BackgroundInjuries to the acromioclavicular (AC) joint are one of the most common among sporting injuries of the upper extremity. Several studies investigated different treatment options comparing surgical and non-surgical treatment, and type of operative interventions. This study aims to evaluate treatment decisions regarding injuries of the AC joint and to compare different treatment strategies depending on the specific training of the treating physician.MethodsWe performed a nationwide survey by contacting different experienced physicians and sending them questionnaires. The questionnaire included 37 questions that assessed preferred treatment strategies in AC joint injuries. We addressed different surgical and nonsurgical options as well as level of experience and factors that might influence the decision on treatment strategy. The physicians were stratified according to their training into general surgeons (group trauma associated) and orthopedic surgeons (orthopedic associated). The AC joint lesions were categorized according to the widely used Rockwood classification.ResultsThis study analyses 96 questionnaires. We included 46 (47.9%) colleagues in group trauma and 50 (52.1%) in group orthopedics. Most of the colleagues (98.9%) prefer non-operative treatment of type I and type II AC lesions. Similarly, 96.8% agree on surgical treatment of types IV, V, and VI lesions. The treatment of type III lesions is performed in 41.6% of cases non-operatively and in 58.4% of cases surgically. Trauma-associated colleagues are 3.4 times more likely to treat AC lesions with a hook plate compared to orthopedic-associated colleagues (p = 0.05). In decreasing order, the most commonly used non-surgical technique is sling immobilization (63.7%), and the most commonly performed surgical treatment is the hook plate (41.1%) in treating type III injuries.ConclusionThis study shows a distinct difference in treatment of AC joint injuries depending on the training of the physician. Further, the need for high-quality studies arises to define the optimal treatment of type III lesions.

The provisioning of remote and composed services in support of various application areas has dramatically increased over recent times. Thus, the concept of Grids has evolved, in the sense of a common platform for electronic service provisioning in multi-domain environments. While, traditionally, Grids have seen a quite static existence, many new service compositions have to take place on-demand and for certain periods of time only. To tackle those issues the concept of Virtual Organizations (VO) delivers a highly suitable representation of such dynamic Grids. However, one important open problem at this stage is the lack of applicable, distributed, and efficient accounting schemes for commercial resource and service consumptions. Even for simple management purposes, e.g., sampling or archiving, this functionality is essential.Therefore, a comprehensive model for Grid accounting has been developed and suitable accountable units have been defined, in which an underlying activity-and resource-based accounting model covers economic cost theory. Furthermore, this work is based on a service model proposed for service provisioning in dynamic VOs, overcoming the typically static nature of traditional Grids.

When considering mobile or nomadic users of commercial grid services, today's grids have to be reflected with regard to potential functional extensions needed, as well as emerging consequences on business modeling. In-line with a formalized investigation of such mobile grids, the concept of a mobile dynamic virtual organization (MDVO) is introduced, and relevant potentials are illustrated by means of a business scenario in e-health and tourism.

One-and two-dimensional barcodes have become very popular in past years and are widely used to identify products as well as services. Recently, 2D barcodes, like QR codes, are also used to optically transfer a dedicated hyperlink. All 2D barcodes share one major limitation: the storage capacity. To overcome that, time can be introduced as a third dimension. Instead of one, a sequence of barcodes is used to transfer a larger amount of data. The main goal of the present work was to design, implement, and especially evaluate the entire workflow for such a QR codebased, three-dimensional (3D) transmission system on the receiver side, such as a SmartPhone, being able to "read" from a sender, represented by a screen. The steps comprise the capturing of the 3D barcode, the recognition and reading of the sequence of 2D barcodes, and the final retrieval of the original content. Furthermore, adversarial conditions had to be identified, tested, and documented in detail. The prototype achieves a theoretical throughput of 12,288 Byte for 30 seconds transmission intervals, which results in approximately 3,280 bit/s. Future work may focus on increasing the throughput of the system as well as the transmission reliability by applying error detection and correction techniques.

Skeletal involvement is a relatively common complication of human brucellosis. Muscle infection and particularly psoas abcess is rarely reported and always secondary to spondylitis. We report here a case of brucellar abscesses in both psoas and right gluteal and posterior thigh muscles occurring without any skeletal, renal or bowel lesion.