After 5-point scoring with sonoelastography, additional measurement with the strain index is not mandatory for differentiating between benign and malignant breast masses.

There were no differences in terms of the number of patients who had malignant cells collected from the circular stapler and local recurrence rates between the two groups. Although this is not a randomized study and size and mean follow-up time of the study were not sufficient, our results did not offer rational arguments in support of intraoperative rectal washout when a circular stapler is used after low anterior resection for carcinoma. Because of the limitations of our study, however, we are unable to arrive at a definite conclusion regarding rectal washout. There is a need for a randomized, controlled, large-scale, multicenter trial to establish the clinical relevance of intraoperative rectal washout.

It has been suggested that salivary flow rate decreases with age. As is known, the presence of a thin salivary film layer is essential for the comfort of the mucosa beneath a denture base and for denture retention. The purpose of this study was to determine the flow rates, viscosity and the pH of resting and stimulated whole saliva before and after prosthetic treatment in complete denture wearing patients. Saliva was collected under clinical conditions between 08.00 and 10.00 hours. The flow rates of whole saliva were measured at three stages: (i) resting and stimulated saliva before prosthetic treatment; (ii) immediately after the first wearing of the complete denture; and (iii) resting and stimulated saliva after 2 or 3 months of wearing the complete denture. Saliva production was stimulated by chewing paraffin wax. Flow rate was calculated as collected volume/collection time. It was found that there was a significant difference between resting and stimulated whole salivary flow rates before and after complete denture wearing.

This study demonstrates that taste perception of the tongue does not change, but that there is a disorder in palatal perception in postmenopausal women. Furthermore, there is tendency to preference of sweeter foods during menopause.

BackgroundPenetrating arterial injuries to the limbs are common injuries in high volume trauma centers. Their overall surgical results reported in the literature are satisfactory - apart of those of the popliteal artery that still may lead to a significant incidence in amputations. With the present study we assessed our outcome with penetrating arterial injuries to the limb as to see if the direct involvement of vascular surgeons in the management of popliteal artery injuries leads to an improved (lowered) amputation rate. Results were benchmarked with our published results from previous years.MethodsAll patients sustaining penetrating arterial injuries to the limbs admitted to the Chris Hani Baragwanath Academic Hospital during an 18- month period ending in September 2011 were included in this study. Axillary, brachial and femoral artery injuries were operated on by the trauma surgeons as in the past. All popliteal artery injuries were operated on by the vascular surgeons (new).ResultsThere were a total of 113 patients with 116 injuries, as some patients had multiple vascular injuries: 10 axillary, 47 brachial, 34 femoral and 25 popliteal artery injuries. Outcome of axillary, brachial and femoral artery injury repair were excellent and not significantly different from our previous reported experience. Injury to the popliteal artery showed a diminished re-exploration rate from 34% down to 10% (p = 0,049) and a decrease of amputation rate from 16% to 11% which was statistically not significant (p = 0,8).ConclusionPenetrating arterial trauma to the axillary, brachial and femoral artery is followed by excellent results when operated by trauma surgeons. In the case of popliteal artery injury operated by the vascular surgeons, the results of this study do not show any statistically significant difference related to amputation rate from our previous reported studies when operated by trauma surgeons. Taking into consideration the diminished re-exploration rate and a tendency to a lower amputation rate, we feel that there is possible tendency of better outcome if operated by vascular surgeons. Multicenter studies with large number of enrolled patients will be required to prove the validity of this suggestion.