Abscess

Orioles outfielder Eric Davis has checked out of the University of Maryland Medical Center, but his immediate future remains clouded by a slow-healing abscess in his upper abdomen.While team doctor William Goldiner discounted speculation that Davis will need surgery to repair the condition, he said Davis will undergo another CT scan today to Davis determine if a change in treatment is needed.Davis has doggedly fought the idea of surgery since it would necessitate him missing six to eight weeks.

Steroids. Staph. Suspensions. Arrests. Acrimony. Aborted trades. The 2005 Orioles have endured it all in what was once a promising season. Rafael Palmeiro's 10-day suspension from baseball yesterday for steroid violations is the latest in a string of setbacks to beset the club this season. The Orioles have had problems from head to foot. Specifically, Sidney Ponson's head and Sammy Sosa's foot. Trouble started on Christmas Day 2004. Ponson, the $22.5 million pitcher, was incarcerated after an altercation on the beach in his native Aruba.

Having diagnosed Eric Davis' affliction, though uncertain of its cause, Orioles team doctors believe the outfielder likely will need two to three weeks to recover fully from an abscess in his abdomen.Dr. William Goldiner said yesterday that Davis has shown significant improvement since Thursday, when doctors were still uncertain of what had caused a 3 1/2 -inch mass to develop inside Davis' abdomen. Further tests revealed the abscess, which Goldiner said has shrunken significantly in the past two days as Davis has been treated with antibiotics.

With the abscess and staph infection on the bottom of Sammy Sosa's left foot not healing as quickly as the Orioles had hoped, the club placed the outfielder on the 15-day disabled list last night and purchased the contract of Triple-A Ottawa outfielder Keith Reed. The announcement came during last night's game against the Minnesota Twins, the fifth straight contest in which Sosa was out of the lineup. He had started the Orioles' first 27 games, hitting .269 with four home runs and 13 RBIs.

A Johns Hopkins Hospital medical team removed one-third of Orioles right fielder Eric Davis' colon yesterday and will conduct tests this weekend to determine whether a mass that had caused him excruciating pain is cancerous, Orioles sources confirmed.Dr. Keith Lillemoe, the general surgeon who operated on Davis, declined to elaborate on the illness that forced the 2 1/2 -hour operation -- saying only that Davis was plagued by a mass on his colon.But the scope of the surgery was greater than what had been originally anticipated.

With the abscess and staph infection on the bottom of Sammy Sosa's left foot not healing as quickly as the Orioles had hoped, the club placed the outfielder on the 15-day disabled list last night and purchased the contract of Triple-A Ottawa outfielder Keith Reed. The announcement came during last night's game against the Minnesota Twins, the fifth straight contest in which Sosa was out of the lineup. He had started the Orioles' first 27 games, hitting .269 with four home runs and 13 RBIs.

Edda Ciano, 84, who renounced her family name after her father, fascist dictator Benito Mussolini, ordered her husband's execution, died Saturday in a Rome hospital, where she was admitted 10 days earlier. Her doctor said she had been weakened by an operation to remove a kidney abscess. RAI state television said she was the first Italian woman to publicly drive a car and to wear pants.

Orioles outfielder Eric Davis has reached a critical juncture in his recovery from an abdominal abscess. Doctors plan to wean Davis from antibiotics today then watch what course the roughly inch mass inside him takes.Should the abscess remain "sterilized" and not become aggravated, doctors believe Davis may be able to rejoin the team next weekend in Atlanta. If the inflammation and pain recur, doctors believe Davis will have to submit to surgery, which would necessitate his missing six to eight weeks or possibly longer.

A 45-year-old Halethorpe woman drowned in her bathtub last year because an emergency room doctor misdiagnosed the source of her abdominal pain, a lawyer for the woman's estate says in a complaint filed yesterday with the state's health claims arbitration board.Sandra Ann Wright should have been admitted for treatment for an abdominal abscess -- and not sent home with a prescription for antibiotics to combat a urinary tract infection -- after being examined and tested Dec. 20, 1991, at St. Agnes Hospital, the complaint states.

LOUISVILLE, Ky. -- Two horses have been pulled out of tomorrow's Breeders' Cup races because they are either lame or sick, and a third may suffer the same fate.Call Now, the 5-1 second choice in the $1 million Juvenile Fillies stakes, was withdrawn yesterday morning after she developed a fever and came down with a slight bout of colic (upset stomach).Pineing Patty, a 30-1 long shot in the $1 million Juvenile Colts race, also developed a high temperature and was scratched by his trainer, Lynn Whiting, because he felt "very dull."

