Cureus Journal of Medical Science

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Cureus Journal of Medical Science

The Open Access medical journal for a new generation of doctors, researchers and patients. Cureus currently recognizes the following medical specialties.
(2)

Don’t see your specialty listed? Contact us at support@cureus.com. A
Allergy and Immunology
Anatomy
Anesthesiology
C
Cardiac/Thoracic/Vascular Surgery
Cardiology
Critical Care
D
Dentistry
Dermatology
Diabetes and Endocrinology
E
Emergency Medicine
Epidemiology and Public Health
F
Family Medicine
Forensic Medicine
G
Gastroenterology
General Practice
Genetics
Geriatrics
H
Health Policy
Hematology
HIV/AIDS
Hospital-based Medicine
I
Infectious Disease
Integrative/Complementary Medicine
Internal Medicine
Internal Medicine-Pediatrics
M
Medical Education and Simulation
Medical Physics
N
Nephrology
Neurological Surgery
Neurology
Nuclear Medicine
Nutrition
O
Obstetrics and Gynecology
Occupational Health
Oncology
Ophthalmology
Optometry
Oral Medicine
Orthopaedics
Osteopathic Medicine
Otolaryngology
P
Pain Management
Palliative Care
Pathology
Pediatrics
Pediatric Surgery
Pharmacology
Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation
Plastic Surgery
Podiatry
Preventive Medicine
Psychiatry
Psychology
Pulmonology
R
Radiation Oncology
Radiology
Rheumatology
S
Substance Use and Addiction
Surgery
T
Therapeutics
Trauma
U
Urology

12/28/2025

At Cureus, peer review is built for speed, transparency, and scientific integrity without the barriers of traditional publishing.

Structured, bias-aware review
Inline feedback (no PDFs, no clunky uploads)
Median review time under 10 days
Median publication time: 26 days

Because reviewers aren’t gatekeepers, they’re partners in advancing science.

Click here to learn more about how Cureus peer review works: https://hubs.la/Q03Z57Gq0

12/27/2025

Vesicostomy is often performed to reduce bladder pressure and prevent kidney damage in children with vesicoureteral reflux (VUR) or neurogenic bladder. But for some patients, febrile urinary tract infections (fUTIs) keep coming back.

This study looked closely at 27 children after vesicostomy and found one clear signal:

VUR during the bladder filling phase, seen on preoperative VCUG, was strongly linked to recurrent infections.
75% of children with filling-phase VUR developed fUTIs
The odds of infection were 7.5 times higher compared to those without it
Other factors like bladder compliance or detrusor overactivity did not show a significant association

The takeaway?
Not all reflux behaves the same, and when reflux occurs may matter just as much as whether it exists. Identifying filling-phase VUR before surgery could help guide closer follow-up and additional preventive strategies.

Read more here: https://hubs.la/Q03YfCMG0

12/26/2025

New technology is changing how we look at the fetal heart.
Using fetal heart quantification (HQ), a form of ultrasound tracking heart motion, researchers followed heart development throughout pregnancy in healthy fetuses.

They found that just four measurements may be especially meaningful:

Tricuspid valve width
Tricuspid valve length
Four-chamber heart area
Right ventricular end-diastolic area

In a high-risk pregnancy complicated by fetal growth restriction and complex heart defects, these same tools detected abnormal heart loading and reduced contractility, changes not always obvious on routine scans.

This study suggests the fetal heart isn’t just something we see, it’s something we can measure, track, and understand earlier than ever before.

Early detection could change monitoring, counseling, and outcomes in high-risk pregnancies.

Read more here: https://hubs.la/Q03Yfxpw0

12/25/2025

Over nine years, researchers linked daily weather data with mechanical thrombectomy (MT) cases at a major stroke center in Japan.

What they found was unexpected:

MT was performed more often on rainy days than on dry days
The signal was strongest for embolic strokes
Door-to-puncture times were actually shorter when it was raining, especially overnight and out of hours
Patient outcomes remained the same

This study suggests weather may act as a real-world signal for stroke workload and team readiness, raising new questions about staffing, preparedness, and demand forecasting in stroke systems of care.

Read more here: https://hubs.ly/Q03Yfv5K0

Do you think environmental factors like weather should influence on-call planning in hospitals?

12/24/2025

Children born with a single ventricle often undergo the Fontan procedure; a life-saving but high-risk surgery. For years, doctors have debated whether early extubation (removing the ventilator within hours) helps or harms recovery.

This systematic review and meta-analysis looked at children extubated early versus later after Fontan surgery. The findings were reassuring:
Early extubation did NOT increase re-intubation or mortality
It was linked to a shorter ICU stay
No clear differences in hospital stay or major complications

While the evidence is still limited, the message is clear:
For carefully selected patients, early extubation can be safe, and may help children recover faster.

Read more here: https://hubs.la/Q03YftCJ0

12/23/2025

In this episode of the Why I Chose Cureus: Author Spotlight Series, Professor Masahito, Associate Professor at Nagaoka University, board-certified neurosurgeon, and headache specialist, shares why Cureus has been his preferred publishing platform across 30 published articles.

Professor Masahito highlights two key reasons for choosing Cureus.

First, speed. Many of his articles were published within approximately one month of submission, enabling rapid dissemination of clinically important findings. This includes early work on online headache care following telemedicine approval in Japan, as well as research on Kampo medicine and therapies commonly used in Japan but less familiar internationally.

