A 24-year old female was admitted with multiple discharging sternal sinuses involving the whole sternum. The cultures grew Mycobacterium tuberculosis. The chest computed tomography (CT) (Figs. 1 and 2) showed the complete destruction of the sternum and paraspinal collection. Triple antituberculosis treatment, surgical drainage of the sternal and spinal abscess and adequate nutrition resulted in...

The sternum is one of the most important and characteristic skeletal elements in living birds, highly adapted for flight and showing a diverse range of morphologies. New exceptional material of young juvenile specimens from the Early Cretaceous Jehol Group in northeastern China reveals the unique sequence of development in the sternum of Enantiornithes, the dominant clade of Cretaceous birds. W...

Injuries of the sternum are commonly due to either direct violence to the front of the chest or indirect violence from flexion-compression of the spine. Injuries from hyperextension are exceedingly rare and will not be considered further. Nowadays many injuries of the sternum result from road accidents. Crushing injuries are frequently due to the impact of the steering column, and flexion-compr...

PURPOSE We aimed to evaluate the postnatal development and the maturation of the sternum and sternal variations using multidetector computed tomography (MDCT). Additionally, we aimed to examine the roles of gender and age in sternal development. MATERIALS AND METHODS Two hundred and fifty patients who underwent thorax MDCT examinations were evaluated for sternal development and variations. Co...

OBJECTIVE Sternum infection remains one of the primary causes of postoperative morbidity and mortality after median sternotomy. We report the clinical efficacy for primary reinforcement of the sternum with a new design of thorax support vest. METHODS A prospective randomized study including 455 patients was started in September 2007 to evaluate the effectiveness of the Posthorax sternum vest ...

We herein present the unique case of a 68-year-old male diabetic patient who developed sterile necrosis of the sternum 1 month after myocardial revascularization with the use of bilateral internal thoracic artery grafts. The sternum had been closed by the bilateral Robicsek wiring technique. The sternum was removed, and bilateral pectoralis major flaps were used to cover the defect. The patient...

This article describes a 28-yr-old black man with sickle cell anemia who presented with severe chest pain secondary to acute infarction of the body of the sternum, hypoventilation, and hypoxemia with no evidence of acute chest syndrome. A bone scan performed 5 days after admission revealed increased uptake in the sternum, suggesting sternal infarction. Repeat bone scan performed 2 mo later demo...

When operating on a false aneurysm arising in the ascending aorta, protruding over the sternum, and eroding the sternum, the problems are how to approach the aneurysm and how to preserve the myocardium and the brain safely. In the present case, the operation was performed for the first time, to the best of our knowledge, safely by flipping up the eroded upper half of the sternum with separated ...

Total or partial fissure in the middle of the sternum (cleft sternum or fissura sterni congenita) is a rare congenital anomaly. Absence of skeleton in the front part of the chest wall gives rise to a severely paradoxical movement of this part of the thorax (Figs 1 and 2). Moreover, the pulsations of the heart and large vessels are clearly visible because they are covered only by soft tissues. T...