An anatomical and radiographic study was undertaken to determine the safest zones in the acetabulum for the transacetabular placement of screws during uncemented acetabular arthroplasty. To avoid injury to intrapelvic structures, which are not visible to the surgeon during placement of the screws, cadavera were studied to define the location of these structures with respect to fixed points of reference within the acetabulum. Four clinically useful acetabular quadrants were delineated. The quadrants are formed by drawing a line from the anterior superior iliac spine through the center of the acetabulum to the posterior fovea, forming acetabular halves. A second line is then drawn perpendicular to the first at the mid-point of the acetabulum, forming four quadrants. The posterior superior and posterior inferior acetabular quadrants contain the best available bone stock and are relatively safe for the transacetabular placement of screws. The anterior superior and anterior inferior quadrants should be avoided whenever possible, because screws placed improperly in these quadrants may endanger the external iliac artery and vein, as well as the obturator nerve, artery, and vein. The acetabular-quadrant system provides the surgeon with a simple intraoperative guide to the safe transacetabular placement of screws during primary and revision acetabular arthroplasty. * No benefits in any form have been received or will be received from a commercial party related directly or indirectly to the subject ofthis article. No funds were received in support of this study.

BackgroundAt present only few studies directly compare the diagnostic yield of endobronchial ultrasound guided fine needle aspiration (EBUS-FNA) and transcervical video-assisted mediastinoscopy (TM) for mediastinal lymph node staging in patients with NSCLC. If and when EBUS-FNA may replace TM as Gold Standard remains controversial.MethodsFrom April 2008 to December 2009, 36 patients with mediastinal lymphadenopathy underwent simultaneous EBUS-FNA/ TM at our institution. Among them were 26 patients with confirmed or suspected NSCLC.ResultsA total of 133 samples were obtained by EBUS-FNA and 157 samples by TM. EBUS-FNA achieved significantly less conclusive, but more indeterminate pathological results in comparison to TM (78.7% vs. 98.6%, p < 0.001; 14.9% vs. 1.4%, p = 0.007). Less paratracheal nodes were sampled by EBUS-FNA (right: 46.2% vs. 88.5%, p = 0.003; left: 23.1% vs. 65.4%, p = 0.005), while sampling rates in the subcarinal localisation were comparable (96.2% vs. 80.8%, p = NS). Among patients with confirmed NSCLC and conclusive EBUS-FNA/ TM findings (n = 18), the prevalence of N2/N3 disease was 66.7% (n = 12) according to TM findings. Diverging nodal stages were found in five patients (27.8%). Three patients who were N2 negative in EBUS-FNA were upstaged to N2 or N3 by TM, two patients with N2 status in EBUS-FNA were upstaged to N3 by TM.ConclusionsCompared to TM, EBUS-FNA had a lower diagnostic yield and resulted in systematic mediastinal nodal understaging. At this point we suggest corroborating negative EBUS-FNA results by transcervical mediastinoscopy.

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Bronchoplastic procedures represent a fairly safe therapy opportunity in patients with centrally localized bronchial carcinoma and compromised or uncompromised pulmonary function. In this study the complication rate was higher after sleeve resection of the bronchus as compared with wedge resection. Pleural coverage of the anastomosis was not effective to prevent major complications due to dehiscence of the bronchial anastomosis. A pedicled muscle flap could be a valuable alternative.