After missing all three games against the Kansas City Royals, Sammy Sosa remained out of the Orioles' lineup last night, and the club still doesn't know when he'll return. Sosa made another visit yesterday to the team's podiatrist, Dr. Jay LeBow, who is treating an abscess on the bottom of the outfielder's left foot. "It's improving, but the doctors keep working on it, trying to see what's causing it," head trainer Richie Bancells said. Sosa played in the Orioles' first 27 games before becoming a late scratch Friday night.

Maryland stallions have produced horses who recently won major stakes around the country. Love of Money, Park Avenue Ball, Perfect Moon and Declan's Moon - all sired by stallions in Maryland - captured stakes from California to New York. Today, Maryland stallions will produce 12 more winners in the Maryland Million at Pimlico. That's a sure bet. The 12 races are limited to horses sired by Maryland stallions. Jim McKay, sports broadcaster and Monkton resident, conceived of the Maryland Million in the mid-1980s as a way of promoting the state's sires and celebrating its racing industry.

Baltimore heavyweight Hasim Rahman had surgery Friday to remove an abscess on his spine, which could keep him out of action "for at least six to eight weeks," according to a spokeswoman for the University of Maryland Medical Center. The two-hour operation, conducted at the medical center, forced the postponement of Rahman's 10-round fight with Danell Nicholson, an elimination bout scheduled for Oct. 7 in Connecticut for the International Boxing Federation's No. 2 ranking. "He had compression of the nerve roots of the spinal canal, causing leg weakness," said Dr. Barbara Lazio, chief resident in neurosurgery, who described the growth as "a collection of infectious material or pus, which is a staph infection."

Being deaf didn't stop Leo M. Jacobs from doing what he wanted with his life. A math teacher for more than 40 years, he later wrote one of the best-selling books on deafness and was named to a special chair at Gallaudet University, the prestigious school for the deaf.But six years ago, Jacobs, 79, lost his cherished independence, becoming paralyzed from the waist down after an abscess near his spinal cord was not diagnosed properly.Today, he stands to receive $1.24 million, awarded by a Howard County Circuit Court jury after it found a Laurel urologist and medical practice responsible for Jacobs' life as a paraplegic.

A Johns Hopkins Hospital medical team removed one-third of Orioles right fielder Eric Davis' colon yesterday and will conduct tests this weekend to determine whether a mass that had caused him excruciating pain is cancerous, Orioles sources confirmed.Dr. Keith Lillemoe, the general surgeon who operated on Davis, declined to elaborate on the illness that forced the 2 1/2 -hour operation -- saying only that Davis was plagued by a mass on his colon.But the scope of the surgery was greater than what had been originally anticipated.

Orioles outfielder Eric Davis has reached a critical juncture in his recovery from an abdominal abscess. Doctors plan to wean Davis from antibiotics today then watch what course the roughly inch mass inside him takes.Should the abscess remain "sterilized" and not become aggravated, doctors believe Davis may be able to rejoin the team next weekend in Atlanta. If the inflammation and pain recur, doctors believe Davis will have to submit to surgery, which would necessitate his missing six to eight weeks or possibly longer.

Being deaf didn't stop Leo M. Jacobs from doing what he wanted with his life. A math teacher for more than 40 years, he later wrote one of the best-selling books on deafness and was named to a special chair at Gallaudet University, the prestigious school for the deaf.But six years ago, Jacobs, 79, lost his cherished independence, becoming paralyzed from the waist down after an abscess near his spinal cord was not diagnosed properly.Today, he stands to receive $1.24 million, awarded by a Howard County Circuit Court jury after it found a Laurel urologist and medical practice responsible for Jacobs' life as a paraplegic.

Orioles outfielder Eric Davis has checked out of the University of Maryland Medical Center, but his immediate future remains clouded by a slow-healing abscess in his upper abdomen.While team doctor William Goldiner discounted speculation that Davis will need surgery to repair the condition, he said Davis will undergo another CT scan today to Davis determine if a change in treatment is needed.Davis has doggedly fought the idea of surgery since it would necessitate him missing six to eight weeks.