1. Fifty-two patients with Perthes' disease (affecting both hips in six instances) have been reviewed ten or more years after the beginning of treatment.

2. Judged radiographically, approximately one-third developed good, one-third fair and one-third poor femoral heads.

3. The clinical results paralleled the radiographic. Except with the worst shaped heads, function was excellent.

4. Certain constant early and late radiographic features are recorded.

5. Of the factors influencing prognosis, the age at onset of the disease and the sex of the patient appear to be important.

I. There is no significant difference in the final radiographic appearance of the femoral head between patients treated in hospital or as out-patients.

2. In view of this, from both a social and economic standpoint, out-patient treatment appears to be the method of choice.

1. A study of the late results of 343 soundly united tibial shaft fractures was carried out. Limitation of ankle and/or foot movement occurred in twenty-one patients (6 per cent) and was found to be the most important cause of disability. Knee stiffness (2·3 per cent of cases) and shortening of up to three-quarters of an inch (5·5 per cent of cases) caused little functional impairment.

2. Stiffness of the foot and ankle was correlated with the severity of injury, occurring in 1 per cent of minor, 5 per cent of moderate and 22 per cent of major injuries.

3. One-third of the patients with limitation of foot and ankle movement had clinical evidence of ischaemic contracture.

4. It is argued that, in the absence of direct injury to the joint, persistent joint stiffness is caused by replacement fibrosis of soft tissues. This may result either from direct tissue injury or from associated vascular damage.

1. Coracoid transplantation for recurring dislocation of the shoulder is described.

2. In my experience of over thirty cases only once has true dislocation recurred after this operation. Recurrence was due to avulsion of the bone block.

3. Failure to repair the original detachment of the glenoid labrum is a frequent cause of recurrence of dislocation of the shoulder. An explanation is offered for this failure; namely that the injured labrum adheres to the deep surface of the subscapularis muscle instead of reattaching itself to bone. This reinforces Watson-Jones's advice that the original dislocation should be treated by complete immobilisation in full medial rotation for three weeks.

1. A case of recurrent posterior subluxation of the shoulder is described. After failure of a soft-tissue repair, a posterior bone block operation was performed.

2. The distinction between traumatic dislocations with tearing of the capsule or of the glenoid labrum, and habitual luxations from laxity of the capsule, is emphasised. Although the anterior rim of the glenoid was detached in this case, it is considered to fall into the latter category.

3. A posterior bone block provides a simple and efficient form of repair in this type of case. It is free from the disadvantage of causing limitation of rotation at the shoulder joint; it employs a principle which might well merit more application than at present in the repair of anterior dislocations.

A minority of cases of osteopetrosis show in addition syndactyly and distal phalangeal anomalies. The seven cases that have been reported with this combination have had an unusual degree of density and thickening of the skull vault, face and mandible, and of the shafts of the metacarpals, metatarsals, proximal phalanges and clavicles. It is submitted that these features constitute a distinct morphological variety of osteopetrosis.

1 . Intertrochanteric osteotomy is valuable in the treatment of patients with osteoarthritis of the hip, giving a high percentage of satisfactory results. It often relieves the pain immediately, is long-lasting in its effects, and may even increase the range of movement.

2. There is no evidence from our figures that the extent of medial displacement of the lower fragment influences the result as judged from relief of pain, performance, and the patient's assessment. Movement, however, is less improved if displacement exceeds half the diameter of the divided bone.

3. Our observations did not support the view that improvement is caused by a changed relationship between the upper fragment and the acetabulum. When measurements were possible the position of the upper fragment usually remained virtually unaltered.

4. Our figures confirm that in most patients relief of pain is immediate; that is to say, the patient is aware on regaining consciousness that his pain has gone, even though he formerly had pain at rest. Whatever may be the mechanism that relieves the pain, it acts immediately.

1. A type of stress fracture of the tibia in runners is described.

2. This type of fracture, associated with "shin soreness," has not been recognised before.

3. The signs, symptoms and radiological appearances are discussed, and treatment is outlined.

1 . Funnel chest deformity is a common cause of progressive postural defects in children.

2. The underlying pathology of the funnel chest is a congenital deficiency of the muscle fibres of the anterior part of the diaphragm which allows the stronger posterior element to pull backwards the xiphoid and sternum. The postural changes are secondary to the chest deformity.

3. Operative correction of the chest deformity is described.

4. Post-operative physiotherapy is essential to correct the postural deformities. Patients must remain under orthopaedic supervision to maintain the correction obtained.

