Journal of neuroimaging : official journal of the American Society of Neuroimaging
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Myotonic Dystrophy Type I (DM1) is a neurodegenerative, genetic, and multisystemic disorder with a large variety of symptoms due to a CTG trinucleotide expansion located on Dystrophia Myotonica Protein Kinase (DMPK) gene. Previous reports have shown cognitive deterioration in these patients. Given that white matter (WM) degradation has also been reported in DM1 patients, here we explored if alterations in the cognitive profile of DM1 patients could be related to the deterioration of WM. ⋯ Our results suggest that despite the pervasive WM integrity loss in DM1 disorder, specific memory impairments can be associated to discreet areas of WM deterioration in these patients.
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Mycobacterium leprae complex affects peripheral nerves, causing nerve enlargement. This proof-of-concept pilot study was conducted to determine if a small hand-held ultrasound device can accurately identify nerve involvement in individuals with leprosy. ⋯ A hand-held ultrasound device can readily identify nerve enlargement in individuals with leprosy. This type of device may assist in the diagnosis of leprosy in areas with limited healthcare resources because of the portability and low-cost nature of such devices.
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Radial artery catheterization has been newly incorporated into the field of endovascular surgical neuroradiology as a safer and more efficient method for Cerebral angiography as opposed to the femoral artery approach. The objective is to understand the relationship between cerebral angiography procedure times after an operator has converted to a radial first approach. ⋯ Transradial procedural time and fluoroscopy time continued to improve until about 55 cases, but did not reach the peak efficiency of the femoral approach. Further advances in catheter technology are needed to continue to improve radial artery diagnostic cerebral angiography.
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Hashimoto's thyroiditis (HT) is a type of autoimmune thyroid disease. Diffusion tensor imaging (DTI) can evaluate microstructural brain involvement in various diseases. We aimed to investigate whether there were any DTI differences in patients with HT, and the relationship between DTI values and disease duration time and thyroid peroxidase antibodies (TPOAb) levels. ⋯ The current DTI study presented microstructural changes in the neurocognitive-related areas that may be related to accompanying neurological findings in HT.
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Assess the incidence of enhancing lesions on follow-up MRIs in patients with multiple sclerosis (MS) to determine the utility of intravenous, gadolinium-based contrast agent (IV-GBCA) use in routine follow-up imaging. ⋯ Enhancing lesions are uncommon on follow-up MRIs in MS patients. Our data suggest that new enhancing lesions are not present on a follow-up MRI when two conditions are met: (1) preceding MRI does not demonstrate any enhancing lesions and (2) there is no interval change of the lesions on the current 3D-T2-FLAIR sequence compared to the preceding 3D-T2-FLAIR sequence. IV-GBCA should be reserved for instances when temporal knowledge of lesion formation is needed.