Alzheimer's - Dementia, Author Interviews, Calcium, Neurology / 19.08.2016

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Silke Kern, MD, PhD Neuropsychiatric Epidemiology Unit and Clinical Neurochemistry Laboratory Department of Psychiatry and Neurochemistry Institute of Neuroscience and Physiology Sahlgrenska Academy University of Gothenburg Gothenburg, Sweden MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings? Response: Calcium has an important role in ischemic neuronal cell death and atherosclerosis. Several studies suggest that increased serum calcium increases the risk for vascular events and worsens the outcome after stroke. Widespread ischemic neuronal cell death and atherosclerosis might lead to dementia. We therefore examined if Calcium supplementation is associated with development of dementia. Our study is the first to show a relationship between Calcium supplementation and increased risk for dementia in older women. This risk is mainly confined to women with cerebrovascular disease (history of stroke or presence of white matter lesions). (more…)
Author Interviews, Brigham & Women's - Harvard, JAMA, Mental Health Research, OBGYNE / 19.08.2016

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Krista F. Huybrechts, M.S., Ph.D. Assistant Professor of Medicine Harvard Medical School Epidemiologist Division of Pharmacoepidemiology and Pharmacoeconomics Brigham and Women’s Hospital Boston, MA 02120 MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: The use of antipsychotic medications during pregnancy has doubled in the last decade. Yet, information on the safety of antipsychotic medication use during pregnancy for the developing fetus is very limited: existing studies tend to be small (the largest study available to date includes 570 exposed women) and findings have been inconsistent. Concerns have been raised about a potential association with congenital malformations. The objective of our study was to examine the risk of congenital malformations overall, as well as cardiac malformations given findings from earlier studies, in a large cohort of pregnant women. We used a nationwide sample of 1.3 mln pregnant women insured through Medicaid between 2000-2010, of which 9,258 used an atypical antipsychotic and 733 used a typical antipsychotic during the first trimester, the etiologically relevant period for organogenesis. We also examined the risks associated with the most commonly used individual medications. (more…)
Accidents & Violence, Author Interviews, Gender Differences, JAMA, Mental Health Research / 17.08.2016

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Edith Chen, Ph.D. Professor Faculty Fellow, Institute for Policy Research Northwestern University Department of Psychology Evanston, IL 60208-2710 MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings? Response: Previous research has documented psychiatric consequences of childhood abuse, but less is known about possible physical health consequences. The main finding is that women who self-reported childhood abuse (in adulthood) were at greater risk for all-cause mortality compared to those who did not report abuse. (more…)
Author Interviews, Autism, Genetic Research, NIH / 16.08.2016

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Karen Usdin, Ph. D. Senior Investigator Chief, Gene Structure and Disease Section Laboratory of Cell and Molecular Biology National Institute of Diabetes, Digestive and Kidney Diseases National Institutes of Health Bethesda MD 20892 MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings? Response: Our laboratory is interested in the causes and consequences of the unusual repeat expansion mutation that causes the Fragile X-related disorders. However these disorders are challenging to study, in part because the repeat tract is difficult to amplify by PCR. This makes monitoring of repeat length, as well as other factors we are interested in such as methylation status and the presence of AGG interruptions, quite difficult. In our experience, both repeat number and methylation status are very variable in patient stem cells and in disease-relevant cell types derived from them. This variability arises because the repeat is prone to both expansion and contraction and because at different times there can be selection for smaller alleles or against unmethylated ones. Thus the frequent monitoring of repeat length and methylation status is critical for work with patient cells, particularly when those cells are to be used for drug screening or to examine the consequences of expansion. While other assays are available to determine one or more of these parameters, some are cumbersome to use or lack the necessary robustness and sensitivity, whilst others are prohibitively expensive for routine laboratory work. We thus saw a need for assays that are robust, sensitive and cost-effective for preclinical studies. (more…)
Author Interviews, Critical Care - Intensive Care - ICUs, Infections, JAMA, Mental Health Research / 11.08.2016

