ABSTRACT
Background: The jugular foramen, the bony opening on the base of skull, is an opening through which pass the ninth, tenth, and eleventh cranial nerves, two dural sinuses, and the meningeal branches of the occipital and ascending pharyngeal arteries. The increasing use of modern diagnostic procedures and new surgical approaches has created a need for much more detailed anatomical studies and explanations. This article reveals some additional features. Material and Methods: 324 jugular foramina of skulls of persons of unknown age and gender were examined. The morphological characteristics of all the investigated jugular foramina were described, measured, and compared, taking into consideration their side. Results: Jugular foramina were studied for a review of its morphology, morphometry and its comparison with previous studies. Different shapes and sizes of jugular foramen were seen. Laterality was also noticed, compartmentation was also observed which was found to be statistically significant. Conclusions: A detailed examination of the jugular foramen anatomy was performed. The main types of jugular foramina and the frequencies of bipartite or tripartite division were established. Several dimensions of the parts of the jugular foramen were measured. Some new data could provide important information about the anatomy of the jugular foramen for reliable surgical interventions in this area.
ABSTRACT
The efficacy of microbiological diagnosis in sexually transmitted diseases (STDs) has been evaluated in comparison with the clinical diagnosis. Amongst the clinical diagnoses of single STDs, syphilis, genital warts, gonorrhoea and herpes genitalis were the predominant ones. Syphilis was the most predominant infection in both the single and mixed STD infections in Chennai. Clinical diagnoses of trichomoniasis, genital chlamydiasis and genital herpes were more accurate and correlated well with laboratory investigations. On the other hand, clinical diagnoses of gonorrhoea, candidiasis and syphilis were less accurate. More over many of these cases, clinically diagnosed as single, infection, were also positive for other STDs in the laboratory investigations. Double infections were clinically diagnosed only in 7 cases as against 11 cases in microbiological tests and one triple infection diagnosed in microbiological tests was diagnosed only as single disease clinically. Therefore, the laboratory/microbiological investigations have been emphasised to have better accuracy of diagnosis of STDs.