Journal of Neurology, Neurosurgery and Psychiatry articles from December 2002

Journal of Neurology, Neurosurgery and Psychiatry archives from December 2002

Drugs for Parkinson's disease. (Editorial).
December 1, 2002... Oldies but goodies It is chastening to reflect that although the portfolio of available drug treatments for Parkinson's disease has multiplied, L-dopa, in its fourth decade of clinical use is still the most potent and effective medication....

Don't slip through the net: JNNP could help you become a technophile. (Editorial).
December 1, 2002... It is possible to thrive in the modern world without recourse to the internet. But only just. If you are a "technophobe", deterred by the daunting size and complexity of this continually evolving medium, JNNP could help you become a...

Fetal striatal transplantation in Huntington's disease: time for a pause; the need to look at the rationale for fetal striatal transplantation. (Editorial Commentary).
December 1, 2002... In this issue of the Journal (pp 678- 685), (1) the NEST-UK consortium reports safety data on four subjects with Huntington's disease receiving unilateral intrastriatal transplantation of human fetal striatal tissue. This well designed and...

Neuroimaging for epilepsy: quality and not just quantity is important; current resources for neuroimaging could be used more efficiently. (Editorial Commentary).
December 1, 2002... The value of magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) of the brain in people developing epilepsy has been amply demonstrated. (1) This is particularly the case for those with medically refractory partial seizures, for whom appropriate surgical...

CJD: Are there distinct neuropsychological features? Different faces wearing the same expression; is there a core neuropsychological deficit in sporadic CJD? (Editorial Commentary).
December 1, 2002... As with many diseases originally defined on purely clinicopathological phenomenological grounds, "Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease" (CJD) has been subject to various "lumping" and "splitting" processes over the years. (1) The demonstration of...

Diagnostic value of nystagmus: spontaneous and induced ocular oscillations. (Physical Signs).
December 1, 2002... Research over the past 20 years has provided a clearer understanding of the pathogenesis of most forms of nystagmus and other ocular oscillations. To the clinician, these advances translate into greater accuracy of nystagmus as a diagnostic...

The internet. (Review).
December 1, 2002... The growing use of email and the world wide web (WWW), by the public, academics, and clinicians--as well as the increasing availability of high quality information on the WWW--make a working knowledge of the internet important. Although this...

The Parkinson's disease sleep scale: a new instrument for assessing sleep and nocturnal disability in Parkinson s disease. (Paper).
December 1, 2002... Background: No formal instruments are available for quantifying sleep problems in Parkinson's disease. Objective: To develop a new sleep scale to quantify the various aspects of nocturnal sleep problems in Parkinson's disease, which may...

Apathy in Parkinson's disease. (Paper).
December 1, 2002... Objective: To assess apathy in patients with Parkinson's disease and its relation to disability, mood, personality, and cognition. Methods: Levels of apathy in 45 patients with Parkinson's disease were compared with a group of 17 similarly...

Standard magnetic resonance imaging is inadequate for patients with refractory focal epilepsy. (Paper).
December 1, 2002... Objectives: Patients with intractable epilepsy may benefit from epilepsy surgery especially if they have a radiologically demonstrable cerebral lesion. Dedicated magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) protocols as performed at epilepsy surgery...

Voxel based morphometry of grey matter abnormalities in patients with medically intractable temporal lobe epilepsy: effects of side of seizure onset and epilepsy duration. (Paper).
December 1, 2002... Objectives: To investigate the use of whole brain voxel based morphometry (VBM) and stereological analysis to study brain morphology in patients with medically intractable temporal lobe epilepsy; and to determine the relation between side,...

Eugene Jamot (1879-1937). (Neurological Stamp).
December 1, 2002... Jamot received his medical degree from the University of Montpellier. Later, in 1909, he enrolled at the school of tropical medicine in Marseilles. In 1910 he joined the French colonial hygiene group and travelled to Cameroon where Germany had...

Detection of grey matter loss in mild Alzheimer's disease with voxel based morphometry. (Paper).
December 1, 2002... Objectives: To test the applicability of an automated method of magnetic resonance image analysis (voxel based morphometry) to detect presence and severity of regional grey matter density reduction--a proxy of atrophy--in Alzheimer's disease....

Alterations in brain activation during cholinergic enhancement with rivastigmine in Alzheimer's disease. (Paper).
December 1, 2002... Background: Rivastigmine enhances cholinergic activity and has been shown in clinical trials to decrease the rate of deterioration in Alzheimer's disease. It remains unclear where in the brain it exerts its effect. Functional magnetic resonance...

Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis. (Historical Note).
December 1, 2002... In America, amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) is often referred to as Lou Gehrig's disease, after the famous baseball player who in 1939 retired because of the disease. (1) ALS is also known as Charcot's disease (vide infra); but many famous...

The apolipoprotein E [euro]2 allele and decline in episodic memory. (Paper).
December 1, 2002... Objectives: The apolipoprotein E (apoE) [member of]4 allele is related to decline in multiple cognitive domains, especially episodic memory, but the effect of the [member of]2 allele on change in different forms of cognitive function has been...

