Concept, design and fabrication of smart orthopedic implants.

Extensive clinical experience has been built up using orthopaedic implants instrumented with strain gauges connected to a Wheatstone bridge by means of percutaneous leads. This research showed the medical relevance of the monitoring of the deformation of implants as a powerful tool to evaluate nursing and rehabilitation exercises, for tracing dangerous overloads and anticipating implant failure and also to observe the healing process. The IMPACT 3500 project focuses on the instrumentation of femoral implants with on board sensors: regular Benoist-Girard implants have been modified, to contain a 'sensing cell', and thoroughly tested in vitro and in vivo. The implant deformations are measured with resistive strain gauges, and the signal is transferred to a personal computer for processing and display, via a hard wired connection, or via a telemetry system. Two fully implantable wireless designs, called Linkstrain and Sealstrain, are powered from the outside by magnetic induction. As Sealstrain contains the whole telemetric system in its cavity, the highest miniaturization was required; this seriously deteriorates the efficiency of the inductive power link.

Wasp sting anaphylaxis as a cause of death: a case report.

A case of death after anaphylactic reaction to a vespid is reported. The antecedent of the patient, the RAST and the RAST-Inhibition results and the geographical distribution of the vespids indicate that the responsible species was "Polistes dominulus". The pathologic finding supported that the cause of the death was an anaphylactic reaction without coexistence of any previous cardiovascular disease or other coexisting agent that could precipitate the fatal outcome.