The Musician Physician

PAGET;S disease is a chronic bone disease involving abnormal bone remodeling processes. While healthy bones constantly "remodel" themselves by creating new bone to replace old bone, bones affected by Paget's disease produce new bone too rapidly, causing fragile, misshapen bones prone to fractures. In advanced stages of Paget's disease, bone composition resembles connective, fibrous tissue containing blood vessels. Paget's disease commonly affects the legs, spine, skull, and pelvis, although it can impact any bone in the body. Paget's disease has a tendency to affect a single bone without affecting others. This is referred to as MONOSTOTIC. Other diseases which affect multiple bones are referred to as POLYOSTOTIC. A laboratory test that can help confirm the diagnosis of Paget's Disease is an elevated  ALKALINE PHOSPHATASE level. In this radiograph, notice how different the left side of the pelvis as compared to the right side. there is SCLEROSIS  (whiteness) and there is BONE EXPANSION.

PAGET'S DISEASE OF THE BREAST is a totally different disease and is a rare form of BREAST cancer which involves the nipple. PAGET  is one of the few eponyms that is assigned to two different diseases.

This is an image from the BARIUM ESOPHAGRAM that was performed to evaluate  his "swallowing tube" (ESOPHAGUS). At the top, note how smooth and wide the upper esophagus is. Below, note how  NARROW and IRREGULAR the esophagus is. This irregularity is due to the mass pushing into the lumen. You can see that the narrow section will not let FOOD pass through as easily. Because of this, the patient  becomes MALNOURISHED and loses weight. Unlike the previous case (2 cases ago) this irregularity is  quite suggestive of ESOPHAGEAL CANCER. The other case showed a gradual narrowing with more or less smooth margins.

This gentleman has described the sensation of DYSPHAGIA. Normally, when food is chewed, it is broken down so that it can travel through the esophagus (swallowing tube) into the stomach. This man has lost many teeth so he has not been able to properly masticate (chew) his food. The arrows point to the narrowed portion of the distal (near the stomach) esophagus. Not only is this part narrow, the part above the narrowing is DILATED. The narrowed segment is referred to as a STRICTURE. This narrowing could be related to inflammation due to REFLUX of stomach acid. Also, motility problems that affect PERISTALSIS can cause narrowing. TERTIARY ESOPHAGEAL CONTRACTIONS disrupt the normal movement of food through the esophagus. Lastly, tumors may block off the esophagus so that food will not pass through easily.

This is a radiograph (X-ray) of the left hip. EVERYONE can see the abnormality. This is a fracture of the FEMORAL NECK. Most people think that patients fall and the trauma breaks the hip. Many times, that is true, however, if the bone is weak (ie., osteoporosis or a metastatic tumor that eats up the bone) a patient may sustain what is called a PATHOLOGICAL fracture. A "regular" fracture is due to abnormal stress on normal bone. A "pathological" fracture is due to normal stress on abnormal bone. The arrow points to an apparent FOCAL area of radiolucency (darkness) which could possibly represent a bone metastasis due to CANCER. A CT scan was performed and no destructive lesions were detected.

This case is HOT off the press! (less than one hour ago). There are TWO types of stroke. A stroke is a sudden vascular injury to the brain. This injury could be a DRY stroke in which there is a problem with oxygenated blood getting to portions of the brain. A WET stroke is when the blood vessel is damaged such that blood leaks out into the brain. The brain loses function because the tiny blood vessels (capillaries) don't get a chance to deliver oxygen to the brain. This patient had a SUDDEN onset of RIGHT arm weakness and difficulty with SPEECH. This is a CLASSIC example of a LEFT sided stroke.