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Helene Lund-Sørensen BM Department of Biomedical Sciences Section of Cellular and Metabolic Research University of Copenhagen MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings? Response: Accumulating research has shown that inflammation and infections are associated with psychiatric diagnoses and interactions between infectious agents, known to affect the brain, and suicidal behavior have been reported. We find an increased risk of death by suicide among individuals hospitalized with infections. The risk of suicide increased in a dose-response relationship with the number of hospitalizations with infections and with the number of days hospitalized with infections. We also examined the risk of suicide association with the time since the last hospitalization with infection and found that infection was linked to an elevated risk with the strongest effect after 1 and 2 years compared with those without infections. (more…)
Aging, Author Interviews, BMJ, Geriatrics, Mental Health Research / 10.08.2016

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Dr. Faiza Tabassum, PhD Southampton Statistical Sciences Research Institute  University of Southampton Southampton, UK MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: Previous research has shown that volunteering in older age is associated with better mental and physical health, but it’s unclear whether this extends to other age groups. We aimed to examine the association of volunteering with mental health or well-being among the British population across all ages. The British Household Panel Survey (BHPS) was used which has collected information from 1991 to 2008 from over 5000 households. The published study has analysed over 66,000 responses representing the whole of the UK. The BHPS included a wide range of questions on leisure time activities, which covered the frequency of formal volunteering—from at least once a week through to once a year or less, or never. The BHPS also included a validated proxy for mental health/emotional wellbeing known as the GHQ-12. (more…)
Author Interviews, Brigham & Women's - Harvard, Mental Health Research, Primary Care / 09.08.2016

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: David S. Kroll, MD Harvard Medical School Department of Psychiatry Brigham and Women's Hospital MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings? Response: Our primary care clinic has the capacity to provide 9 psychiatry evaluations per week, but before we started this project nearly half of the evaluation appointments went unused due to no-shows, and meanwhile the waiting time was two months. We had tried appointment reminders but this had very little impact on the problem—it turns out that forgetting is only a small part of why patients miss their appointments and that instead they have competing obligations—family, housing, legal, etc. Since the traditional model of scheduling and keeping appointments wasn’t working for so many patients, we implemented a referral-based walk-in clinic instead and found that this significantly increased the number of patients who were seen while virtually eliminating our wait list. (more…)
Author Interviews, Cognitive Issues, Dental Research, Geriatrics, Kidney Disease / 05.08.2016

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Danielle Mairead Maire Ni Chroinin, MB BCh BAO BMedSc MD MRCPI FRACP Staff Specialist in Geriatric Medicine Liverpool Hospital and Senior Conjoint Lecturer UNSW MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings? Response: Oral disease may have a large impact on older persons’ health and wellbeing, causing pain, impairing speech, adversely affecting nutrition, contributing to systemic infection and harming self-esteem. However, this important issue may be neglected in the acute hospital setting. Our aim was to investigate oral health status and abnormalities in older patients admitted acutely to hospital, exploring the association with medical co-morbidities. We included all individuals aged 70 and older admitted to a geriatric service over 3 months (N=202), and evaluated oral health using a simple bedside tool the Oral Health Assessment Tool (OHAT). Overall, we found that poor oral health was not uncommon, and was associated with dementia and renal impairment. This association persisted even after adjustment for anticholinergic medication and oral pH, highlighting that patients with these conditions may be particularly vulnerable. (more…)
Alzheimer's - Dementia, Author Interviews, Neurological Disorders / 05.08.2016

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Auriel Willette, PhD Assistant Professor Departments of Food Science and Human Nutrition, and Psychology Iowa State University MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings? Response: The Alzheimer's disease (AD) field continues to look for biological markers that can detect onset and progression of the disease, mainly memory decline and atrophy of medial temporal lobe where conscious memories are formed. The immune system has long been known to affect the onset and progression of Alzheimer's disease (AD), usually through a process called inflammation in the brain that causes damage to brain cells called neurons. We wished to examine all available immune system data in a large, well-established cohort across the AD spectrum and discover which immune markers best explained memory decline and medial temporal atrophy over 2 years. In essence, among dozens of candidate immune markers, we consistently found two to be most relevant: neuronal pentraxin 2 (NPTX2) and chitinase-3-like-protein-1 (C3LP1). NPTX2 is important for facilitating communication between neurons, whereas C3LP1 is related to activation of a part of the immune system that causes inflammation in the brain. To our surprise, higher NPTX2 levels at baseline were potently related to less memory loss and less medial temporal atrophy over 2 years. C3LP1, by contrast, was a relatively poor predictor. NPTX2 also better predicted levels of amyloid and tau in the brain, which are generally thought to help cause AD. Finally, we found that more years of education led to higher NPTX2 levels, suggesting that more formal learning leads to more stable, stronger connections between neurons that give rise to memory. (more…)
Author Interviews, Brain Injury, JAMA, Pediatrics / 02.08.2016

