[Excision of necrotic and infected tissues combined with induced membrane and external fixator technique for the treatment of chronic osteomyelitis in tibia after fracture operation].

OBJECTIVE: To investigate the clinical efficacy of excision of necrotic and infected tissues combined with induced membrane and external fixator technique to treat chronic osteomyelitis in tibia after fracture operation. METHODS: From June 2011 to June 2014, a total of 13 patients with tibia osteomyelitis were treated with excision of necrotic and infected tissues and external fixator technique in the first stage. There were 8 males and 5 females, ranging in age from 16 to 67 years old with an average of (37.3±14.3) years old. Within 6 to 8 weeks the induced membrane was formed and the induced membrane technique was applied to promote new bone forming in the second stage. RESULTS: Thirteen patients had no reinfection and achieved complete bone healing after 24 to 52 months follow-up. All the patients had satisfactory function. CONCLUSIONS: Excision of necrotic and infected tissues combined with induced membrane and external fixator technique to treat chronic osteomyelitis in tibia after fracture operation can provide satisfactory results.

RASSF7 expression and its regulatory roles on apoptosis in human intervertebral disc degeneration.

Apoptosis plays an important role in intervertebral disc degeneration (IDD). Overwhelming evidence indicates that RASSF7 is essential for cell growth and apoptosis. Recently, it has been noted that the JNK signaling can be negatively regulated by suppressing phosphorylated-MKK7 activation during pro-apoptosis. We aimed to investigate the RASSF7 expression level in human degenerative nucleus pulposus (NP) cells and non-degenerative NP cells and the link between RASSF7-JNK with NP cells apoptosis. We harvested NP tissues from 20 IDD patients as disease group and 8 cadaveric donors as normal controls. We detected RASSF7 expression by Real-time-PCR and western blotting. Consequently, we found that the expression of RASSF7 was higher in non-degenerative group than in degenerative group (P<0.05). Overexpression of RASSF7 in degenerative NP cells led to decreased apoptosis rate than that in scramble group (P<0.05). Collectively, our findings suggest that RASSF7 plays an important role in human IDD and RASSF7 might be potentially developed as a curative agent.