Unilateral transplantation of human primary fetal tissue in four patients with huntington's disease: NEST-UK safety report ISRCTN no 36485475. (Paper).
December 1, 2002... Objectives: Huntington's disease (HD) is an inherited autosomal dominant condition in which there is a CAG repeat expansion in the huntingtin gene of 36 or more. Patients display progressive motor, cognitive, and behavioural deterioration...

Distinct neuropsychological characteristics in Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease. (Paper).
December 1, 2002... Mann, D.M.A. Neary, D. Objectives: To characterise the nature of cognitive change in Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease (CJD). Methods: Case histories are reported of four patients with sporadic (sCJD) and two with familial CJD (fCJD),...

Perceived health in a population based sample of victims of the 1956 polio epidemic in the Netherlands. (Paper).
December 1, 2002... Objective: To investigate perceived health and its relation to residual paresis from polio, late onset neuromuscular symptoms following poliomyelitis (LSP), and sex, in a population based sample of polio survivors. Methods: 350 subjects...

Multiple Sclerosis Impact Scale (MSIS-29): reliability and validity in hospital based samples. (Paper).
December 1, 2002... Background and aim: The psychometric properties of rating scales are sample dependent and need evaluations in different samples. The Multiple Sclerosis Impact Scale (MSIS-29), a new patient based rating scale for multiple sclerosis (MS) was...

Managing severe lower limb spasticity in multiple sclerosis: does intrathecal phenol have a role? (Paper).
December 1, 2002... Objective: Established treatment options for managing severe lower limb spasticity and associated pain are of limited value in people with advanced multiple sclerosis (MS). This has resulted in a resurgence of the use of lumbar intrathecal...

A randomised clinical trial of oral steroids in the treatment of carpal tunnel syndrome: a long term follow up. (Paper).
December 1, 2002... Objectives: To determine the efficacy of a two week and a four week course of oral steroids in the conservative treatment of carpal tunnel syndrome. Methods: 109 patients with carpal tunnel syndrome were randomly divided into two treatment...

The British Neuropsychiatry Association 2003 Annual Meeting.
December 1, 2002... The British Neuropsychiatry Association 2003 Annual Meeting will be held at the Institute of Child Health, central London on 13-14 February 2003. The meeting will cover the topics: "Recovering from head injury", "Medico-legal aspects of...

Sexual function in men with cauda equina lesions: a clinical and electromyographic study. (Paper).
December 1, 2002... Objective: To investigate the effects of cauda equina lesions on sexual function in men. Methods: Sexual function was investigated in 46 men with long standing cauda equina/conus medullaris lesions. All had clinical and radiological...

Comparison between the lumbar infusion and CSF tap tests to predict outcome after shunt surgery in suspected normal pressure hydrocephalus. (Paper).
December 1, 2002... Objective: To compare the lumbar infusion test and the cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) tap test for predicting the outcome of shunt surgery in patients with suspected normal pressure hydrocephalus. Methods: 68 patients with suspected normal...

Prediction of post-traumatic complaints after mild traumatic brain injury: early symptoms and biochemical markers. (Paper).
December 1, 2002... Objectives: To identify parameters at first presentation after mild traumatic brain injury (MTBI) that are predictive of the severity of post-traumatic complaints (PTC) after six months. Early recognition of patients with MTBI who are at risk...

Intraoperative mapping of the cortical areas involved in multiplication and subtraction: an electrostimulation study in a patient with a left parietal glioma. (Paper).
December 1, 2002... Objectives: Advances in neuroimaging studies have recently improved the understanding of the functional anatomy of the calculation processes, having in particular underlined the central role of the angular gyrus (AG). In this study, the authors...

Evidence for the role of demyelination, HLA-DR alleles, and cytokines in the pathogenesis of parvovirus B19 meningoencephalitis and its sequelae. (Paper).
December 1, 2002... Objective: To review the clinical and pathological features of parvovirus B19 meningoencephalitis and its sequelae in 12 previously published cases, and to perform additional tests to determine the pathogenesis of the disease. Methods:...

PubMed. (Neuronline).
December 1, 2002... http://www.pubmed.org. First, library shelves groaned under the weight of volume after volume of Index Medicus Then came Medline, a journal abstracting and search service initially available on CD (at a price) and, for the UK higher...

Duration, frequency, recency, and type of migraine and the risk of ischaemic stroke in women of childbearing age. (Short Report).
December 1, 2002... Background: Migraine is recognised increasingly as a risk factor for ischaemic stroke in women of childbearing age. Migraine with aura poses a higher risk than migraine without aura. Objective: To investigate further the effect of duration,...

Certification of deaths attributable to epilepsy. (Short Report).
December 1, 2002... Objective: To estimate the number of sudden unexpected epilepsy deaths occurring annually in England and Wales in those 16-50 years of age. Methods: All 1997 death entries mentioning epilepsy as a cause of death in those 16-50 years were...

Measurement of amygdala T2 relaxation time in temporal lobe epilepsy. (Short Report).
December 1, 2002... Objectives: To implement and validate the use of coronal dual echo T2 maps for the measurement of T2 relaxation time of the amygdala (AT2) as a rapid and reproducible method for identifying amygdala abnormality. Methods: 20 healthy subjects...

