Word: diaphragmic
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...Brenda's parents sleep in another part of their lavish Westchester home, the couple gambol in the percales, certain that they are in an endless summer. But a chill of guilt becomes pervasive when she returns to Radcliffe. The parents discover the diaphragm she has "forgotten" to hide, and the assault of letters and threats begins. To Neil, the affair suddenly becomes serious but not desperate; to Brenda, it is desperate but not serious. The lovers collect their severance pay-Brenda the suffocating devotion of her parents, Neil an ineradicable bitterness...
Some babies born with severe internal malformations have hernias that must be corrected surgically to save life. Surgery may also be required for adult victims of chest injuries in which the diaphragm is torn. The question before the surgeons in Boston was to decide when surgery is indicated for the vast majority of in-between patients whose hernias result from a slight innate weakness. The answer depends largely on how successful the surgery will...
...hiatus is simply an opening, the word being derived appropriately from the Latin verb hiare, to yawn. The esophagus (gullet), which carries food from the mouth to the stomach, passes through a hiatus in the diaphragm, the muscular wall that divides the chest and abdominal cavities. A hernia is a rupture, or break, usually in a muscle, that permits an organ to protrude through it. A hiatal hernia is an enlarged opening at the point where the gullet goes through the diaphragm. A relatively small hernia will permit the lowest part of the gullet to slide upward into the chest...
Early surgery for hernia consisted mainly of stitching the diaphragm to restore the hiatus to its natural, former size and putting the stomach back in place. This worked well for most patients, at least for a few months, but after that as many as 25% had a recurrence of their acid reflux. So they were back where they started with "heartburn," which became especially severe while they were lying down, and it was likely to wake them in the middle of the night. Then they spent sleepless hours, propped up in pain...
...technique, which is now being adopted by many other surgeons, involves a more elaborate procedure: stitching part of the stomach to form an internal flap that prevents reflux. Ligaments and other tissues are attached where the gullet joins the stomach, so that this junction is anchored permanently below the diaphragm...