Aggressive giant cell tumour (GCT) of the distal humerus in a young pregnant woman.

A 25-year-old pregnant woman reported suffering from an aggressive giant cell tumour of the distal humerus extending into the elbow joint. The successful management required a careful evaluation of the various treatment options due to her pregnancy. Surgical excision of the mass was performed. The residual bone defect was reconstructed with an elbow mega-prosthesis. The patient made a pain-free recovery with a good range of motion and delivered the baby at term with no complications.

Management of a pathological fracture in a rare case of Gorham Stout disease of the hip with a mega prosthesis.

Gorham-Stout disease (GSD) is a rare bone disease of unknown etiology, characterized by spontaneous and progressive resorption of bones. This disease occurs most commonly in males of the age group of fewer than 40 years and has no genetic predisposition. It most commonly affects the skull, spine, pelvis and shoulder girdle. The diagnosis of GSD is established based on the combination of clinical, radiologic, and histological features, after excluding other diseases. There is no standard treatment for it so far, and the therapy depends on patient's clinical condition and may include surgery, radiotherapy, and drugs, with varying degrees of success. To the best of our knowledge such involvement of hip and its treatment by a megaprosthesis, in an elderly lady by GSD has not been reported. This case report describes an unusual presentation of the disease of the hip in an elderly female successfully treated with replacement of the deficient proximal femur by using a bipolar hip mega prosthesis of the hip (XLO, India).

Multi-modality imaging approach to bone tumors - State-of-the art.

The approach to the radiographic diagnosis of bone tumors is much beyond the conventional radiographs in present era of multiplanar and functional imaging. Radiographs is still the most pertinent part of initial diagnosis of bone tumors, however, there are few limitations, like lesions in complex anatomy, marrow assessment, soft tissue resolution, which are important for staging. Diagnosis is just one aspect of the tumor evaluation, extent of marrow involvement by the tumor growth, involvement of overlying soft tissue, involvement of adjacent joint, and knowledge about skip lesions and metastasis are equally important for staging and treatment of the disease. Multimodality imaging like CT, MRI helps cover all these aspects. Emerging role of PETCT/PET MRI has further revolutionized the imaging of bone tumors by providing anatomical and morphological characteristics simultaneously and combining the whole body scan in same sitting. This article will discuss the role of various imaging modalities along with illustrative examples of few cases. Team work between radiologist with orthopedic oncologist and pathologist will help in deciding a road map for diagnosing and treatment of bone tumors. Follow up scanning with MRI and PET FDG scan has also been well established in assessing therapeutic response.

Extremely High Ferritinemia Associated with Haemophagocytic Lympho Histiocytosis (HLH).

Hyperferritinemia (>10,000 ng/ml) is an important hallmark used as an indicator of infection triggered macrophage activation syndrome leading to hemophagocytic lympho histiocytosis (HLH). Measurement of serum ferritin can be used in diagnosis as well as disease monitoring indicator and prognosis related to HLH, cAPS, sepsis, neoplasm and inflammatory conditions. It is a major contributor to manage critically ill patients as predicting and monitoring indicator. It can be used as acute phase response in conditions of MAS, AOSD, cAPS etc. A case study in our hospital showed extremely high ferritin values along with low hemoglobin, elevated LDH and triglycerides with positive MRSA in sputum culture and macrophage proliferation and hemophagocytosis in the bone marrow examination. Patient showed definite inverse relation with steroid therapy and serum ferritin levels.