Dr. Urska Cvek, Dr. Marjan Trutschl, Professors of Computer Science, and Phillip Kilgore, Research Scientist, from the Laboratory for Advanced Biomedical Informatics at LSU Shreveport recently published two articles. “Experimental evaluation of the Elson test efficiency following central slip injury” resulted from their collaboration with Dr. Giovanni F. Solitro, Assistant Professor of Orthopedic Surgery at LSU Health Shreveport, and was published in the Journal of Hand Surgery Global Online. Injuries to the hand are fraught with multiple, concurrent injuries and many injuries may have chronic debilitating complications, if not detected early. One such example is a finger laceration with a concurrent extensor tendon injury, causing delayed boutonniere deformity formation and limited function. The research focused on exploring the amount of work, quantified by flexion and extension cycles, that are needed to obtain a positive Elson test following a central slip injury of a finger.

Their second recent manuscript “A retrospective analysis of calcium levels in pediatric trauma patients” (PMID: 34336394) was published in the International Journal of Burns and Trauma and explored traumatic injury in pediatric patients, which is a major cause of morbidity and mortality. Evidence exists that major trauma patients are at high risk for hypocalcemia, but the rate of pediatric occurrence is not documented. The purpose of this study was to determine the incidence of hypocalcemia in pediatric trauma patients, as well as to investigate any correlation between hypocalcemia and the need for transfusion and operative intervention.