In the treatment of head and neck carcinoma, radical cervical lymphadenectomy leaves the affected side of the neck devoid of the sternocleidomastoid muscle, thus more vulnerable to the unwanted side effects of the adjuvant radiotherapy. It also causes asymmetry and cosmetically unpleasant appearance of the cervical region. In the reported case with widely ulcerated squamous-cell carcinoma over ...

In a recent issue of Critical Care, Wu and Orizaola Balaguer [1] hypothesized that nociceptive head turning after brain death (BD) is a spinal reflex. We argue that it can be a supraspinal response, which would invalidate a diagnosis of BD. The sternocleidomastoid and trapezius are innervated by the spinal nucleus of the accessory nerve extending from the lower medulla to the ventral horn of th...

We report here on a rare case of lipoma in the deep lobe of the parotid gland. MRI revealed that the tumour was situated mainly in the deep lobe and it extended posteriorly and medially into the space between the sternocleidomastoid muscle and the posterior belly of the digastric muscle, with slight extension into the parapharyngeal space. This tumour produced strong signals on T1- and T2-weigh...

This study evaluated the electromyographic characteristics of masticatory and neck muscles in subjects with vestibular lesions. Surface electromyography of the masseter, temporalis and sternocleidomastoid muscles was performed in 19 patients with Ménière's disease, 12 patients with an acute peripheral vestibular lesion, and 19 control subjects matched for sex and age. During maximum voluntary c...

AIMS/BACKGROUND To examine the effects of acupuncture at the sternocleidomastoid muscles on foveation characteristics in congenital nystagmus. METHODS Six patients with congenital nystagmus (CN) received a series of treatments consisting of two needles inserted into each sternocleidomastoid, stimulated by tapping gently every 5 minutes, for 20 minutes per session. Their eye movements were rec...

[Purpose] The purpose of this study was to determine the effect of the cocontraction of masticatory muscles during neck stabilization exercises on changes in the thickness of the neck flexors. [Subjects and Methods] Twenty subjects performed neck stabilization only exercise and neck stabilization exercise with simultaneous contraction of the masticatory muscles. Changes in the thickness of the ...

Muscular echinococcosis accounts for 0.5% to 5.4% of all hydatid disease cases, with very little data on the incidence of muscular echinococcosis of the head and neck. We report a unique case of primary echinococcosis of the right sternocleidomastoid muscle in a 56-year-old man. Preoperative assessment by ultrasound and fine needle aspiration did not point to echinococcosis. We suspected the ri...