Boy grows second skeleton

Shane Terry is a 4-year-old little boy in Watertown, NY who has one of only 600 confirmed cases in the world of fibrodysplasia ossificans progressiva, or FOP, a disease which causes bone to form in muscles, tendons, ligaments and other connective tissue.

“When he was first diagnosed, I wanted to keep him in a bubble,” Kimberly A. Hayes, Shane’s mother, told the newspaper. “Through an FOP group online, I learned that I need to let him be as much of a kid as I can. I have to look at every situation to see which would be safest for Shane.”

The life expectancy of this disease is only 41 as there is no known cure.

Read the whole article here or visit the FOP website here.

Double arm transplant recipient doing well

The world's first complete double arm transplant recipient, Karl Merk, is doing well after surgery.

"It was really overwhelming when I saw that I had arms again," said the 54-year-old, who wore a sleeveless black shirt showing clearly where his new arms had been grafted.

"These are my arms, and I'm not giving them away again," he told reporters at the Munich University Clinic where he remains nearly three months after the 15-hour operation.

It took a team of 40 surgeons, anesthesiologists, nurses and other support staff to perform the 15-hour operation on July 25-26. Merk lost his arms just below the shoulder in a combine harvester accident six years ago.

Doctors say there is an indication that nerves are growing back but that it could take up to two years for him to relearn how to use his hands.

Amazing what doctors are able to do now. You can read the whole article here and here.

Yeah, but do they charge full price?

I must say this surprised me. A new survey shows that about half of American doctors say they regularly give patients placebo treatments — usually drugs or vitamins that won't really help their condition. Also found is that many of the doctors aren't honest with the patient about what they're doing. Well duh, doesn't that sort of defeat the purpose of a placebo?

I type a lot of reports where the patient will have 15 or 20 medications and never once have I come across one that says placebo after it. It seems this might be a dangerously deceiving practice to me.

"It's a disturbing finding," said Franklin G. Miller, director of the research ethics program at the U.S. National Institutes Health and one of the study authors. "There is an element of deception here which is contrary to the principle of informed consent."

I'm not so much worried about the deception as I am about whether the doctor is charging regular price for these placebos. I'd be pissed if I found out I was paying regular price for something that didn't actually do anything.

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123-year-old transplanted cornea still sees

Wow, German engineering at it's finest I guess. Well technically it's Norwegian, but German engineering sounded better.

Bernt Aune’s transplanted cornea has been in use for a record 123 years — since before the Eiffel Tower was built. The amazing thing is, the cornea still sees, though not as good as when originally placed.

Okay, if you're like me then it sounds like Bernt is 123 years old. Nope, just the cornea. Bernt had his cornea transplant in 1958 from the body of an elderly woman who was born in June 1885. Doctors told him to expect the transplant to only last five years.

“This is the oldest eye in Norway — I don’t know if it’s the oldest in the world,” Aune, now 80, told Reuters by telephone on Thursday. “But my vision’s not great any longer.”

Well now that's gotta be one pooped cornea! {source}

How much do you really know about the Apgars?

I don't know about you but I often find myself typing about stuff I really have no clue about. I know test names but may not know exactly what they're for, equipment names that I've never actually laid eyes on, things like that. I try and keep up with new things and have a pretty good idea what most of the things I'm typing about are, but medicine changes so fast that I think it's impossible to know everything.

Well Lil Sugar has a quicky quiz to see how much you know about the APGAR score. It's always sorta fun to test your knowledge. Oh, by the way, did you know APGAR stands for American Pediatric Gross Assessment Record? Maybe you can amaze your friends at your next MT Christmas party. Ha ha.

New treatment for depression

The government has approved a new noninvasive treatment for depression -- a device that beams magnetic pulses through the skull. How cool is that?

The new therapy is called transcranial magnetic stimulation or TMS, and though revolutionary, it isn't necessarily for everybody. The FDA approved the NeuroStar therapy specifically for patients who had no relief from their first antidepressant, offering them a different option than trying pill after pill.

"We're opening up a whole new area of medicine," says Dr. Mark George of the Medical University of South Carolina in Charleston, who helped pioneer use of TMS in depression. "There's a whole field now that's moving forward of noninvasive electrical stimulation of the brain."

Now how great that they are attempting to come up with something that doesn't involve more pills. Good for them.

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MT company makes Forbes list

Transcend has made the list at #19 of Forbes top 200 small companies in America.

To qualify, companies must have annual revenue of between $5 million and $750 million and meet certain profit margin, share price and trading volume thresholds.

"We are pleased to be recognized by Forbes," said Larry Gerdes, President and Chief Executive Officer of Transcend. "More than anything else, our financial performance results from our success in consistently delivering high quality service to our customers. I want to thank our employees for their day-in and day-out dedication and sense of urgency when it comes to taking care of our customers' needs."

Congrats to Transcend.

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