al. first described a formula, based on donor biometrics, to predict total liver volumes. Many centres have shown that such formulae have different accuracy based on the population studied. To date, no such study has been carried out in a South East Asian population.

Our primary aim was to study the accuracy of seven internationally recognized formula. Secondarily we aimed to derive a formula for caluculating the weight of a liver graft using CT derived volume.

A prospectively held database of adult living donor liver transplants between July 1996 and January 2015 was interrogated. Only entries with complete data were included.

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Prevalence of Surgical Site Infections in Non-Diabetic Patients Undergoing Major Surgery at St. Francis Hospital Nsambya

Surgical site infection (SSI) is an infection occurring in an incision wound within 30 days of surgery and significantly effects patient recovery and hospital resources.

To determine the prevalence of SSI among non-diabetic patients undergoing major surgery at St.Francis hospital Nsambya. This was a Cross-section prospective study, the study was carried out at St. Francis Hospital Nsambya in Kampala.

This is one of the tertiary level referral and teaching hospital for MKPG Nkozi University. It has a bed capacity 342 beds. Approval to conduct the study was obtained from the institutional review board prior to commencement of data collection.

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Pilon Fractures of Middle Phalanx Managed with Lag Screw and Early Mobilisation

Proximal interphalangeal (PIP) joint injuries are commonly seen in athletes and especially the pilon fractures are quite common due to axial loading injuries.

It is associated with volar lip fragment with dorsal subluxation of middle phalanx with varying degree of comminution of the base of middle phalanx.

Varied treatment options have been described ranging from extension block splint, external frame finger distraction and open reduction internal fixation. The key is in restoring the joint congruity with early controlled mobilisation thereby preventing joint stiffness or deformity.

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Prosthetic Reconstruction of Auricular Defects with an Adhesive-Retained Epithesis: A Clinical Report

Craniofacial implants have been widely used for the long-term retention of ear epithesis. However, previous surgical failures and patient preferences may contraindicate the implantation in some cases.

This clinical report presents the prosthetic reconstruction of auricular defects without implant anchorage. An adhesive-retained ear epithesis was designed for two patients.

The margins of epitheses were sealed by using tissue adhesives; this along with the mechanical support of tissue undercuts promoted the retention of epitheses. Patients were clinically evaluated during follow-ups at 1, 3, and 6 months; they had no complaints and were satisfied with their appearance.

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Cadherin Expression in the Nigerian and United Kingdom Breast Cancer Cases: A Comparison of Clinicopathological and Prognostic Characteristics

The expression of the cadherins have been shown to have both clinicopathological and prognostic significance in breast cancer from different ethnic populations.

However, the clinicopathological and prognostic significance of the cadherins expression in Nigerian breast cancer (BC) have hitherto not been determined.

The aim of this study was therefore to describe the expression patterns of E- and P-cadherin in Nigerian and United Kingdom (UK) BC cases and to compare the clinicopathological and prognostic significance of the cadherins between the two cohorts.

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Calculating Additional Risk of Concomitant Laparoscopic Surgery in Living Kidney Donors

During the evaluation of a donor candidate for living kidney donation, occasionally a concomitant benign abdominal disease is diagnosed. Combining organ donation and surgical treatment of that disease could be beneficial to the donor.

This paper quantified the additional risk to the donor if the two operations were combined. Study design: The clinical database of 155 academic medical centers and affiliated hospitals of University HealthSystem Consortium was used to predict the minimum expected surgical risk of a combined laparoscopic cholecystectomy and laparoscopic donor nephrectomy.

Results: Our model predicted that a minimum of 8.64% of patients undergoing laparoscopic cholecystectomy at the same time as a donor nephrectomy would experience at least one complication. This represents an increase of 2.3% (relative risk=1.24) from the 6.34% risk for patients undergoing only the cholecystectomy.

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