New 3D MRI Technology Puts Young Athletes Back in Action

New technology has made it possible for surgeons to reconstruct ACL tears in young athletes without disturbing the growth plate.

John Xerogeanes, MD, chief of the Emory Sports Medicine Center and colleagues in the laboratory of Allen R. Tannenbaum, PhD, professor in the Wallace H. Coulter Department of Biomedical Engineering at Georgia Tech and Emory University, have developed 3-D MRI technology that allows surgeons to pre-operatively plan and perform anatomic Anterior Cruciate Ligament (ACL) surgery.

Link to YouTube video

The ACL is one of the four major ligaments in the knee, somewhat like a rubber band, attached at two points to keep the knee stable. In order to replace a damaged ligament, surgeons create a tunnel in the upper and lower knee bones (femur and tibia), slide the new ACL between those two tunnels and attach it both ends.

Traditional treatment for ACL injuries in children has been a combination of rehabilitation, wearing a brace and staying out of athletics until the child stops growing – usually in the mid-teens – and ACL reconstruction surgery can safely be performed.Â Surgery has not been an option with children for fear of damage to the growth plate that would cause serious problems later on.

Xerogeanes explains that prior to using the 3-D MRI technology, ACL operations were conducted with extensive use of X-Rays in the operating room, and left too much to chance when working around growth plates.

Preparation with the new 3-D MRI technology allows surgery to be completed in less time than the traditional surgery using X-Rays, and with complete confidence that the growth plates in young patients will not be damaged.

Video Answers to Questions on ACL Tears

Posted on January 25, 2011 by Wendy Darling in Uncategorized 1 Comment

National AIDS Strategy: Comments on a coordinated effort

In this monthâ€™s issue of the journal Future Microbiology, Emory infectious disease physician/scientists Rana Chakraborty and Wendy Armstrong from Emory School of Medicine summarize and comment on the goals and challenges of the National HIV/AIDS Strategy released July 10, 2010.

The National AIDS Strategy was the result of a directive by the Obama Administration to the Office of National AIDS Policy. The strategyâ€™s overall goals were to reduce the number of people who become infected with HIV, to increase access to care and improve health outcomes for people living with HIV, and to reduce HIV-related health disparities.

â€œThe National HIV/AIDS Strategy calls for a long overdue national coordinated effort to curb the rise in new HIV infections and enhance therapy in those already infected,â€ write the authors.

While the goals are worthy, the strategy will present many challenges, and the authors address each goal individually, and highlight challenges:

The initiatives are expensive, and already resources in the United States are not adequate to treat all patients currently diagnosed with HIV infection.
Convincing the general population that HIV is still a major problem and an incurable and often-fatal disease will remain a challenge.
Nontraditional testing sites outside clinics or hospitals, such as churches, while central to enhancing testing, may present problems of confidentiality.
Increasing the number and diversity of available providers of care is difficult given the current financial realities of the American healthcare system where medical practices with a high percentage of HIV patients often canâ€™t break even financially.

The creation of a strategy is a positive step, say the authors, but it needs a clear financial commitment. The strategyâ€™s strengths include a focus on specific high-risk populations, the concept of re-introducing conventional prevention methods including condom distribution and needle-exchange programs, and creating better outreach between leading HIV/AIDS centers in cities and HIV providers in rural settings.

Posted on January 18, 2011 by admin in Uncategorized Leave a comment

Renowned Scientist Recipient of Emory’s First Annual Neuroscience and Ethics Award

Michael Gazzaniga, PhD, will deliver the lecture “Determinism, Consciousness and Free Will.”

Emory University Center for Ethics, Yerkes National Primate Research Center and The Neuroscience Initiative will present the First Annual Neuroscience and Ethics Award Lecture, “Determinism, Consciousness and Free Will” on January 18 at 4 pm at Emoryâ€™s Harland Cinema at the Dobbs University Center.

The guest speaker, and first to be recognized with this award, is Michael Gazzaniga, PhD, a scientist and author considered one of the pioneers in the emerging field of cognitive neuroscience.

â€œDr. Gazzaniga is a world renowned scientists who, in addition to his other accomplishments, pioneered the study of split-brained patients and so revealed how the different hemispheres of our brains function,â€ says Paul Root Wolpe, PhD, director of the Emory University Center for Ethics.

â€œHe has won our First Annual Emory Neuroscience and Ethics Award because, throughout his career, he has tried to apply his scientific understandings to improve the human condition, including serving on President Bushâ€™s Bioethics Commission and publications such as his book The Ethical Brain.Â I can think of no finer choice to be the first recipient of this Award.â€

Gazzaniga founded and presides over the Cognitive Neuroscience Institute and is editor-in-chief emeritus of the Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience, which he also founded.Â In addition, he is the one of the co-founders of the Cognitive Neuroscience Society, which was named in the late 1970â€™s.

