INTRODUCTION: There has been a dramatic rise in the use of vertebroplasty for the treatment of vertebral compression fractures over the last decade. There are estimated to be over 700,000 such fractures each year in the United States alone, many of which lead to severe pain and a significant reduction in quality of life [1]. In the short term, vertebroplasty has been shown to reduce the pain an...

Determining the age of sharks using vertebral banding is a vital component of management, but the causes of banding are not fully understood. Traditional shark ageing is based on fish otolith ageing methods where growth bands are assumed to result from varied seasonal calcification rates. Here we investigate these assumptions by mapping elemental distribution within the growth bands of vertebra...

Objective: An image display with a standardized uptake value (SUV) scale is recommended for analyzing PET exams, thus requiring the reconstruction of accurate images both SUV measurement and visual analysis. This study aimed to determine whether such may also be obtained high-speed CZT-SPECT/CT system, further application longitudinal monitoring vertebral fractures. Materials Methods: SPECT was...

STUDY DESIGN Cohort study. PURPOSE The aim of this study is to propose and evaluate a new technique to assess bone mineral density of fractured vertebrae using quantitative computed tomography (QCT). OVERVIEW OF LITERATURE There is no available technique to estimate bone mineral density (BMD) at the fractured vertebra because of the alterations in bony structures at the fracture site. MET...

The field of evolutionary medicine examines the possibility that some diseases are the result of trade-offs made in human evolution. Spinal fractures are the most common osteoporosis-related fracture in humans, but are not observed in apes, even in cases of severe osteopenia. In humans, the development of osteoporosis is influenced by peak bone mass and strength in early adulthood as well as ag...

The vertebral column has evolved to accommodate the broad range of locomotor pressures found across vertebrate lineages. Xenarthran (armadillos, sloths and anteaters) vertebral columns are characterized by xenarthrous articulations, novel intervertebral articulations located in the posterior trunk that are hypothesized to stiffen the vertebral column to facilitate digging. To determine the degr...