Neurology
Had a stroke? The elderly may not know, or remember
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Older adults often do not realize or may even forget they have had a stroke and may not be a reliable source of medical information, U.S. researchers said on Monday.
Brain scans showed that while just 12 percent of seniors asked about strokes remembered having had one, nearly a third had brain damage showing they had.
The stroke itself could damage memory, and many people may also have so-called silent strokes that are never diagnosed at the time, Dr. Christiane Reitz of Columbia University Medical Center in New York and colleagues wrote in the Archives of Neurology.
New tool helps predict dementia in elderly
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A new risk assessment index can help identify older adults who are likely to develop dementia within the next 6 years, according to a report in the online issue of the journal Neurology.
“This new risk index could be very important both for research and for people at risk of developing dementia and their families,” lead author Dr. Deborah E. Barnes said in a statement.
“It could be used to identify people at high risk for dementia for studies on new drugs or prevention methods,” she continued. “The tool could also identify people who have no sign of dementia but should be monitored closely, allowing them to begin treatment as soon as possible, and potentially helping maintain their thinking and memory skills and quality of life longer.”
Does the stress of being a parent lead to decay in children’s teeth?
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A team of scientists from The Ohio State University has examined the stress levels of parents whose young children either had no cavities or so many cavities that the children had receive anesthesia before undergoing dental treatment.
The investigators presented their findings today during the 87th General Session of the International Association for Dental Research.
The team also looked at the parents’ education levels and income, and noted if they were single parents. Finally, they measured the parents’ stress levels again after the children had received dental treatment.
Multiple Sclerosis Associated with Lower Cancer Risk
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A new study shows that people with multiple sclerosis may be at a lower risk for cancer overall, but at a higher risk of developing certain types of cancer, such as brain tumors and bladder cancer. The study is published in the March 31, 2009, print issue of Neurology®, the medical journal of the American Academy of Neurology.
Researchers looked at the medical records of 20,000 people with multiple sclerosis and 204,000 people without the diagnosis. After 35 years, they found that the people with MS had a decreased overall risk of cancer by 10 percent compared to people who did not have the disease. The result was more pronounced in women. However, for people with MS the risk for certain cancers, such as brain tumors and bladder and other urinary organ cancers, increased by up to 44 percent compared to people without MS.
Scientists also evaluated the parents of people with MS to determine whether there was a possible genetic link. They found that there was no overall increased or decreased risk of cancer among either mothers or fathers of those with MS, compared to parents of people without MS.
aking Simple Precautions While Working and Playing Outdoors Can Help Prevent Neurological Injuries
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As warm weather approaches, many people are eager to get back to outdoor activities and projects, such as gardening, home improvement, and workshop activities. But according to the American Association of Neurological Surgeons (AANS), many of these activities actually send thousands of people to U.S. hospital emergency rooms every year. The U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) tracks product-related injuries through its National Electronic Injury Surveillance System (NEISS).
Every year, an estimated 1.5 million people are treated in U.S. hospital emergency rooms for head injuries and nearly 12,000 are treated for neck fractures. Thousands of these injuries are tied to sports and recreational activities. Not so obvious, however, is that common and often seemingly harmless products found in backyards, gardens, garages, and home workshops also contribute to these injuries.
A few true-life cases reported by the CPSC:
Pathologists Pioneer Biomarker Test to Diagnose or Rule Out Alzheimer’s Disease
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A test capable of confirming or ruling out Alzheimer’s disease has been validated and standardized by researchers at the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine. By measuring cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) concentrations of two of the disease’s biochemical hallmarks – amyloid beta42 peptide and tau protein – the test also predicted whether a person’s mild cognitive impairment would convert to Alzheimer’s disease over time. Researchers were able to detect this devastating disease at the earliest stages, before dementia symptoms appeared and widespread irreversible damage occurred. The findings hold promise in the search for effective pharmaceutical therapies capable of halting the disease.
