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BackgroundDisc herniation is the most common cause for spinal surgery and many clinicians employ epidural steroid injections with limited success. Intradiscal injection of ozone gas has been used as an alternative to epidural steroids and surgical discectomy. Early results are positive but long-term data are limited.MethodsOne hundred and eight patients with confirmed contiguous disc herniation were treated with intradiscal injection of ozone in 2002-2003. One-hundred seven patients were available for telephone follow-up at 5 years. Sixty patients were available for a similar telephone follow-up at ten years. Patients were asked to describe their clinical outcome since the injection. Surgical events were documented. MRI images were reviewed to assess the reduction in disc herniation at six months.ResultsMRI films demonstrated a consistent reduction in the size of the disc herniation. Seventy-nine percent of patients had a reduction in herniation volume and the average reduction was 56%. There were 19 patients that ultimately had surgery and 12 of them occurred in the first six months after injection. One of these 12 was due to surgery at another level. Two surgeries involved an interspinous spacer indicated by stenosis or DDD. All other surgeries were discectomies. Of the patients that avoided surgery 82% were improved at 5 years and 88% were improved at 10 years. Other than subsequent surgeries, no spine-related complications were experienced.Conclusions/Level of EvidenceWe conclude that ozone is safe and effective in approximately 75% of patients with disc herniation and the benefit is maintained through ten years. This is a retrospective review and randomized trials are needed.Clinical RelevanceIntradiscal ozone injection may enable patients to address their pain without multiple epidural injections and surgery. The benefit of ozone is durable and does not preclude future surgical options. The risk reward profile for this treatment is favorable.

N-myc and c-myc amplification was investigated in 27 medulloblastomas. DNA was extracted from 19 formalin fixed and paraffin embedded tumors and from fresh frozen tumor tissue in 8 other cases. The results showed no evidence of amplification of N-myc oncogene and only 1 case had a 27 fold amplification of c-myc. Cytogenetically, this neoplasm presented numerous double minute chromosomes (DMs). Moreover, it had an unusual rapidly aggressive course with massive cerebrospinal fluid dissemination unresponsive to intrathecal chemotherapy. Our results indicate a low incidence of N-myc and c-myc gene amplification in medulloblastomas, suggesting that the oncogenic mechanism in these neoplasms is not closely related to DNA gene amplification. C-myc amplification, although not frequently observed, may however provide a growth advantage for medulloblastoma cells in vivo, favoring their rapid dissemination. Medulloblastomas with c-myc activation may represent a subgroup of tumors with a more aggressive behavior.

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Two cases of pituitary abscess are reported. Bacteriological and histological findings of both cases are discussed, together with data available from the literature.