Second, affordable open access. Open access ensures research can be read and built upon globally, an increasingly important factor in the era of AI and large language models. Cureus provides this visibility at a reasonable cost, making global knowledge sharing more accessible.

Explore Professor Masahito’s work on Cureus:
https://hubs.la/Q03YX9390

For clinicians and researchers seeking rapid publication, global visibility, and cost-effective open access, Cureus offers a practical and impactful publishing pathway..

Want to be featured in this series?
View the recording guide and submit your video:
https://hubs.la/Q03YX9Vd0

Explore more author stories in the Why I Chose Cureus series.

12/22/2025

A woman in her late 70s was hospitalized after a hemorrhagic stroke and myocardial infarction. During her care, she developed severe thyrotoxicosis following levothyroxine administration, a life-threatening situation.

Standard therapy wasn’t possible. She had an adverse reaction to methimazole, eliminating one of the cornerstone treatments for thyroid storm.

Instead, clinicians turned to therapeutic plasma exchange (TPE); a treatment more commonly associated with hematologic and autoimmune conditions. After just two plasma exchanges, her thyroid hormone levels stabilized, without requiring emergency thyroidectomy or radioiodine therapy, and she was safely discharged home.

This Cureus case highlights how TPE can serve as a lifesaving bridge when conventional therapies for thyroid storm fail or are contraindicated, especially in medically fragile patients.

Read more here: https://hubs.la/Q03Y8hQn0

12/21/2025

Treating complex abdominal aortic aneurysms demands millimeter-level precision, especially when vital arteries must be preserved. But commercial planning platforms are costly and out of reach for many centers worldwide.

This case report shows a different path. Using open-source imaging software, AI-assisted scripting, and a low-cost desktop 3D printer, surgeons created patient-specific templates to plan and perform a physician-modified endograft (PMEG).

In a 78-year-old man with a failed prior EVAR, the workflow allowed accurate placement of fenestrations for the celiac, superior mesenteric, and renal arteries, all confirmed patent on final angiography.

The key tools?
• Free software
• Affordable 3D printing
• Surgeon-driven planning
• Less than 2 hours to print the guide

This case highlights how innovation, not expense, can drive precision, making advanced vascular care more accessible, scalable, and reproducible.

Read more here: https://hubs.la/Q03Y7RQj0

$Fixing unstable Weber B ankle fractures in patients with osteoporosis is tricky. Traditional lag screws can fail to comp...$

12/20/2025

Fixing unstable Weber B ankle fractures in patients with osteoporosis is tricky. Traditional lag screws can fail to compress the fracture; or worse, irritate nearby tendons and joints, sometimes leading to another surgery just to remove hardware.

This paper introduces a novel “seesaw” technique. Instead of a lag screw, surgeons use a locking plate and controlled leverage to gently translate the fracture fragment and achieve compression, even in weak bone.

Over 50 patients treated across three years, this approach resulted in:

No loss of reduction
No syndesmotic instability
No malalignment during rehab

The takeaway?
Sometimes innovation isn’t new hardware, it’s a smarter way to use mechanics.

Read more here: https://hubs.la/Q03Y7BzZ0

12/19/2025

A 16-year-old boy with years of untreated constipation arrived with abdominal distension, breathing difficulty, and unstable vitals. Scans revealed a massive stercoroma; a hardened faecal mass, causing a closed-loop large bowel obstruction with a competent ileocecal valve.

When re**al evacuation failed, surgeons performed a Hartmann’s procedure, decompressing the bowel and resecting the megacolon. He survived, because the obstruction was recognized and treated quickly.

This rare case reminds us that severe constipation in adolescents is never “just constipation.” Delayed care can lead to megacolon, perforation, sepsis, or emergency surgery.

Read more here: https://hubs.la/Q03Y7r350

12/18/2025

Sacrococcygeal pilonidal disease mostly affects young adults, but recovery is often far from straightforward. This large multi-centre study from Western Australia; 774 patients across eight hospitals, reveals just how common complications really are.

Key findings:

Surgical site infections: 28.8%
Wound dehiscence: 28.4%
Re-presentations within 30 days: 27%
Readmissions: 7.5%

Certain surgical techniques and patient factors sharply increased complication risk:

Secondary intention healing (OR 6.0)
Other flap procedures (OR 3.1)
Overweight status (OR 1.9)
Wound dehiscence itself (OR 50.6)

Meanwhile, clear margins and methylene blue use were protective.
Among flap techniques, the modified Karydakis flap showed the most favorable risk profile over time.

The message?
This condition may look simple, but its surgery is not. Better training, careful technique selection, and targeted patient optimization are essential to improve outcomes.

Read more here: https://hubs.la/Q03Y70Sg0

12/17/2025

This case highlights a surprising diagnostic pitfall: a patient with visibly clear cortical amyloid deposition on 18F-florbetapir PET received a Centiloid value of 0; falsely “negative.”

Why?
The choice of reference region mattered. Using the whole cerebellum (including white matter) lowers SUVR by ~7%, pushing Centiloid values below diagnostic thresholds.

That means patients who do have significant amyloid burden may be incorrectly deemed ineligible for disease-modifying Alzheimer’s therapy.

The authors stress a simple takeaway with major clinical consequences:
Never rely on Centiloids alone.
Always pair quantitative metrics with expert visual reads.

As anti-amyloid therapies expand, harmonizing PET reference regions and reporting standards is critical to prevent misclassification and ensure patients receive appropriate treatment.

Read more here: https://hubs.la/Q03XCTMY0

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