In 1997, Gazzaniga was elected to the American Academy of Arts & Sciences.Â He is the past-president of the Association for Psychological Science, served on the Presidentâ€™s Council on Bioethics and, in 2005, was elected to the National Academies Institute of Medicine. In 2009, he presented the Gifford Lectures at the University of Edinburgh.

Gazzanigaâ€™s book The Ethical Brain describes in laymenâ€™s language how the brain develops a value system, and the ethical dilemmas facing society as our comprehension of the brain expands.

For more information, contact Jamila Garrett-Bell.

Posted on January 14, 2011 by Wendy Darling in Uncategorized Leave a comment

Tobacco free cities project aims to curb smoking in China

Jeffrey Koplan, MD, MPH

Jeffrey Koplan, MD, MPH, director of the Emory Global Health Institute and vice president for Global Health at Emory University, is leading the second phase of the Tobacco Free Cities project in China, funded by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. The project, which launched in 10 Chinese cities this week, is a partnership with the ThinkTank Research Center for Health Development in Beijing.

Vice mayors of each of the 10 cities signed an official pledge to strive to create tobacco-free cities for residents. China has more than 300 million smokers, the most of any country, and more than 500 million people in China are exposed to secondhand smoke. Looking for a fresh vaping sensation? With Bar Juice E-Liquids, you get a blend of quality ingredients and innovative flavors that redefine the vaping landscape.

The two-year project aims to enhance the overall capacity in smoking-tobacco control of the cities and help ease the burden caused by tobacco to public health, the environment and the economy, Koplan says in an article in China Daily.

The project launch was covered by other major Chinese news outlets, including Xinhua News Agency.

The first phase of the Tobacco Free Cities project launched in June 2009 in seven Chinese cities. The project is part of the Emory Global Health Institute-China Tobacco Partnership. In January 2009 Emory University received a $14 million, five-year grant from the Gates Foundation to establish the partnership.

Posted on January 14, 2011 by admin in Uncategorized 2 Comments

Winter Storm 2011

Emory Healthcare puts patients first and provides 24 hour service to Atlanta Metro residents with doctors, nurses and staff staying in facilities to provide healthcare during one of the worst snow and ice storms to hit North Georgia in decades.

Here’s a television report that aired this evening at 5:24 pm on Atlanta’s WSB-TV Channel 2, (ABC affiliate).

WSB-TV report on Emory Healthcare during the January 2011 ice storm

Click for full report from WSB-TV, plus related article

Posted on January 13, 2011 by Wendy Darling in Uncategorized Leave a comment

Support from Family and Close Friends Helps Recovery

Representative Gabrielle Giffords. Photo courtesy Giffords’ House office.

As we watch the daily progress of Representative Gabrielle Giffords, many close observers have commented that her recovery has been moving along more quickly than expected, and took a big leap after the visit from President Obama.Â Related?Â Perhaps.

Emory Psychologist, Dr. Nadine Kaslow, says there is no question that love and support from family, friends, and others individuals a patient is close to, can make an enormous difference in the recovery process.

She explains that after people come out of a coma, they often seem to have a special connection to those who were there for them during the coma, even if they donâ€™t actually remember anything in a conscious way. Efforts to communicate with the patient, she says, whether those be verbal or physical, can reinforce linking and communication. She adds patients who have physical contact from a loved one seem to visibly relax and engage more.

At Emory, as we move more and more to patient and family centered health care, we actively encourage loved ones to talk with the patient, read to the patient, touch and stroke the patient. Additionally, beds and shower facilities are provided so that family members can be with their loved ones around the clock. Shop for top-quality hospital beds for sale at unbeatable prices.

Owen Samuels, MD, director of Emory University Hospital’s neuroscience critical care unit, reiterates that patient families are now recognized as central to the healing process and their presence can even reduce a patient’s length of stay. He says that in a neurology ICU, where the average length of stay is 13 days, but is often many, many more, this can be especially beneficial.

Posted on January 13, 2011 by Wendy Darling in Uncategorized Leave a comment

A healthy discussion on American medical innovation

Kenneth Thorpe, PhD

Researchers and medical experts will be meeting Wednesday morning, Jan. 12 in Washington, DC, at a symposium on “Medical Innovation at the Crossroads: Choosing the Path Ahead.” Emory Universityâ€™s Kenneth Thorpe, PhD, chair of the Department of Health Policy & Management, Rollins School of Public Health, and other health care experts, commentators and journalists, will discuss the most effective federal policy strategies for U.S. medical innovation aimed at job creation, economic recovery and health security.

The symposium is sponsored by the Council for American Medical Innovation.