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Danny G. Thomas, MD, MPH Department of Pediatrics, Emergency Medicine Children’s Hospital of Wisconsin Corporate Center Milwaukee, WI MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings? Response: This was a secondary analysis of a randomized controlled trial of strict rest after concussion published last year. We wanted to find out how mental and physical activity levels related to symptom spikes or sudden increases in concussion symptoms. We found that one in three patients had symptoms spikes in recovery. Patients who had symptom spikes tended to have higher symptoms in the emergency department and throughout recovery. Most symptom spikes were not associated with an increase in physical and mental activity level the day prior. We did find that a sudden increase in activity like returning to school did increase the risk of having a symptom spike, but the good news is these symptom spikes seemed to resolve the following day and did not impact recovery by 10 days. (more…)
Accidents & Violence, Addiction, ADHD, Author Interviews / 29.07.2016

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Anna Chorniy PhD Postdoctoral Research Associate Center for Health and Wellbeing Princeton University Princeton NJ 08544 MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: Attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) is one of the common chronic mental conditions affecting children. In the U.S., 11% of children ages 4–17 (6.4 million) are estimated to have an ADHD diagnosis and almost 70% of them report taking medication for the condition (e.g. Visser et al., 2014). However, little evidence exists on the effects of ADHD treatment on children’s outcomes. We use a panel data set of South Carolina Medicaid claims paid out in 2003–2013 to investigate the effects of ADHD medication treatment on a seldom studied set of outcomes associated with this condition: adolescent risky behaviors and the incidence of injuries. The occurrence of injuries allows us to evaluate short-term effects of ADHD treatment, while substance abuse and risky sexual behavior outcomes speak for the long-term effects of medication. Second, we use Medicaid spending on treatment of these negative events to evaluate the impact of ADHD drugs on the severity of ADHD, and compare the cost of ADHD treatment with the costs of negative health events. (more…)
Author Interviews, Memory / 29.07.2016

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Flavio Frohlich PhD Assistant Professor Departments of Psychiatry, Cell Biology and Physiology, Biomedical Engineering, and Neurology Neuroscience Center School of Medicine University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: Although we do not understand why we sleep, it is clear that sleep is very important for overall well being and health. One of many likely functions of sleep is memory consolidation, the process of stabilizing previously acquired memories. In particular, a brief electric brain activity pattern called the sleep spindle has been shown to correlate with memory consolidation and learning in general. We asked if this brain rhythm causes memory consolidation by using non-invasive feedback brain stimulation to selectively enhance sleep spindles. We applied a weak electric current in the shape of a sleep spindle to the scalp each time our algorithm detected a sleep spindle in the EEG. (more…)
Accidents & Violence, Author Interviews, Columbia, Mental Health Research / 29.07.2016

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: J. John Mann MD Paul Janssen Professor of Translational Neuroscience Director, Molecular Imaging and Neuropathology Division Department of Psychiatry Columbia University/New York State Psychiatric Institute MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings? Response: In 2014 there were 21,000 firearm suicides in the USA. Overseas, programs that have resulted in major reductions in firearm availability have reduced firearm suicide rates which have also been shown in the USA to be closely correlated with risk of firearm suicide. Reducing access to firearms to those at risk for suicide would help reduce firearm suicide rates in the USA. Most such suicides involve a firearm purchased many years earlier. We recommend methods for reducing such access including improved gun safety and smart gun technology. (more…)
Author Interviews, Depression, Medical Imaging, Mental Health Research, Radiology / 29.07.2016