Fatal instability following "odontoid sparing" transoral decompression of a periodontoid pseudotumour. (Short Report).
December 1, 2002... Pseudotumour of the craniovertebral junction is an uncommon cause of high cervical myelopathy in the elderly. The anterior transoral approach is the preferred means of accessing these lesions. An "odontoid sparing" transoral approach, in which...

Failure of regular external ventricular drain exchange to reduce cerebrospinal fluid infection: result of a randomised controlled trial. (Short Report).
December 1, 2002... Background: It is controversial whether regular changes of external ventricular drains can reduce cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) infection. Objective: To carry out a randomised controlled clinical trial over a two year period to determine...

Clinical and genetic heterogeneity in peroneal muscular atrophy associated with vocal cord weakness. (Short Report).
December 1, 2002... Background: The peroneal muscular atrophy syndrome is the most common inherited disorder of the peripheral nervous system and has extensive clinical and genetic heterogeneity. Cranial nerve involvement is rare, though there are distinct...

Difference in distribution of muscle weakness between myasthenia gravis and the Lambert-Eaton myasthenic syndrome. (Short Report).
December 1, 2002... Background: Myasthenia gravis and the Lambert--Eaton myasthenic syndrome (LEMS) may have a similar distribution of muscle weakness. Deciding on a diagnosis of myasthenia gravis or LEMS on clinical grounds may therefore be difficult. ...

Peripheral nerve granuloma in a patient with tuberculosis. (Short Report).
December 1, 2002... The cause of peripheral neuropathy associated with tuberculosis is controversial. Possibilities include an immune mediated neuropathy, direct invasion of nerves, vasculitic neuropathy, compressive neuropathy, a meningitic reaction, and the...

Bilateral paramedian thalamic syndrome: abnormal circadian wake-sleep and autonomic functions. (Short Report).
December 1, 2002... Objectives: To describe wake-sleep and body core temperature (t[degrees]) rhythm abnormalities in two patients with bilateral paramedian thalamic calcifications. Methods: Patients underwent (18F)FDG PET scans and 24 hour polygraphic...

MRI findings in mesenrhombencephalitis due to Listeria monocytogenes. (Neurological Picture).
December 1, 2002... A 53 year old woman was admitted as an emergency case with a two day history of fever, malaise, and vomiting, as well as bifrontal headache. At the time of admission, she felt numbness on the right side of her face and she had an unsteady gait....

Letter.
December 1, 2002... Sympathetic cardiac denervation in Parkinson's disease and pure autonomic failure but not in multiple system atrophy Three neurodegenerative diseases causing primary autonomic failure are pure autonomic failure (PAF), Parkinson's disease...

Neurogenetics.
December 1, 2002... Neurogenetics would barely have figured in the training curriculum, had one existed, 20 years ago and such specialist clinics were almost unknown. Now it constitutes a significant part of the curriculum and neurology trainees are expected to...

Running a neurogenetic clinic.
December 1, 2002... As a group neurogenetic conditions are not rare. We estimate that approximately 10% of patients with neurological conditions have a single mutated gene as the basis for their disease. Furthermore, when polygenic inheritance is considered (that...

Basic genetics for the clinical neurologist.
December 1, 2002... To the casual observer, the clinical neurologist and molecular geneticist would appear very different species. On closer inspection, however, they actually have a number of similarities: they both use a rather impenetrable language littered...

Genetic neuromuscular disease.
December 1, 2002... The clinical practice of neuromuscular disease is currently undergoing enormous change as a direct result of the wealth of recent molecular genetic discoveries. Indeed, the majority of gene discoveries in the area of neurological disease relate...

Genetics of movement disorders and ataxia.
December 1, 2002... Genetic disorders of the central nervous system have a propensity to cause movement disorders or ataxia, as a part of the phenotype, or sometimes as the main phenotypic manifestation. The Online Mendelian Inheritance in Man (OMIM) database...

Surfing for neurogenetics. (World Wide Web).
December 1, 2002... Genetics is the area of medicine most associated with the world wide web. This has stemmed from the acclaimed efforts of the International Human Genome Sequencing Consortium to ensure that the draft sequence of the human genome sequence was...

Genetics of the dementias.
December 1, 2002... While the majority of dementias are sporadic, many diseases causing dementia can also occur on a familial basis. Some of these show an autosomal or sex linked inheritance, In others, certain genes are not directly causative, but are major risk...

Genetics of epilepsy.
December 1, 2002... The last decade has witnessed rapid advances in understanding the role of genetic factors in epilepsy. Mutations and chromosomal defects underlying many inherited symptomatic epilepsies have now been identified, and several genes have been...

Clinical training in multiple sclerosis. (YNT-Schering Fellowship).
December 1, 2002... The YNT-Schering fellowship aims to promote high quality international clinical training in neurology. The fellowship focuses on advanced training in the diagnosis and management of patients with multiple sclerosis. The YNT-Schering fellowship...