INTRODUCTION Primary sternal osteomyelitis is extremely rare in children and only very few cases have been reported in the international literature. CASE PRESENTATION A 40 days old Caucasian infant was referred to our clinic with a 4 days history of fever and malaise, accompanying a painful swelling of four days duration involving the lower end of the sternum. Examination revealed a 2 cm swel...

OBJECTIVE Following open-heart surgery, sternal osteomyelitis or infection of the graft may be a serious complication with high mortality rates. The recommended treatment of an infected graft is its explantation. Because of the poor performance status of the patient, this may not always be an option. We report a successful treatment concept without removal of the infected graft. METHODS The i...

A 15-year-old boy was referred to our hospital for further investigation and treatment of sternal osteomyelitis due to blunt chest trauma, more specifically elbowing during a basketball game 19 days earlier. On an initial presentation, his chest was markedly swollen and chest computed tomography demonstrated a sternal fracture and massive fluid collection in the chest wall. Since his general co...

A 39-year-old male, who recently underwent a composite valve graft of the aortic root and ascending aorta for bicuspid aortic valve and aortic root aneurysm, was hospitalized for severe sepsis, rhabdomyolysis (creatine kinase 29000 U/L), and severe liver dysfunction (AST > 7000 U/L, ALT 4228 U/L, and INR > 10). Cardiac magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) findings were consistent with sternal osteo...

Hodgkin lymphoma with symptomatic osseous involvement can have a similar presentation to osteomyelitis. Common findings in symptoms, laboratory workup, and imaging can make it very difficult to distinguish between the two diseases. Excisional biopsy should be pursued if fine-needle biopsy is equivocal and suspicion of lymphoma is high. We report a case of a 40-year-old man who presented with a ...

1 Heather A. Levites, BS Omer E. Kaymakcalan, MD Division of Plastic and Reconstructive Surgery Division of Thoracic Surgery Department of Surgery Health Sciences Center Stony Brook Medicine Stony Brook, N.Y. Brett T. Phillips, MD, MBA Division of Plastic, Maxillofacial, and Oral Surgery Department of Surgery Duke University Durham, N.C. Thomas V. Bilfinger, MD Alexander B. Dagum, MD Division o...

In HIV infected individuals extra pulmonary tuberculosis is more common than pulmonary tuberculosis and hematological dissemination of the bacilli is one of the major reasons for this to occur. Also, it is seen that in these individuals the disease progresses over weeks rather than in months or years. The most common presentations being tuberculosis of lymph nodes, pleura, pericardium with or w...