Dr. Howard Smith Oncall

  Vidcast:  https://youtu.be/VqIN3664keY   Short Shorts are quickie reports about cutting edge medical and healthcare discoveries.  They’re worth knowing about this 2nd week of May, 2022.   Silkworms help to repair Achille’s tendons.  From UCLA and the Terasaki Institute for Medical Innovation comes the novel combination of silk from the Bombyx mori silkworm and a water-retaining gel called GelMA.  These materials form a matrix in which mesenchymal stem cells can grow to produce a strong, biocompatible material called SG that can repair tendons.  This material works in rats and soon will be tested in humans.   https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/smll.202107714   A new portable MRI device offers on-the-spot evaluations of wrist and elbow joint integrity for athletes such as tennis and baseball players at high risk for overuse injuries.  Developed at Japan’s University of Tsukuba, the car-mounted device can be deployed in the field at the practice sites to catch cartilage and bony injuries early while s