The Effect of Gamma Irradiation on the Osteoinductivity of Demineralized Human Bone Allograft

The gamma irradiation has been used for end sterilization of allograft bones and its effects with a 25 kGy dosage on the osteoinductive properties of demineralized bone allograft powder was studied. This work carried out using an experimental method in an animal model. In this study the demineralized bone allograft powder which had been sterilized and prepared with gamma irradiation in a 25 kGy dosage in 18 hours, was used as a study group and the demineralized bone allograft powder which had been prepared aseptically was used as the reference group. 30 mg of bone powder from each group were implanted into right and left paravertebral muscles of eighteen rats, separately. After four weeks, the implanted samples were harvested with a 0.5 cm border and then the osteoinductivity of implants in two groups were compared with histopathologic studies. In 94.4% of the reference samples a new bone formation was observed. In the study group, this difference was observed only in 27.7% of samples (P<0.002). It appears that using gamma irradiation may lead to a reduction in osteoinduction properties of demineralized bone allograft powder

Association between Latest Activated Sites in the Left Ventricle and Akinetic Segments in Patients with Ischemic Cardiomyopathy

Background: It is not clear whether the latest activation sites in the left ventricle (LV) are matched with infracted regions in patients with ischemic cardiomyopathy (ICM). We aimed to investigate whether the latest activation sites in the LV are in agreement with the region of akinesia in patients with ICM.  Methods: Data were analyzed in 106 patients (age = 60.5 ± 12.1 y, male = 88.7%) with ICM (ejection fraction ≤ 35%) who were refractory to pharmacological therapy and were referred to the echocardiography department for an evaluation of the feasibility of cardiac resynchronization therapy. Wall motion abnormalities, time to peak systolic myocardial velocity (Ts) of 6 basal and 6 mid-portion segments of the LV, and 4 frequently used dyssynchrony indices were measured using 2-dimensional echocardiography and tissue Doppler imaging (TDI). To evaluate the influence of the electrocardiographic pattern, we categorized the patients into 2 groups: patients with QRS ≤ 120 ms and those with QRS >120 ms. Results: A total of 1 272 segments were studied. The latest activation sites (with longest Ts) were most frequently located in the mid-anterior (n = 32, 30.2%) and basal-anterior segments (n = 29, 27.4%), while the most common sites of akinesia were the mid-anteroseptal (n = 65, 61.3%) and mid-septal (n = 51, 48.1%) segments. Generally, no significant concordance was found between the latest activated segments and akinesia either in all the patients or in the QRS groups. Detailed analysis within the segments indicated a good agreement between akinesia and delayed activation in the basal-lateral segment solely in the patients with QRS duration ≤ 120 ms (Φ = 0.707; p value ≤ 0.001). Conclusion: The akinetic segment on 2-dimensional echocardiogram was not matched with the latest activation sites in the LV determined by TDI in patients with ICM.