Thyroid nodule is a common problem in surgical practice. In 1994, more than 350 thyroid operations were performed in our department, of which 183 were for thyroid nodules. Conventional preoperative assessment of a patient with a thyroid nodule, including history and physical examination, radionuclide scan and ultrasonography, has been...

Retinopathy of prematurity (ROP), which could lead to visual impairment and blindness, is a recognised serious morbidity amongst surviving premature infants. The inverse relationship between the risk of this disease with birth weight and gestational age had been well-documented, in particular, in infants with birth weight ≤1500 g (very...

Haematuria of any degree should never be ignored and, in adults, it should be regarded as a symptom of urological malignancy until proven otherwise. Mariani et al, in their evaluation of 1000 consecutive patients, revealed life-threatening lesions in 9.1% of cases. This article is available only as a PDF. Please...

Aseptic meningitis is a common diagnosis among infants admitted for fever without an obvious source. In cases where the aetiologic agent could be identified, more than 90% were due to enteroviruses. This article is available only as a PDF. Please click on “Download PDF” on top to view the full...

Schwannomas are extra-axial neoplasms derived from the nerve sheath of peripheral or cranial nerves. They represent approximately 8% of all intracranial tumours, arising predominantly from the vestibular nerve. This article is available only as a PDF. Please click on “Download PDF” on top to view the full article.

Magnetic resonance cholangiopancreatography (MRCP) has attracted a lot of interest from clinicians because it is a non-invasive method of obtaining a cholangiographic image without the morbidity that is associated with endoscopic retrograde cholangiopancreatography (ERCP). This article is available only as a PDF. Please click on “Download PDF” on top to...

A review of mediastinal masses in children, emphasising imaging features, is important for several reasons. Firstly, the mediastinum is the most common location for thoracic masses in children. This article is available only as a PDF. Please click on “Download PDF” on top to view the full article.

The pandemic of human immunodeficiency virus (HIV)/acquired immunodeficiency syndrome (AIDS) is a global healthcare problem and HIV infection is the most common cause of death worldwide. There are now 60 million deaths recorded from the infection worldwide by the United Nations AIDS (UNAIDS) organisation, most of them in sub-Saharan...

Diffusion-weighted magnetic resonance (MR) imaging (DWMRI) is becoming essential to the assessment of acute cerebral infarction and has also been applied to distinguish cerebral abscess from necrotic intracranial neoplasm. There have also been a few case reports on DWMRI of encephalitis. This article is available only as a PDF. Please...

Septic ovarian venous thrombosis is an uncommon entity. Classically, it occurs as a postpartum complication with reported frequency of 1 in 600 to 2000 deliveries. This article is available only as a PDF. Please click on “Download PDF” on top to view the full article.

The presence of more than 2 testicles is called polyorchidism. It is a rare anomaly. This article is available only as a PDF. Please click on “Download PDF” on top to view the full article.

Positron emission tomography (PET) has become a powerful scientific and clinical tool for probing biochemical processes in the human body. This is due, in large part, to advances in instrumentation and synthetic chemistry. This article is available only as a PDF. Please click on “Download PDF” on top to view...

The past few years have seen the transition of positron emission tomography (PET) from the research domain into mainstream clinical applications for oncology. The emergence of PET as the functional imaging modality of choice for diagnosis, staging, therapy monitoring and assessment of recurrence in cancer has led to an...

The incidence of non-immune hydrops (NIH) has been reported to be 1/10001 and is associated with high perinatal morbidity and mortality at all gestational ages with an overall perinatal mortality rate (PNMR) of 86.6%. If the diagnosis is made before 24 weeks’ gestation, the PNMR is 95%, with 30%...

Liver abscess has been recognised since the time of Hippocrates. The first report on liver abscess was published by Bright in 1836.1 However, reports pertaining to liver abscess in the neonatal period have been published only since the 1930s. Neonatal liver abscess is a rare entity. To our knowledge,...

A record of Diagnostic Radiology would be incomplete without reference to Wilheim Roentgen, who discovered the rays that he could not comprehend; hence, X-rays. The day was Friday, 8 November 1895, as he worked on cathode ray tubes at the University of Wurzburg, Germany. These rays penetrated opaque substances,...

Glaucoma is an optic neuropathy with characteristic optic nerve damage and visual field loss. With the introduction of the ophthalmoscope by Helmholtz in 1851, ophthalmologists were able to visualise changes of optic nerve head associated with glaucoma. Von Graefe described glaucomatous optic nerve damage as “amaurosis with excavation of...

Radiology is riding the crest of a wave. We have superb images, available immediately in all parts of the hospital. Fusion of functional and structural imaging modalities is a reality and molecular imaging is developing fast. Modern radiology increases the effectiveness of treatment, reduces the length of hospital stay...

Headache is a common presenting complaint in the Emergency Department (ED), accounting for 1% to 4% of all visits.1-3 A significant proportion of these visits would result in hospital admissions and the associated socioeconomic burden. Most of these patients seek pain relief and assurance that their persistent headache is...

Enteric fever is a potentially fatal multi-systemic febrile disease caused by Salmonella.  Salmonella are gram-negative, rod-shaped facultative intracellular anaerobic bacteria with more than 2500 serotypes that cause a broad spectrum of clinical manifestations. Clinically, Salmonella can be divided into 2 distinct categories. The first group being the non-typhoidal species...

Thyroid nodules which can be palpated are present in between 4% and 7% of the population. Solid nodules as small as 3 mm and cysts of 2 mm can be detected with high-frequency ultrasonography (US). US has been also commonly used to differentiate malignant nodules from all thyroid lesions...

A 55-year-old Chinese woman presented to the ear, nose and throat clinic with a 6-month history of left-sided blood-stained mucus. It was dark brown with no epistaxis. There was no mucopus, nasal obstruction, facial pain or fever. She denies any history of hypertension, trauma, head and neck cancer, anticoagulation...