Active clinical trials for "Wounds and Injuries"

The purpose of this study is to determine if the type of surgery (orthopaedic, general surgery, thoracic, etc.) affects the level of cytokines and thus potentially the risk of multisystem organ failure.

The prescribed antibiotic for prophylaxis of infection following PRK should be effective at eradicating a potential infection. In addition, the antibiotic should have a rapid onset of action, effectively penetrate the target tissue, and be safe and not toxic to any layer of the healing cornea, especially the epithelium. Several studies have investigated the toxicity of the fourth generation fluoroquinolones on the corneal epithelium and studies have demonstrated that gatifloxacin is less deleterious to the healing cornea than moxifloxacin. Most of these studies, however, have been conducted in animals. This was a retrospective chart review.

The anterior cruciate ligament (ACL) is located inside the knee joint and provides stability to the knee. ACL injuries occur more frequently in women than men; the reason for this is unknown. The purpose of this study is to determine gender-specific anatomical, hormonal, and demographic risk factors for ACL injury. This observational cohort study will only enroll incoming cadets at the U.S. Naval, Air Force, or Military Academies. Study hypothesis: Human movement factors, including key kinetics and kinematics of the knee during a jump-landing task, are associated with the rate of ACL injury.

The military is subject to traumatic wounds of various types and severity. Such wounds are predisposed to infection because they 1) tend to be extensive and deep, 2) may affect areas of normal carriage of potentially pathogenic bacteria in the gastrointestinal tract, upper respiratory tract, and the female genital tract, 3) typically produce tissue damage, 4) may introduce foreign bodies, 5) may interfere with local blood supply, 6) tend to produce ischemia, edema and hemorrhage, 7) may be complicated by fractures or burns and 8) may lead to shock and overwhelming of the body's systemic defenses. It will not always be possible in the military setting to cleanse and debride the wound promptly and effectively or to promptly provide surgery in the event of damage to vital structures. In the active military setting, the probability of wound infection following trauma is relatively high. In the absence of rapid identification of infecting flora and provision of information on antimicrobial susceptibility, clinicians must resort to empiric therapy rather than a tailored therapy. There is a tendency to use one of the top available agents that would likely be active against the vast majority of bacteria. This leads to increases in antimicrobial resistance, an important problem. The investigators hypothesize that the use of molecular biology techniques will provide identification of the microorganisms responsible for wound infection more rapidly and accurately. The investigators will evaluate real-time PCR (polymerase chain reaction) technique under this proposal. This procedure can be applied directly to material from the wound without need for first growing the organisms. It can be used to define the total flora of the wound within five hours. The investigators will first develop primers and probes that will detect the various bacteria anticipated in a given wound in a certain location. These primers and probes will be used in real-time PCR for rapid and accurate identification of the wound flora. The information obtained with real-time PCR is quantitative so that one may judge the relative importance of different isolates. The investigators will also use another molecular approach, 16S rRNA gene cloning, and conventional cultures; these will provide further information about the flora of various wounds. Definitive identification of anaerobes can be provided quickly and that, along with information on usual antimicrobial susceptibility patterns, can be life-saving or shorten the course of the infection considerably.

The Vietnam Head Injury Study (VHIS)-Phase III is a prospective, long-term follow-up study of head-injured Vietnam veterans. The purpose of this research study is to determine the long-term consequences, if any, of head injury.

A comparative study between two groups, group I; retrospective group, 21 patients underwent hepaticojejunostomy for treatment of iatrogenic bile duct injuries without access loop, in the period between January 2013 and December 2014, group II; a prospective group, 23 patients underwent hepaticojejunostomy for iatrogenic bile duct injuries with duodenojejunostomy as a permanent access loop, in the period between June 2017 and May 2019. Primary (early and late outcome) and management of complications data were collected and analyzed properly.

The renal Doppler resistive index (RRI) is a noninvasive tool that has been used to assess renal perfusion in the intensive care unit (ICU) setting. Many parameters have been described as influential on the values of renal RI. Mechanical ventilation is associated with significant increases in the risk of acute kidney injury (AKI). Ventilator-induced kidney injury (VIKI) is believed to occur due to changes in hemodynamics that impair renal perfusion. The investigators hypothesized that patients who need mechanical ventilation should have a different response in RRI when different levels of Positive end expiratory pressure (PEEP) are applied. Investigators wish to describe changing in RRI due to changes in PEEP and to verify whether these changes could partially explain the occurrence of VIKI

The aim of the study is to define a set of quantitative parameters related to articular biomechanics, which will be evaluated during some specific motor tasks. The goal is the prevention of primary and secondary anterior cruciate ligament injury in athletes. Specifically, the validation of a new comparative methodology of biomechanics analysis will be performed, based on inertial sensors and musculoskeletal models. This way, brief but exhaustive description of functional characteristics of athletes could be created and easily used in ambulatory environment.

This study is designed to test the following hypothesis: patients undergoing immediate alloplastic and autologous breast reconstruction following mastectomy that receive preoperative immunonutrition will experience a reduction in wound complications in the 30-day postoperative period compared to a standard of care control group (retrospective chart review) of 264 (132 alloplastic + 132 autologous) consecutive breast reconstruction patients prior to 5/25/2018.

Traumatic brain injury (TBI) is the leading cause of death, disability and cognitive impairment in young people worldwide. The majority of the traumatic deaths in developed countries results directly from lesions in the central nervous system. Furthermore, due to the persistence of disabling effects of TBI for many years, personal and public costs of supporting survivors have to be taken in consideration. Many patients rescued by ICU treatment may have been severely disabled or vegetative because of trauma. These data suggest that, despite improvement in medical and surgical treatments, other factors related to trauma itself and to patient's condition could have an impact on the final outcome. Aim of the TBI-PRO project is to collect high quality clinical and epidemiological data and to describe the outcome of moderate-to-severe TBI in a local contest (Bergamo area, Italy).