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Maria A. Oquendo, M.D. Professor of Psychiatry Vice Chair for Education Columbia University Medical Center American Psychiatric Association, President International Academy of Suicide Research, President MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings? Response: Our team has worked for years on identifying the biological underpinnings of both risk for suicidal behavior (SB) and for predicting the lethality or medical consequences of suicidal behavior. We have shown that if you compare those who are depressed and have had SB to those who are depressed but do not have suicidal behavior, you can see clear differences in the serotonin system using Positron Emission Tomography and a molecule tagged with radioactivity. We predicted that if you could see these differences cross-sectionally, then their presence might also predict suicidal behavior and its lethality in the future. Our study showed that those with higher serotonin 1a binding in the raphe nuclei, which likely indicates low serotonin functioning, made more medically damaging suicide attempts in the two years that followed. They also suffered from more pronounced suicidal ideation in the subsequent year. (more…)
Author Interviews, JAMA, Schizophrenia / 26.07.2016

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Professor Jayashri Kulkarni MBBS, MPM, FRANZCP, PhD Director, Monash Alfred Psychiatry research centre Vic Australia MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings? Response: Schizophrenia is a complex psychiatric disorder and many patients are not able to achieve remission on the available treatments. There are clear sex differences in many aspects of the illness, which not only implicates a role for the sex hormone estrogen in schizophrenia, but also highlights the need for sex-specific treatments. Our group has conducted many clinical trials using adjunctive estradiol treatment, with excellent improvement in psychotic symptoms- however, there can be physical side effects with longer term estradiol use. Raloxifene and other selective estrogen receptor modulators ( SERMs) - the so-called "brain estrogens", with their more specific brain impacts and less body side effects - provide an option to use longer term estrogen in people with refractory schizophrenia. We conducted the first ever pilot study of raloxifene in 2010, and now present findings from a bigger study of adjunctive raloxifene treatment in schizophrenia. (more…)
Author Interviews, Gastrointestinal Disease, Mental Health Research / 24.07.2016

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Laureate Professor Nicholas J. Talley, MBBS (Hons.)(NSW), MD (NSW), PhD (Syd), MMedSci (Clin Epi)(Newc.), FRACP, FAFPHM, FAHMS, FRCP (Lond. & Edin.), FACP, FACG, AGAF, FAMS, FRCPI (Hon), GAICD Pro Vice-Chancellor, Global Research, University of Newcastle, Australia Professor of Medicine, Faculty of Health and Medicine, University of Newcastle, Australia President, Royal Australasian College of Physicians Chair, Committee of Presidents of Medical Colleges Hon. Treasurer, Australian Academy of Health and Medical Sciences Editor-in-Chief, Medical Journal of Australia Senior Staff Specialist, John Hunter Hospital, Newcastle, Australia Professor of Medicine and Professor of Epidemiology, Joint Supplemental Consultant Gastroenterology and Health Sciences Research, Mayo Clinic, Rochester, MN, USA MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings? Response: Functional gastrointestinal diseases (FGIDs) like the irritable bowl syndrome (IBS) are very common, cause major distress including pain and psychological dysfunction, impact on quality of life and drive high health care costs. We speculated that there are two distinct types of functional gastrointestinal disease that others have not recognized. For example, IBS in a subgroup may first begin with gut symptoms (pain, diarrhea, constipation, bloating etc) in those free of psychological distress and only later does new onset anxiety or depression develop, implicating gut disease as the primary driver of the entire symptom complex (a gut-to-brain disease). On the other hand, we speculated there is another quite different subgroup where disease begins with anxiety or depression and only later do new onset gut symptoms develop, and this is likely primarily a central nervous system cause (probably through the stress system), or a brain-to-gut disease. This is exactly what we found, with gut disease occurring first followed by new onset psychological distress in about two thirds of people from the community over a one year follow-up. (more…)
Author Interviews, Depression, Lancet / 23.07.2016

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Professor David A. Richards, PhD Professor of Mental Health Services Research and NIHR Senior Investigator University of Exeter Medical School University of Exeter St Luke's Campus Exeter United Kingdom MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: Depression is a common mental health disorder affecting around 350 million people worldwide. Untreated depression is expected to cost the global economy US$5.36 trillion between 2011 and 2030. Many patients request psychological therapy, but the best-evidenced therapy—cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT)—is complex and costly. A simpler therapy—behavioural activation (BA)—might be as effective and cheaper than is CBT. We aimed to establish the clinical efficacy and cost-effectiveness of BA compared with CBT for adults with depression. (more…)
Author Interviews, Mental Health Research, Pharmacology, Schizophrenia / 21.07.2016