Homing in on a previously suggested pathological CSF biomarker signature, a team of Penn Medicine researchers, led by Leslie M. Shaw, PhD, Co-Director of the Penn Alzheimer’s Disease Neuroimaging Initiative (ADNI) Biomarker Core, found evidence of neuron degeneration – marked by an increase in CSF concentration of tau proteins – and plaque deposition, indicated by a decrease in amyloid beta42 concentration. In addition, people with two copies of the genetic risk factor for Alzheimer’s disease, APOE ε4 , had the lowest concentrations of amyloid beta42, compared to those with one or no copies. The study appears in the online edition of the Annals of Neurology.
“With this test, we can reliably detect and track the progression of Alzheimer’s disease,” said Dr. Shaw. “Validated biomarker tests will improve the focus of Alzheimer’s clinical trials, enrolling patients at earlier stages of the disease to find treatments that can at least delay –and perhaps stop– neurodegeneration. In addition, prevention trials can test methods to delay or block mild cognitive impairment from converting to full-blown Alzheimer’s.”
Better Tests Needed to Pinpoint Memory Problems
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There’s a lot more to memory than the ability to remember a story, who the President is, or what you ate for lunch.
Do you recall who told you the story? How about whether you heard it before or after the President’s inauguration? Do you remember that you planned to meet a friend for lunch tomorrow?
According to new research by scientists at Washington State University (WSU), aspects of memory that record the source of information and the relative timing of events are at least as important to our everyday functioning as the ability to recall specific content.
“These other aspects of memory may actually have greater contributions to what people are reporting in their everyday lives as causing problems,” said Maureen Schmitter-Edgecombe, a WSU psychologist and leader of the study.
Transcendental Meditation buffers students against college stress: Study
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Transcendental Meditation may be an effective non-medicinal tool for students to buffer themselves against the intense stresses of college life, according to a new study to be published in the February 24 issue of the peer-reviewed International Journal of Psychophysiology.
“Effects of Transcendental Meditation practice on brain functioning and stress reactivity in college students” is the first random assignment study of the effects of meditation practice on brain and physiological functioning in college students.
The study was a collaboration between the American University Department of Psychology in Washington, D.C., and the Center for Brain, Consciousness, and Cognition at Maharishi University of Management in Fairfield, Iowa.
New Protein May Reverse Neurodegenerative Diseases
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An investigational protein that transformed normal laboratory mice into super-jocks holds great promise in developing new treatments for neurodegenerative diseases like Parkinson’s, Alzheimer’s and ALS (Lou Gehrig’s Disease), say researchers at the University of Virginia Health System.
A study published in the February 17, 2009 online edition of Mitochondrion reports that the protein, rhTFAM (an abbreviation for recombinant-human mitochondrial transcription factor A), succeeded in entering and energizing the DNA of the mice’s mitochondria, enabling them to run two times longer on their rotating rods than a control group cohort.
Because many neurodegenerative diseases cause mitochondria to malfunction, medical researchers have been focusing on developing methods for repairing and restoring them. The new UVA study represents an important step toward achieving that goal. It shows that a naturally occurring protein, TFAM, can be engineered to rapidly pass through cell membranes and target mitochondria. Study findings show that rhTFAM acts on cultured cells carrying a mitochondrial DNA disease as well as lab mice.
Formal “brain exercise” won’t help healthy seniors
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Healthy older people shouldn’t bother spending money on computer games and Web sites promising to ward off mental decline, the author of a review of scientific evidence for the benefits of these “brain exercise” programs says.
“These marketed products don’t confer any additional benefit over and above being socially and intellectually active in one’s normal daily life,” Dr. Peter J. Snyder of Lifespan Affiliated Hospitals in Providence, Rhode Island, told Reuters Health. “There are some things that we could be doing that have much more rigorous data to support their application.”
Types of “brain training” are known to help people with memory problems function better, but their benefits for those who don’t have measurable cognitive impairment isn’t clear, Snyder and his team note in the journal Alzheimer’s & Dementia. Meanwhile, Snyder said in an interview, the market for these products has swelled from $2 million in 2005 to an estimated $225 million this year.
Can Exercising Your Brain Prevent Memory Loss?
