Melanomas affect the foot and ankle region and are associated with a poor prognosis. The aim of the current study was to evaluate the functional and oncological outcomes of salvage surgery using cutaneous flaps for soft tissue reconstruction of the foot and ankle following the extended resection of a melanoma. A retrospective review was conducted to evaluate patients who presented with foot mel...

Cutaneous melanoma is an immune-dependent aggressive tumour. Up to our knowledge, there are no reports regarding immune parameters monitoring in longitudinal followup of melanoma patients. We report a followup for 36 months of the immune parameters of patients diagnosed in stages I-IV. The circulatory immune parameters comprised presurgery and postsurgery immune circulating peripheral cells and...

BACKGROUND/AIMS Radiofrequency ablation (RFA) is one of the most frequently applied curative treatments in patients with a single small hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC). However, the clinical significance of and risk factors for early massive recurrence after RFA-a dreadful event limiting further curative treatment-have not been fully evaluated. METHODS In total, 438 patients with a single HCC ...

BACKGROUND We sought to determine whether suboptimal chemotherapy compromised the prognosis of osteosarcoma patients. METHODS A total of 132 eligible patients who underwent chemotherapy between 1998 and 2008 were identified in our database. Information regarding patient demographics, clinical characteristics, and survival status were extracted for analysis. Optimal chemotherapy was defined as...

Background. Nephroblastoma is the commonest renal tumour seen in children. It has a good prognosis in developed countries with survival rates estimated to be between 80% and 90%, while in Africa it remains low. Method. Retrospective study of patients diagnosed with nephroblastoma who are seen at 4 paediatric oncology units, representing 58.5% of all South African children with nephroblastoma an...

Anatomical resection (AR) is superior to nonanatomical resection (NAR) in theory, but the actual clinical benefit of AR for hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) is controversial due to the substantial heterogeneity of HCC. Here, we retrospectively compared AR and NAR outcomes for solitary hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) <5 cm in the right posterior section (RPS) and investigated the risk factors for H...

Background: We compared the clinical outcomes of cardiac valve surgery in adult Jehovah’s Witness patients refusing blood transfusion to those in non-Jehovah’s Witness patients without any transfusion limitations. Methods: From 2005 to 2014, 25 Jehovah’s Witnesses (JW group) underwent cardiac valve surgery using a blood conservation strategy. Twenty-five matched control patients (non-JW group) ...

introduction : very severe head trauma cases, defined as glasgow coma scale (gcs) scores of less than 6, have a higher mortality rate and poorer outcome. the purpose of this study was to recognize factors associated with survival and 6-month favorable outcome of very severe head trauma patients presenting to emergency department.  methods: in this historical cohort study, the authors retrospect...