Scoliosis uses the 45 to 50° threshold as a result of the well-documented, plus or minus 5° measurement error that can occur while measuring Cobb angles. Surgeons who are specialized in spine surgery perform surgery for scoliosis. To completely straighten a scoliotic spine is usually impossible, but for the most part, significant corrections are achieved. The two main types of surgery are: One or both of these surgical procedures may be needed. The surgery may be done in one or two stages and, on average, takes four to eight hours. A 50-year follow-up study published in the "Journal of the American
The Gifts of the Body the patients and the caregiver. The book contains ten short stories, the titles of each being associated with "gifts" which are various functions of the body, both physical and emotional: sweat, wholeness, tears, skin, hunger, mobility, death, speech, sight, hope, and mourning. The caregiver experiences each "gift", as he/she deals with patients who have AIDS, showing the different shared relationships in each case. Each patient is a distinct case, differing in terms of age, financial situation, attitude toward the illness etc., showing the reader that this disease affects all types of people. The book is written in the "no-frills style"