Patient Selection
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Pleura
March 18, 2009
Patients with recurrent or persistent spontaneous pneumothorax are treated thoracoscopically. Those with blebs or small bullae are generally managed by stapler resection of the lesions. We have recently experimented with a new device (Endo-Floating Ball) for the coagulation of blebs as an alternative to endostapler resection.
July 1, 2008
Thymectomy for myasthenia gravis, thymic cysts, thymoma less than two centimeters in size, and mediastinal parathyroid adenoma within the thymus are all indications for a video-assisted extended transcervical thymectomy.
July 1, 2008
Epiphrenic diverticuli are acquired mucosal outpouchings protruding through the muscular wall of the distal 10 cm of the esophagus. Most are associated with an underlying esophageal motility disorder.
July 1, 2008
Buttressing suture/staple lines in thoracic surgery has been shown to promote healing and prevent breakdown, especially in situations where the native tissues have been compromised. There are a wide variety of tissue flaps that have been used within the chest ranging from pleura, muscle, to omentum.
July 1, 2008
Patient SelectionThe initial selection is performed by the spine surgeon for typical indications of spine stabilization, resection of tumor, drainage of an abscess, and re-operation for complications of previous spine surgery [1
June 15, 2008
Various diathermy techniques have been proposed to reduce intraoperative blood loss in surgery. In particular, standard bipolar technology is able to coagulate small vessels, with a diameter ranging from 1 mm to 3 mm, but it has some disadvantages, including sticking, charring, and significant thermal spread [1,2].
April 8, 2008
The desire for an objective method to record, quantify, and store lung sound information was the impetus for development of the field of computer-assisted mapping of lung sounds. Techniques are constantly evolving, with many different types of sensors, sensor coupling methods, and digital signal processing techniques in existence.
April 8, 2008
Introduction