A health assessment survey was collected from US military personnel deployed to the Middle East taking part in the "Rest and Recuperation" program or on temporary assignment to Camp As Sayliyah Doha, Qatar, from January to December 2004. In addition, a concurrent clinic-based observational study was conducted to determine pathogen etiology and potential risk factors. From 28,322 health assessment surveys, overall self-reported incidence of diarrhea was 4.9 cases per 100 person-months. Disease incidence increased with rank and was higher in Iraq compared with Afghanistan. During this period, 109 US military personnel with acute diarrhea and 85 asymptomatic personnel were enrolled in the observational study. Enterotoxigenic E. coli (ETEC) was the predominant pathogen (32%), followed by enteroaggregative E. coli (12%) and Salmonella spp. (6%). These data are consistent with previous reports implicating ETEC as the primary cause of acute diarrhea for military personnel deployed to this region.

Level IV (expert opinion).

Implants available for distal radius fracture fixation include dorsal nonlocked plating (DNLP), volar locked plating (VLP), radial-ulnar dual-column locked plating (DCPs), and locked intramedullary fixation (IMN). This study examines the biomechanical properties of these four different fixation constructs. In 28 fresh-frozen radii, a wedge osteotomy was performed, creating an unstable fracture model and the four fixation constructs employed (DNLP, VLP, DCPs, and IMN). Dorsal bending loads were applied and bending stiffness, load to yield 5 mm displacement, and ultimate failure were measured. Bending stiffness for VLP (16.7 N/mm) was significantly higher than for DNLP (6.8 N/mm), while IMN (12.6 N/mm) and DCPs (11.8 N/mm) were similar. Ultimate load to failure occurred at 278.2 N for the VLP, 245.7 N for the IMN, and 52.0 N for the DNLP. The VLP was significantly stronger than the DNLP and DCPs, and the IMN and DCPs were stronger than the DNLP. The VLP has higher average bending stiffness, ultimate bending strength, and resistance to 5 mm displacement than the other constructs and significantly higher ultimate bending strength than the DCPs and DNLP. There was no statistically significant difference between the VLP and IMN. VLP and IMN fixation of distal radius fractures can achieve comparable stability.

Horizontal cleavage and horizontal oblique meniscal tears have traditionally been treated with partial meniscectomy. Recent research has shown the deleterious long-term effects of meniscectomy in these patients regarding the development of osteoarthritis. Meniscal preservation is thus the preferred method of surgical treatment in patients with these tears. However, traditional repair techniques using inside-out sutures or suture anchor–based devices do not address the horizontally aligned nature of these particular tears and thus do not compress the meniscal tissue in the correct plane. The recent development of an arthroscopic suture-passing system now allows surgeons to place arthroscopic sutures in any pattern or direction. This allows surgeons to treat tears of any type with sutures ideally placed to repair the given tears. This Technical Note describes and demonstrates 2 all-suture, all-inside, arthroscopic meniscus repair techniques to treat these challenging horizontal tear types. The repair techniques are named the vertical lasso and horizontal lasso.