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Glorimar Ortiz, MS Senior Researcher/Statistician NRI-National Association of State Mental Health Program Directors Research Institute Falls Church, VA 22042 MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings?  Response: Despite the lack of empirical evidence that antipsychotic polypharmacy produces greater outcomes to antipsychotic monotherapy, and that several clinical guidelines recommend against it, patients with a diagnosis of schizophrenia continue to being discharged on polypharmacy. Over the past few years, attempts have been made to lower the rate of antipsychotic polypharmacy throughout the country. Most of the existing literature on this topic are based on Medicaid claims data which exclude data for patients discharged from state psychiatric inpatient hospitals. Our study is very important because it is the first time that data on the use of antipsychotic medications are analyzed using a large sample of discharges from state psychiatric inpatient hospitals. These hospitals now have the opportunity to benchmark their antipsychotic medication use rate with national rates more accurately, and therefore, develop and implement performance improvement activities that are more precise. The study found that 12% of all discharges were prescribed two or more antipsychotic medications. Of those patients discharged on at least one antipsychotic medication, 18% were prescribed two or more antipsychotics. The study also found that patients with a schizophrenia diagnosis and an inpatient hospital stay of 3 months or longer are more likely of being discharged on polypharmacy, and that the main reason for this was to reduce patient’s symptoms. Antipsychotic polypharmacy affects nearly 10,000 patients with schizophrenia annually in state psychiatric inpatient hospitals. (more…)
Author Interviews, Karolinski Institute, Mental Health Research / 20.07.2016

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Lorena Fernández de la Cruz | Assistant Professor Department of Clinical Neuroscience | Karolinska Institutet Child and Adolescent Psychiatry Research Center Stockholm MedicalResearch.com: What is OCD? Response: Obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) is one of the most common psychiatric disorders. OCD has a lifetime prevalence of about two per cent in the general population, generally runs a chronic course, and is often associated with a significantly reduced quality of life. Despite this, the risk of suicide in OCD has traditionally been considered low, probably due the particular personality profile of this patient group, typically described as “harm avoidant”. However, we have seen that the risk of suicide is higher than previously thought. (more…)
Alcohol, Author Interviews, Memory / 19.07.2016

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Jeff Boissoneault, PhD Research Assistant Professor Center for Pain Research and Behavioral Health Department of Clinical and Health Psychology University of FloridaJeff Boissoneault, PhD Research Assistant Professor Center for Pain Research and Behavioral Health Department of Clinical and Health Psychology University of Florida MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings? Response: Many older adults are regular moderate drinkers. Although moderate drinking is considered to be a low risk behavior, growing evidence suggests older adults may be more susceptible to the cognitive and behavioral effects of moderate alcohol intake than younger people. We have previously shown that blood alcohol concentrations (BACs) below the legal limit for driving in the United States, 0.08 g/dL, affect working, or short-term, memory performance in older but not younger adults. For this study, we examined frontal theta power (FTP) and posterior alpha power (PAP), which are electrophysiological measures of brain activity associated with cognitive effort and maintenance of visual information, during a working memory task in both older and younger social drinkers. We found that during a nine-second delay period during which participants held briefly-displayed images in memory, moderate alcohol intake increased PAP in younger adults but decreased PAP in older adults. Examining the relationship between PAP and behavioral performance (accuracy and reaction time) suggested older adults may attempt to compensate for moderate alcohol-induced working memory impairment by prioritizing quick responding over the protection of their mental representation of the task images from environmental distractions. Younger adults did not show this effect. (more…)
Author Interviews, PTSD, Sleep Disorders / 19.07.2016

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Jim Burch, MS, PhD Associate Professor Dept. of Epidemiology & Biostatistics Cancer Prevention & Control Program Arnold School of Public Health University of South Carolina, Columbia, SC and Health Science Specialist WJB Dorn Department of Veterans Affairs Medical Center Columbia, SC MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: Over 21 million Veterans live in the U.S., and nearly 9 million of them receive healthcare through the Veterans Health Administration, which is the largest integrated healthcare system in the U.S. The military population is particularly vulnerable to sleep disturbances due to their work schedules, living conditions, and other physical and psychological factors that accompany their jobs. However, previous studies have not comprehensively described the scope and characteristics of sleep disorders among Veterans. Sleep is considered a physiological necessity. Inadequate sleep has been associated with a wide range of adverse health outcomes, including an increased risk of chronic diseases such as heart disease and cancer, psychiatric disorders, reduced quality of life, and increased mortality. (more…)
Author Interviews, Depression, JAMA, Mental Health Research, Pediatrics / 18.07.2016

