A reduced retroversion angle of the humeral head may predispose to recurrent anterior shoulder dislocation and may also be a factor in persistent instability after soft-tissue repair. We performed rotational osteotomy of the proximal humerus in 20 patients with recurrent anterior shoulder dislocations (10 traumatic, 10 non-traumatic) and a decreased retroversion angle of the humeral head. The mean preoperative retroversion angle was 12 degrees, which was increased after surgery to a mean value of 32 degrees. All patients regained a normal range of shoulder motion and normal function within three months after surgery. At the five-year review all shoulders were stable, pain-free and had no radiological signs of osteoarthritis.

A retrospective study of patients with osteosarcoma was undertaken to determine whether there was a relationship between biopsy and survival. Fifty-seven patients treated at the Karolinska Hospital, Stockholm, between 1938 and 1959 were included in this study, all of whom were less than thirty years old, had a metaphysial osteosarcoma in a long bone but had no pulmonary metastases at the time of diagnosis; all were treated by amputation. No clinical variants of osteosarcoma were included. Twenty-four of the fifty-seven patients had an amputation without a prior biopsy; the others had biopsies before amputation. These two groups were fairly closely matched in age, sex, site and size of tumour, and in the level of amputation; some patients in each group received radiation before operation. Evaluation of these two groups of patients revealed that the performance of a biopsy, with or without a delay of not more than thirty days between the biopsy and the definitive operation, had no adverse effect on survival.