Search results for "42"
showing 10 items of 3911 documents
Targeting B cells in relapsing–remitting multiple sclerosis: from pathophysiology to optimal clinical management
2017
Multiple sclerosis (MS) is a chronic inflammatory demyelinating disease that is caused by an autoimmune response against central nervous system (CNS) structures. Traditionally considered a T-cell-mediated disorder, the contribution of B cells to the pathogenesis of MS has long been debated. Based on recent promising clinical results from CD20-depleting strategies by three therapeutic monoclonal antibodies in clinical phase II and III trials (rituximab, ocrelizumab and ofatumumab), targeting B cells in MS is currently attracting growing interest among basic researchers and clinicians. Many questions about the role of B and plasma cells in MS remain still unanswered, ranging from the role of…
Anisometropia of ocular refractive and biometric measures among 66- to 79-year-old female twins
2016
Purpose To examine the prevalence of anisometropia of spherical refraction (AnisoSR), astigmatism (AnisoAST) and spherical equivalent (AnisoSE) and their associations with spherical refraction (SR), refractive astigmatism (AST), spherical equivalent (SE) and interocular differences of ocular biometric parameters among elderly female twins. Methods Refraction of 117 monozygotic (MZ) and 116 dizygotic (DZ) female twin subjects aged 66–79 years was assessed with an auto-refractor (Topcon AT) and controlled by subjective refraction. Corneal refraction, anterior chamber depth and axial length were measured with a Zeiss IOL Master. Participants with eyes operated for cataract or glaucoma were exc…
Biomarkers of Neurodegeneration in Autoimmune-Mediated Encephalitis
2018
Progranulin (PGRN), Total-Tau (t-tau), and Neurofilament light chain (NfL) are well known biomarkers of neurodegeneration. The objective of the present study was to investigate whether these parameters represent also biomarkers in autoimmune-mediated Encephalitis (AE) and may give us insights into the pathomechanisms of AE. We retrospectively examined the concentration of PGRN in the cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) and serum of 38 patients suffering from AE in acute phase and/or under treatment. This AE cohort comprises patients with autoantibodies against: NMDAR (n = 18 patients), Caspr2 (n = 8), Lgi-1 (n = 10), GABAB(R) (n = 1), and AMPAR (n = 1). Additionally, the concentrations of NfL (n = 25…
Genetic contribution to alcohol dependence: Investigation of a heterogeneous german sample of individuals with alcohol dependence, chronic alcoholic …
2017
The present study investigated the genetic contribution to alcohol dependence (AD) using genome-wide association data from three German samples. These comprised patients with: (i) AD; (ii) chronic alcoholic pancreatitis (ACP); and (iii) alcohol-related liver cirrhosis (ALC). Single marker, gene-based, and pathway analyses were conducted. A significant association was detected for the ADH1B locus in a gene-based approach (puncorrected = 1.2 × 10-6; pcorrected = 0.020). This was driven by the AD subsample. No association with ADH1B was found in the combined ACP + ALC sample. On first inspection, this seems surprising, since ADH1B is a robustly replicated risk gene for AD and may therefore be …
Multi-Dimensional, Short-Timescale Quantification of Parkinson's Disease and Essential Tremor Motor Dysfunction
2020
Introduction: Parkinson's disease (PD) is a progressive movement disorder characterized by heterogenous motor dysfunction with fluctuations in severity. Objective, short-timescale characterization of this dysfunction is necessary as therapies become increasingly adaptive. Objectives: This study aims to characterize a novel, naturalistic, and goal-directed tablet-based task and complementary analysis protocol designed to characterize the motor features of PD. Methods: A total of 26 patients with PD and without deep brain stimulation (DBS), 20 control subjects, and eight patients with PD and with DBS completed the task. Eight metrics, each designed to capture an aspect of motor dysfunction in…
Vaccination in multiple sclerosis patients treated with highly effective disease-modifying drugs: an overview with consideration of cladribine tablets
2021
Infectious diseases are an important consideration in autoimmune conditions such as multiple sclerosis. Infective episodes may trigger relapses and significantly deteriorate the course of the disease. Some immunotherapies may cause increased rates of infection-related adverse events. Thus, infection and vaccine-related issues should be included in the individualized patient-specific treatment strategy and counseling before starting therapy and regularly on treatment. Clinical and epidemiological studies as well as pharmacovigilance data repeatedly demonstrated the safety of the great majority of vaccines in multiple sclerosis patients. Moreover, studies have shown that vaccinations with kil…
Behavioral and clinical characteristics of people receiving medical care for HIV infection in an outpatient facility in Sicily, Italy
2016
Paola Di Carlo,1 Giuliana Guadagnino,1 Palmira Immordino,1 Giovanni Mazzola,2 Pietro Colletti,2 Ilenia Alongi,1 Lucia Adamoli,1 Francesco Vitale,1 Alessandra Casuccio1 1Department of Sciences for Health Promotion and Mother-Child Care “G D’Alessandro”, University of Palermo, 2Department of Medicinal Clinics and Emerging Diseases, “Paolo Giaccone” Polyclinic University Hospital, Palermo, Italy Aim: The authors examined a cohort of HIV-positive outpatients at the AIDS Center of Palermo University in Italy in order to identify factors related to the frequency of their visits to the outpatient facility for health care services.Methods: Two hundr…
Diagnostic Criteria for Parkinson's Disease: From James Parkinson to the Concept of Prodromal Disease.
2018
The diagnosis of Parkinson’s disease (PD) is based on clinical features and differently to the common opinion that detecting this condition is easy, seminal clinico-pathological studies have shown that up one-fourth of patients diagnosed as PD during life has an alternative diagnosis at post-mortem. The misdiagnosis is even higher when only the initial diagnosis is considered, since the diagnostic accuracy improves by time, during follow-up visits. Given that the confirmation of the diagnosis of PD can be only obtained through neuropathology, to improve and facilitate the diagnostic-therapeutic workup in PD, a number of criteria and guidelines have been introduced in the last three decades.…
Somatosensory Training Improves Proprioception and Untrained Motor Function in Parkinsons Disease
2018
Background: Proprioceptive impairment is a common feature of Parkinson's disease (PD). Proprioceptive function is only partially restored with anti-parkinsonian medication or deep brain stimulation. Behavioral exercises focusing on somatosensation have been promoted to overcome this therapeutic gap. However, conclusive evidence on the effectiveness of such somatosensory-focused behavioral training for improving somatosensory function is lacking. Moreover, it is unclear, if such training has any effect on motor performance in PD.Objective: To investigate, whether proprioception improves with a somatosensory focused, robot-aided training in people with PD (PWPs), and whether enhanced proprioc…
Pathways of care for HIV infected children in Beira, Mozambique: pre-post intervention study to assess impact of task shifting
2018
Abstract Background In 2013, Mozambique implemented task-shifting (TS) from clinical officers to maternal and child nurses to improve care for HIV positive children < 5 years old. A retrospective, pre-post intervention study was designed to evaluate effectiveness of a new pathway of care in a sample of Beira District Local Health Facilities (LHFs), the primary, local, community healthcare services. Methods The study was conducted by accessing registries of At Risk Children Clinics (ARCCs) and HIV Health Services. Two time periods, pre- and post-intervention, were compared using a set of endpoints. Variables distribution was explored using descriptive statistics. T-student, Mann Whitney and …