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Dr Carmen Pace MPsych (Clin Child) PhD AMACPA Clinical Psychologist and Research Fellow Murdoch Childrens Research Institute The Royal Children’s Hospital Flemington Rd Parkville, Victoria AUS MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: We know that mothers of very preterm infants (born prior to 32 weeks gestation) are at higher risk for psychological distress compared to mothers who have healthy full term infants. However, detailed longitudinal research looking at how symptoms evolve over the first weeks and months is limited, and fathers are largely neglected in the literature. We addressed these gaps by assessing symptoms of depression and anxiety in both mothers and fathers every two weeks for the first twelve weeks after birth, and again at six months. (more…)
Author Interviews, Education, Memory, Neurological Disorders / 15.07.2016

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Kalipada Pahan, Ph.D Floyd A. Davis, M.D., Endowed Chair of Neurology Professor, Departments of Neurological Sciences, Biochemistry and Pharmacology Rush University Medical Center VA Scientist, Jesse Brown VA Medical Center Chicago, IL 60612 MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings? Response: Individual difference in learning and educational performance is a global issue. In many cases between two students of the same background studying in the same class, one turns out to be a poor learner and does worse than the other academically. Little is known on what changes occur in the brain of poor learners and how to improve performance in poor learners. Here, we have demonstrated that cinnamon, a common food spice and flavoring material, converts poor learning mice to good learners. Results of the study were recently published in the Journal of Neuroimmune Pharmacology. (more…)
Alzheimer's - Dementia, Author Interviews, Endocrinology, Hormone Therapy, Mayo Clinic, Menopause / 13.07.2016

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Kejal Kantarci, M.D. M.S. Professor of Radiology Division of Neuroradiology MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings? Response: A rapid decline in estrogen with menopause may be associated with an increased risk of Alzheimer’s disease risk in women. This study was conducted in newly postmenopausal women who received 17β-Estradiol via a skin patch or conjugated equine estrogen orally or placebo. Those who received 17β-Estradiol patch had reduced β-amyloid deposits, the plaques found in the brains of people with Alzheimer’s disease, three years after the end of the hormone therapies. In the study, women with APOE e4 — one form of the most common gene associated with late-onset Alzheimer's disease — who received the 17β-Estradiol patch had lower levels of β-amyloid deposits than those who received placebo. (more…)
Alzheimer's - Dementia, Author Interviews, Chemotherapy, Parkinson's / 13.07.2016

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Charbel Moussa MD. PhD Assistant Professor of Neurology Director- Laboratory for Dementia and Parkinsonism Clinical Research Director- National Parkinson's Foundation Center for Excellence Translational Neurotherapeutics Program Department of Neurology Georgetown University Medical Center Washington DC. MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings? Response: We conducted a pilot open label proof-of-concept study to evaluate the safety and tolerability of Nilotinib in participants with advanced Parkinson’s disease (PD) with dementia (PDD) or dementia with Lewy bodies (DLB). Our primary objective is to demonstrate that low oral daily doses of 150mg or 300mg Nilotinib (compared to 600-800mg in cancer) are safe and tolerated. Our secondary objectives are that Nilotinib will cross the blood brain barier and may inhibit cerebral spinal fluid Abl. Based on preclinical data we also hypothesized that Nilotinib will increase DA levels. Motor and cognitive functions were also measured as exploratory clinical outcomes. Other exploratory outcomes are that Nilotinib may alter PD-related CSF biomarkers DJ-1 and α-synuclein. As most participants in this study had dementia we also explored the effects of Nilotinib on Alzheimer's Disease-related CSF biomarkers, including Aβ40 and Aβ42, total tau and phosphorylated tau (p-tau). (more…)
Alzheimer's - Dementia, Author Interviews, Brain Injury, JAMA, Parkinson's / 11.07.2016