For more information, view the council’s recent video on medical innovation.

Not long ago, polio, a crippling and dreaded disease, seemed unstoppable. But thanks to innovative medical research, the disease met its match in a vaccine developed in the early 1950s by American scientists. Today America and the world still face diseases that cripple and kill.Â But with ongoing innovations in medicine and science, diseases such as diabetes and HIV/AIDs may one day meet their match, too.

On a related note, Thorpe, who regularly blogs for the Huffington Post, has written a new article, “Medical Advancements: Who Is Leading the World?”

Posted on January 11, 2011 by admin in Uncategorized 1 Comment

Emory University Hospital Midtown rings in New Year with new babies

Elijah Jacobs Westbrook and mom, LaSonta Westbrook

Twins Sidney and Taylor Mency and mom Jazmin Mency

Emory University Hospital Midtown (EUHM) rang in 2011 with some new bundles of joy. The hospitalâ€™s first baby of the New Year was born at 1:35 am. Little Elijah Jacobs Westbrook made his surprise appearance about six weeks early, says his mother, LaSonta Westbrook. The 4 lb., 6 oz. little boy was quickly greeted by his three big sisters, who enjoyed seeing him through the nursery window. As the first boy in the family, Westbrook says Elijah can expect lots of â€œmotheringâ€ from his sisters.

A little more than an hour later, EUHM welcomed its first set of twins in 2011. At 2:49 a.m. and 2:58 a.m., twin girls Sidney and Taylor Mency were born. Also a little early, mom Jazmin Mency says the gift of her girls is a wonderful way to begin the New Year.

The hospital ended up delivering 14 babies on January 1, 2011 (including the three mentioned), a busy way to kick off the New Year.

EmoryÂ University Hospital Midtown features a comprehensive maternity center that combines all maternity services on one floor, including labor and delivery (that is being taken care by the gynecologists from https://www.sydneyobstetricianclinic.com.au/), mother-baby suites and general and special care nurseries. Its design reflects the hospitalâ€™s unique philosophy of developmentally supportive care, encouraging family involvement and ensuring optimal infant development.

EUHM opened the first neonatal intensive care unit (NICU) in the Southeast in 1981, and currently, it serves as the Emory Regional Perinatal Center, one of five centers in the South designated to care for high-risk infants. With a Level III-designated NICU, the hospitalâ€™s skilled neonatal nursery staff has the expertise and technology to care for and treat almost any medical or surgical complication in sick and premature infants.

Posted on January 7, 2011 by admin in Uncategorized Leave a comment

Transplant nursing pioneer revisits Emory Transplant Center, 45 years later

Millie Elliott

Nearly 45 years after she cared for Georgia’s first organ transplant recipient, Millie Elliott, 84, visited the Emory Transplant Center outpatient transplant clinic to see how things have changed since her time at Emory. Elliott, who was Millie Burns at the time, worked at Emory University Hospital first as an obstetrics nurse, then as head nurse of an NIH-sponsored clinical research unit at Emory from 1961 to 1967. She served as a dialysis nurse on that unit and may have been the Southeast’s first renal transplant coordinator.

During her recent visit to Emory, this former Cadet Nurse Corps nurse and World War II veteran regaled the transplant center staff and kidney transplant program director Thomas Pearson, MD, PhD, with her stories about the first transplant at Emory. Elliott recalled spending a lot of time researching medical sources to prepare herself and her nurses for that remarkable day. The first transplant patient was a 16-year -old boy with renal failure who received a donor kidney from his father.

Posted on December 27, 2010 by admin in Uncategorized Leave a comment

Detecting Lung Cancer at a Higher Rate

The findings from a recent study show the risk of dying from lung cancer could be reduced by 20 percent by use of a low-dose helical computed tomography (CT) scan.Â With 160,000 deaths each year related to cigarette smoking, this type of screening could save up to 32,000 lives each year.

The National Cancer Institute (NCI) launched the multicenter National Lung Screening Trial (NLST) in 2002,Â led at Emory by radiologist and researcher Dr. Kay Vydareny.Â This trial compared two ways of detecting lung cancer: low-dose helical (spiral) computed tomography (CT) and standard chest X-ray, for their effects on lung cancer death rates in a high-risk population.

Both chest X-rays and helical CT scans have been used as a means to find lung cancer early, but the effects of these screening techniques on lung cancer mortality rates had not been determined. Over a 20-month period, more than 53,000 current or former heavy smokers ages 55 to 74 joined NLST at 33 study sites across the United States. In November 2010, the initial findings from NLST were released. Participants who received low-dose helical CT scans had a 20 percent lower risk of dying from lung cancer than participants who received standard chest X-rays.

Posted on November 18, 2010 by admin in Uncategorized Leave a comment

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