Nobuhiro Kanai

Surgical treatment of tumors in the anterior skull base using the transbasal approach.

Five patients with tumors in the anterior skull base were surgically treated using the transbasal approach, which permits removal of the tumor, repair of the dura mater, and reconstruction of the skull base in a one-stage procedure. By using autologous materials for the bone graft and pedunculated pericranial flap for the reconstruction, the intracranial structures are separated from the air-filled nasal and paranasal cavities. No postoperative complications such as wound infection and leakage of cerebrospinal fluid were encountered. The use of this surgical technique makes it possible to extirpate brain tumors that heretofore have been considered unresectable.

Blood flow changes in carotid and vertebral arteries by hyperbaric oxygenation

Hyperbaric oxygenation (OHP) therapy for head injury and cerebrovascular disease has been used in recent years, and some investigators have suggested that the effectiveness of the therapy may be closely related t o the cerebrovascular response t o OHP.1-6 It has also been shown that in the patient with severe brain damage, the response of cerebrospinal fluid pressure to OHP varies considerably, mainly because of the change in cerebral blood

Cytology of CSF and its Cell Culture revealed RNA-virus-like Particles of Glioblastoma

A 17-year-old boy, who had a diagnosis of glioblastoma diagnosed by surgical specimen and postmortem examination, was investigated cytologically. CSF and cell culture of CSF revealed RNA-virus-like particles electron microscopically, showed characteristically a variable number of large, bizarre, mononucleated and multinucleated giant cells with pleomorphic nuclei exhibiting varing degrees of hyperchromasia, coarse clumping of chromatin, and significant cell protrusions.

Clinical Experiences of Non-destructive Transcutaneous Afferent Electrical Stimulation Therapy for Pain Relief

Clinical experiences of the transcutaneous afferent electrical stimulation therapy for various types of intractable pain are reported. A total of 29 pain patients included 9 residual or recurrent chronic pain patients who had had various destructive pain treatment, 15 non-malignant chronic pain patients and 5 patients with pain due to malignant tumors. In 93% of the patients complete or partial relief of pain was observed. After the subsequent successive stimulation therapy from a week to two years and ten months 86% of the 22 patients who could use the stimulator by themselves in free of charge got pain relief in more or less degree. Only 42% of these patients, however, wished to continue this therapy for their pain relief. All the malignant tumor patients and many posttraumatic chronic headache patients with Barre-Lieou syndrome discontinued electrical stimulation. Good benefits are to be expected from this non-destructive treatment for chronic pain in combination with medication and/or destructive treatment.