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Paul K. Crane, MD MPH Professor Department of Medicine Adjunct Professor Department of Health Services University of Washington MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: The background is that the most common experience of head injury with loss of consciousness is an apparent recovery. Sometimes this is very fast, sometimes it takes somewhat longer, but typically people return to their prior baseline. Nevertheless there is concern that the head injury may have set in motion processes that would lead to late life neurodegenerative conditions. This is bad enough for someone to deal with but it's made even worse if the head injury isn't even the victim's fault. Previous research has focused especially on Alzheimer's disease. A more limited research has focused on Parkinson's disease. We used data from three prospective cohort studies that included more than 7,000 people to study the relationship between head injury with loss of consciousness and subsequent risk of Alzheimer's and Parkinson's disease. We collected head injury exposure data at study enrollment, at a time when we administered cognitive tests and knew they did not have dementia, so our exposure data are not biased. Each of these studies also performed brain autopsies on people who died, and we evaluated data from more than 1500 autopsies. (more…)
Author Interviews, Cannabis, JAMA, Mental Health Research / 06.07.2016

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Mary P. Heitzeg, PhD Assistant Professor Department of Psychiatry University of Michigan MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings? Response: We wanted to find out if marijuana use changed the way the brain’s reward system responded to natural rewards. To probe response to natural reward, we used the chance to win some money and we observed brain response using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI). We looked at brain activity when participants were 20 years old on average, and then again 2 years later and 4 years later. We found that over time marijuana use was associated with a decrease in the brain’s reward response to the chance to win money. This finding is consistent with current theories of addiction that suggest that repeated use of a substance may dampen the brain’s reward response to things normally perceived as pleasurable and this alteration may drive the individual to continue substance use. (more…)
Author Interviews, Bipolar Disorder, JAMA, Schizophrenia / 06.07.2016

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Thomas M. Lancaster, PhD Neuroscience and Mental Health Research Institute Cardiff University Brain Imaging Research Centre Cardiff University, Cardiff, United Kingdom   MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings? Response: Psychotic disorders such as schizophrenia and bipolar disorders are heritable. Part of this genetic risk may be conferred by the combined effects of common risk alleles identified via genome wide association studies. Individuals with psychosis are also more likely to experience alterations in the ventral striatum (VS); a key node in the brain’s reward processing network. We hypothesized that common genetic risk for psychosis may confer risk via alterations in the VS. Using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) data from an adolescent sample (the IMAGEN cohort), we showed that increased psychosis risk was associated with increased BOLD (blood oxygen level dependency) in the VS, during reward processing. (more…)
Author Interviews, Depression, Fertility / 04.07.2016

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Jessica Datta Department of Social & Environmental Health Research London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine London MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: The paper presents an analysis of data from the third National Survey of Sexual Attitudes and Lifestyles (Natsal-3). Natsal-3 is a survey of more than 15,000 women and men aged 16-74 resident in Britain, conducted in 2010-2012, which includes a wide range of questions about sexual relationships and behaviour and reproductive history. In this paper we analysed responses to the questions: ‘Have you ever had a time, lasting 12 months or longer, when you and a partner were trying for a pregnancy but it didn’t happen?’ and ‘Have you (or a partner) ever sought medical or professional help about infertility?’. As well as calculating the prevalence of experience of infertility and help seeking, we looked at associated factors e.g. education, employment, relationship status. (more…)
Author Interviews, Autism, OBGYNE / 04.07.2016

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Dr-Claudia-Avella-GarcíaClaudia Avella-García MD, MPH, PhD ISGlobal - Institut de Salut Global Barcelona Unitat Docent de Medicina Preventiva i Salut Publica H.Mar-UPF-ASPB MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: Acetaminophen (paracetamol) is used by around half of all pregnant women in developed countries and is currently the recommended treatment for fever and pain during gestation. However, evidence linking exposure to this medication with negative changes in neurodevelopment has been coming to light, warranting further study. Therefore, our objective was to evaluate whether prenatal exposure to acetaminophen was adversely associated with child neurodevelopment at 1 and 5 years of age. For this reason, we evaluated 2644 mother-child pairs recruited during pregnancy as part of the INfancia y Medio Ambiente – Childhood and Environment (INMA) project, a Spanish general population-based cohort. We collected information on acetaminophen use prospectively up until week 32 of gestation. We evaluated neurodevelopment at 1 year of age using the Bayley Scales of Infant Development. At 5 years of age we applied a battery of tests evaluating different aspects of neurodevelopment including both cognitive and behavioural aspects. (more…)