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Participating in certain mental activities, like reading magazines or crafting in middle age or later in life, may delay or prevent memory loss, according to a study released today that will be presented at the American Academy of Neurology’s 61st Annual Meeting in Seattle, April 25 to May 2, 2009.
The study involved 197 people between the ages of 70 and 89 with mild cognitive impairment, or diagnosed memory loss, and 1,124 people that age with no memory problems. Both groups answered questions about their daily activities within the past year and in middle age, when they were between 50 to 65 years old.
The study found that during later years, reading books, playing games, participating in computer activities and doing craft activities such as pottery or quilting led to a 30 to 50 percent decrease in the risk of developing memory loss compared to people who did not do those activities. People who watched television for less than seven hours a day in later years were 50 percent less likely to develop memory loss than people who watched for more than seven hours a day.
Forgotten and lost - when proteins “shut down” our brain
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Which modules of the tau protein, in neurons of Alzheimer disease patients, may act in a destructive manner were investigated by researchers from the Max Planck Institute for Biophysical Chemistry (Göttingen) and the Max Planck Unit for Structural Molecular Biology (Hamburg) with the help of Nuclear Magnetic Resonance Spectroscopy (PLoS Biology, February 17, 2009).
Coordination becomes difficult, items disappear, keeping new information in the mind is impossible. Worldwide almost 30 million people suffer from Alzheimer’s disease, a neurodegenerative, irreversible ailment which starts with memory gaps and ends in helplessness and the loss of personality. The most critical factor in developing Alzheimer’s disease is age. Most cases occur after the age of 65.
Two hallmarks are typical for Alzheimer affected brains. One of them, located between nerve cells, is amyloid plaques - extracellular protein aggregates mainly composed of a protein named beta-amyloid. The other clue is intracellular tau fibrils. In the interplay with genetic factors, the latter contribute to a disordered communication within the cell. This triggers cell death.
MRI shows brain atrophy pattern that predicts Alzheimer’s
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Using special MRI methods, researchers have identified a pattern of regional brain atrophy in patients with mild cognitive impairment (MCI) that indicates a greater likelihood of progression to Alzheimer’s disease. The findings are published in the online edition of Radiology.
“Previously, this pattern has been observed only after a diagnosis of probable Alzheimer’s disease,” said the study’s lead author, Linda K. McEvoy, Ph.D., assistant project scientist in the Department of Radiology at the University of California San Diego School of Medicine in La Jolla. “Our results show that some individuals with MCI have the atrophy pattern characteristic of mild Alzheimer’s disease, and these people are at higher risk of experiencing a faster rate of brain degeneration and a faster decline to dementia than individuals with MCI who do not show that atrophy pattern.”
According to the Alzheimer’s Association, more than five million Americans currently have Alzheimer’s disease. One of the goals of modern neuroimaging is to help in early and accurate diagnosis, which can be challenging. There is no cure for Alzheimer’s disease, but when it is diagnosed early, drug treatment may help improve or stabilize patient symptoms.
Kids a possibility for girls with Turner syndrome
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Girls born with a genetic defect that leads to infertility may yet be able to have children when they reach adulthood, according to researchers in Sweden.
Turner syndrome occurs when a female is born with one X chromosome instead of two. Usually they stop growing prematurely and their ovaries shut down at an early age. In some cases, however, it may be possible to retrieve ovarian tissue containing immature eggs, freeze and store it, and later produce eggs for in vitro fertilization.
Puberty starts spontaneously in 15-30 percent of girls with Turner syndrome. However, only 2-5 percent of them start menstruating “with the possibility of achieving pregnancy,” Dr. Birgit Borgstrom and colleagues write in the Journal of Clinical Endocrinology and Metabolism.
Tests may judge dementia patients’ driving safety
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A battery of cognitive tests may help predict which people with mild dementia can still drive safely, researchers reported Monday.
In a study of older drivers with and without early-stage Alzheimer’s disease, the researchers found that drivers’ scores on tests of memory, visual processing and motor skills were good predictors of their performance on road tests.
The findings, published in the journal Neurology, suggest that doctors can use such tests to help judge which patients with mild dementia can still get behind the wheel without endangering themselves or others.
