The authors present a case report of a previously healthy 15-year-old male who experienced global weakness in the presence of profound hypokalaemia following a high-voltage electrical arc injury. The clinical picture is discussed in the context of our evolving understanding of electrical injuries and potassium homeostasis.
A post-traumatic composite skin, muscle and bone defect in the left thigh with a 14-cm bone gap in the femur was secondarily reconstructed with a salvage osseomyocutaneous microvascular free tissue transfer of the tibia (18 cm), calf muscles and overlying skin (26×13 cm) harvested from the lower leg. The latter was amputated for chronic trophic ulceration of the foot and causalgia resulting from damage to the femoral and sciatic nerve in the primary injury. This situation resulted in an above-the-knee amputation stump with a better fitting and a more convenient prosthesis, rather than amputation at the hip joint.
Despite global advances in the rights of sexual and gender minorities, more than 70 countries worldwide still criminalise consensual same-sex conduct. Taking the case of Kenya, this article employs the concept of 'dignity takings' to underscore the direct and indirect costs of criminalising homosexuality. Criminalisation leads to a direct taking where it engenders forced examinations and medical tests, and indirect takings where the institutionalisation of stigma -labelling sexual and gender minorities as criminal -creates an environment that legitimises the use of violence against individuals on the basis of their real or perceived sexual orientation or gender identity. Viewing criminalisation as a dignity taking not only helps one to understand the direct effects by which the state is empowered to violate the bodies of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender persons, but also the more pernicious ways in which the state uses homophobia as a political weapon that can exclude individuals from meaningfully participating as citizens in the body politic. The article also examines the efforts of Kenyan LGBT activists to reclaim dignity by employing international human rights norms and institutions of the African regional human rights system. I argue that the pursuit of public, grassroots activism is an assertion of agency in the face of institutionalised AFRICAN HUMAN RIGHTS LAW JOURNAL 685 stigma and systemic violence, and that the strategic mobilisation of human rights norms has allowed activists to reframe LBGT rights in terms of fundamental rights to life and dignity guaranteed to all Africans, effectively countering the false claim that homosexuality is 'un-African'.
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.