5. A series of twelve children treated by operation is reported, with excellent results in all.

1. The results of seventy-six transfers of the tibialis anterior tendon to the outer side of the foot to prevent relapse of congenital club foot are reviewed.

2. There were relapses in fifty-two of the seventy-six feet on which the operation had been performed.

3. The equinus component of the deformity is the dominant feature in all the relapses.

4. A test for occult equinus is described.

5. The factors contributing to the high relapse rate are discussed.

1. A case of discoid medial cartilage is describe—the fifth so far recorded—and comparison is made with the previous cases in the literature.

2. The origin of the anomaly, its incidence and clinical features are discussed.

3. The view is expressed that discoid cartilage is a congenital lesion due to abnormal development, fibrocartilage being laid down in mesenchyme which normally disappears in the formation of the joint. It is not the effect of arrest of a normal process or persistence of a normal foetal state. The only time at which a cartilage may be said to be disc-shaped is in the earliest weeks of embryonic life, when the disc or plaque of undifferentiated mesenchyme is present between the developing bones. The central part of this mass disappears early, and the fibrocartilage develops in its peripheral portion. In a ten-weeks'-old embryo (37 millimetres) the cartilages were shown to have a crescentic shape like that of the adult cartilage.

1. Partial diastasis of the tibio-fibular syndesmosis is believed to be common, but it is often overlooked as a cause of recurrent sprains of the ankle.

2. The treatment of recurrent sprains of the ankle by stabilising the inferior tibio-fibular joint with a lag screw is described. The method has been used in seventy-five patients aged between sixteen and sixty-five years. The longest follow-up has been six years.

Cartilage formation was provoked in the skull vault of the young rat by making multiple incisions, and scraping the periosteum to reduce the blood supply to the injured area. The hypothesis that ischaemia induces osteogenic cells to produce cartilage in the course of fracture repair thus receives experimental support.

1. In five series of experiments in eighty-two rabbits we succeeded in causing rarefaction of the calcaneum of all the animals soon after it was relieved from muscular compressing forces; new bone was generated when the calcaneum was subjected again to the stresses and strains of muscle contraction.

2. We found evidence that during muscle action pressure forces are transmitted through the bone, and that the presence or absence of these pressure forces conditions the balance between bone formation and bone removal.

3. In the calcaneum of the rabbit lack of muscular action seems to be the most important factor inducing osteoporosis. It is possible that the origin of post-traumatic osteoporosis has the same basis.

4. In our experiments bone rarefaction was characterised by a great increase in the vascularity of the bone; this increase ceased when the bone reached its final precarious bone density. Thus, vascular over-activity accompanied the removal of bone; but bone reconstruction was also seen to be accompanied by a more localised increase in vascularity.

5. From our experiments we cannot suggest that the inhibition of muscle contraction accompanying Sudeck's syndrome is responsible for this disorder, because we were unable in our animals to cause any of the other signs characteristic of Sudeck's bone atrophy. But the constancy with which we caused bone atrophy by the removal of muscle action may possibly help to explain the mechanism of bone absorption accompanying Sudeck's disease.

The principle of Occam's razor proves nothing. Nevertheless, it is possible to explain all the phenomena of severe scoliosis on the basis of a primary rotation deformity alone. The typical rotation type of scoliotic deformity can be reproduced artificially by fitting vertebrae together in an abnormal rotatory relationship without any element of lateral flexion. From this, certain mechanical factors inevitably come into play which must tend to increase the deformity. Above all, the forces responsible for progressive scoliosis are dynamic and active, not just passive. The spine readily compensates for a passive, non-progressive deformity such as a simple wedge vertebra. It is my belief that rotation is usually the dominant factor and that correction and control of severe scoliosis can only be achieved by concentrating on the rotation deformity. I am well aware that this is an old idea but its essential truth has been insufficiently appreciated in recent years and we have not faced its full implications. Failure to correct rotation invites recurrence. Conversely, even a slight reduction in rotation usually produces a marked cosmetic improvement, often out of all proportion to the radiographic appearances.

A small proportion of the total phosphate in normal bone salt occurs in the form of pyrophosphate. The deposit formed in vitro on incubation of rachitic cartilage with a calcifying medium does not contain pyrophosphate unless ATP is added to the medium, in which case the proportion of pyrophosphate is of the same order as that found in normal bone.