Journal of neurology, neurosurgery, and psychiatry
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J. Neurol. Neurosurg. Psychiatr. · Nov 2012
Is psycho-physical stress a risk factor for stroke? A case-control study.
Chronic stress is associated with cardiovascular diseases, but the link with stroke has not been well established. Stress is influenced by life-style habits, personality type and anxiety levels. We sought to evaluate psycho-physical stress as a risk factor for stroke, while assessing gender influences. ⋯ Compared with healthy age-matched individuals, stressful habits and type A behaviour are associated with high risk of stroke. This association is not modified by gender.
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J. Neurol. Neurosurg. Psychiatr. · Nov 2012
Randomized Controlled Trial Multicenter StudyThe LaLiMo Trial: lamotrigine compared with levetiracetam in the initial 26 weeks of monotherapy for focal and generalised epilepsy--an open-label, prospective, randomised controlled multicenter study.
Of the newer antiepileptic drugs, lamotrigine (LTG) and levetiracetam (LEV) are popular first choice drugs for epilepsy. The authors compared these drugs with regard to their efficacy and tolerability in the initial monotherapy for epilepsy. ⋯ ClinicalTrials.gov identifier NCT00242606.
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J. Neurol. Neurosurg. Psychiatr. · Nov 2012
Logopenic aphasia in Alzheimer's disease: clinical variant or clinical feature?
Primary progressive aphasia (PPA) is a clinical syndrome characterised by progressive decline in components of the language system. Recent evidence suggests that the logopenic/phonological (LPA) variant is a reliable in vivo marker of Alzheimer related pathology. The aim of this study was to determine if patients with clinically typical early stage Alzheimer's disease (AD) display a characteristic language disorder that resembles LPA, or if LPA is a clinical manifestation of an atypical form of AD. ⋯ The impairment found in clinically typical early stage AD did not correspond consistently to the linguistic profiles described in any of the sub-syndromes of PPA. The only reliably distinguishing feature was a reduction across a range of syntactic complexity measures. The findings suggest that LPA represents an atypical clinical presentation of AD rather than a common clinical feature of typical AD.