http://medicalxpress.com/ en-us Medical Xpress internet news portal provides the latest news on Health and Medicine. (HealthDay)—Increases in the upper thoracic scoliotic curve, thoracic kyphosis, and number of rod-lengthening procedures are risk factors for postoperative complications associated with growing-rod (GR) surgery for early-onset scoliosis (EOS), according to a study published in the April 15 issue of Spine. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2013-04-factors-idd-scoliosis-surgery-complications.html Surgery Tue, 30 Apr 2013 14:10:01 EST news286548011 A new study suggests that surgery for appendicitis that uses a pinhole incision through the navel may be a feasible alternative to traditional appendectomies. Published early online in the British Journal of Surgery, the findings indicate that larger studies to test the potential of the procedure are warranted. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2013-04-appendix-scarless-surgery-navel.html Surgery Wed, 10 Apr 2013 19:00:02 EST news284832220 Patients with diabetes were no more likely to suffer infection, deep vein thrombosis (a deep vein blood clot) or other complications following total knee replacement (TKR) than patients without diabetes, according to new research published online today, in advance of its publication in the March 2013 Journal of Bone and Joint Surgery (JBJS). http://medicalxpress.com/news/2013-02-patients-diabetes-greater-infection.html Diabetes Wed, 27 Feb 2013 13:30:01 EST news281190108 As the nation grapples with surging health care costs, researchers at the University of Connecticut Health Center, Farmington, and Saint Francis Hospital and Medical Center, Hartford, have confirmed two simple cost-effective methods to reduce expensive postoperative complications—communications team training and a surgical checklist. Investigators found that when surgical teams completed communications training and a surgical procedure checklist before, during, and after high-risk operations, patients experienced fewer adverse events such as infections and blood clots. The study is published in the December issue of the Journal of the American College of Surgeons. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-12-surgical-checklist-costly-postoperative-complications.html Surgery Wed, 05 Dec 2012 14:15:04 EST news273939291 (HealthDay)—Living liver donors from Japan have higher health-related quality of life (HRQOL) than the Japanese norm population, according to a study published in the November issue of Liver Transplantation. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-11-qol-liver-donors-population.html Other Tue, 06 Nov 2012 16:17:19 EST news271441032 (HealthDay)—Intentionally leaving the pressure-regulating balloon in place during a non-infected artificial urinary sphincter (AUS) revision procedure is safe and is not associated with infection or complications, according to research published online Sept. 13 in The Journal of Sexual Medicine. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-09-balloon-safe-urinary-sphincter.html Diseases, Conditions, Syndromes Fri, 21 Sep 2012 13:40:01 EST news267451987 Each year in Quebec, nearly 6000 people undergo coronary bypass surgery. Recovery is long and quality of life is greatly affected, in particular because most patients experience cognitive deficits that affect attention and memory for weeks or even months after the surgery. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-09-brain-lessen-cognitive-impairments-coronary.html Psychology & Psychiatry Tue, 18 Sep 2012 04:15:49 EST news267160537 Postoperative complications are the most significant independent risk factor leading to 30-day hospital readmissions among general surgery patients, according to a new exploratory study published in the September issue of the Journal of the American College of Surgeons. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-08-surgeons-postoperative-complications-posing-strongest.html Surgery Tue, 28 Aug 2012 01:00:01 EST news265309052 (HealthDay) -- For patients with esophageal or esophagogastric-junction cancer, treatment with neoadjuvant chemoradiotherapy followed by surgical resection is associated with improved survival compared with surgery alone, according to a study published in the May 31 issue of the New England Journal of Medicine. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-05-pre-op-chemoradiotherapy-ups-survival-esophageal.html Cancer Thu, 31 May 2012 10:20:01 EST news257675383 Cigarette smoking contributes to significantly higher hospital costs for smokers undergoing elective general surgery, according to a study published in the June 2012 issue of the Journal of the American College of Surgeons. When researchers analyzed data on more than 14,000 patients, they found that postoperative respiratory complications help drive up these health care costs. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-05-significantly-higher-hospital-surgical-patients.html Surgery Tue, 29 May 2012 11:00:02 EST news257504811 (HealthDay) -- For men undergoing radical prostatectomies (RPs), private health insurance coverage is linked with fewer complications, less in-hospital recovery time, and decreased mortality, compared to public coverage, according to a study published in the April 1 issue of Cancer. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-03-short-term-outcomes-private-prostatectomies.html Health Fri, 30 Mar 2012 14:00:01 EST news252332394 Researchers at the Rothman Institute at Jefferson have shown that local anesthesia delivered through a catheter in the joint, intraarticularly, may be more beneficial than traditional opioids such as morphine and Oxycontin for pain management following total knee replacement surgery. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-02-benefits-local-anesthesia-knee-surgery.html Surgery Fri, 10 Feb 2012 05:50:01 EST news248073760 Using two cell surface markers found to be highly expressed in breast cancer lymph node metastases, researchers at Moffitt Cancer Center, working with colleagues at other institutions, have developed targeted, fluorescent molecular imaging probes that can non-invasively detect breast cancer lymph node metastases. The new procedure could spare breast cancer patients invasive and unreliable sentinel lymph node (SLN) biopsies and surgery-associated negative side effects. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-01-noninvasive-lymph-node-metastasis.html Cancer Thu, 12 Jan 2012 12:04:20 EST news245592202 Surgeons aged between 35 and 50 years provide the safest care compared with their younger or older colleagues, finds a study published in the British Medical Journal today. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-01-surgeons-aged-safest.html Other Tue, 10 Jan 2012 18:54:56 EST news245444084 Aspirin taken within five days of cardiac surgery is associated with a significant decrease in the risk of major postoperative complications, including renal failure, a lengthy intensive care unit stay and even early death (30-day mortality), according to a study by researchers at Thomas Jefferson University and UC Davis Medical Center set to appear in the journal Annals of Surgery. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2011-12-preoperative-aspirin-therapy-benefit-cardiac.html Surgery Mon, 05 Dec 2011 13:46:40 EST news242315182 In the last 20 years, due to diagnostic and surgical advances, more and more patients have become appropriate candidates for spine surgery, and the number of these procedures performed has risen significantly. While medical experts acknowledge the potential benefits of spine surgery, they also understand that complications can reduce the success in the short and long term. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2011-09-factors-complications-spine-surgery.html Other Wed, 21 Sep 2011 11:05:30 EST news235821464 The majority of people who undergo bariatric weight-loss surgery benefit from the procedure, but long-term complications and further surgery are not uncommon, according to a UK paper on late postoperative complications in the October issue of BJS, the British Journal of Surgery. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2011-09-weight-loss-surgery-complications-standard-obesity.html Other Tue, 06 Sep 2011 10:51:53 EST news234525091 Use of natural language processing, such as in the form of free-text searches of electronic medical records (EMRs) of clinical and progress notes of patients performed better at identifying postoperative surgical complications than the commonly used administrative data codes in EMRs, according to a study in the August 24/31 issue of JAMA. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2011-08-electronic-medical-text-tool-postoperative.html Other Tue, 23 Aug 2011 16:53:51 EST news233337213 The type of primary insurance patients carry affects outcomes of cardiac valve operations in the United States according to a study in the May issue of the Journal of the American College of Surgeons. As a result, the type of primary insurance should be considered as an independent risk factor during preoperative risk stratification and planning, the researchers reported. They found that uninsured and Medicaid patients incur worse unadjusted and risk-adjusted outcomes following cardiac valve operations compared with those who carry private insurance. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2011-07-outcomes-cardiac-valve-procedure-patients.html Health Wed, 06 Jul 2011 17:06:58 EST news229190793