Internal medicine
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A 36-year-old man with inverse Gottron's sign was admitted for clinically amyopathic dermatomyositis (CADM) with rapidly progressive interstitial lung disease (RP-ILD). Early addition of plasma exchange (PE) to triple therapy improved severe respiratory failure and transiently decreased serum ferritin levels and anti-melanoma differentiation-associated gene 5 antibody (anti-MDA5 Ab) titers. Furthermore, switching from tacrolimus to tofacitinib resulted in disease remission. Recognition of the inverse Gottron's sign may allow for the earlier diagnosis of anti-MDA5 Ab-positive dermatomyositis, and early addition of PE to triple therapy and administration of tofacitinib in refractory cases may be effective for anti-MDA5 Ab-positive CADM with RP-ILD under life-threatening conditions.
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Case Reports
Ventral Variant Posterior Cortical Atrophy with Occipito-temporal Accumulation of Tau Proteins/Astrocyte Gliosis.
A 73-year-old woman with posterior cortical atrophy (PCA) presented with progressive apperceptive visual agnosia, alexia, agraphia, ventral simultanagnosia, prosopagnosia, and allocentric (stimulus-centered) left-sided hemispatial neglect. All of these symptoms were attributed to damage to the bilateral occipito-temporal cortices, consistent with ventral variant PCA. While the Pittsburgh compound B uptake was extensively distributed throughout the occipito-parietal (dorsal) and occipito-temporal (ventral) areas, the THK5351 (ligand binding to tau aggregates/astrocyte gliosis) accumulation was limited to the ventral area. These findings suggest that local accumulation of tau proteins and/or astrocyte gliosis over the occipito-temporal cortices can result in ventral variant PCA.
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Objective Atrial fibrillation (AF) is the most common cause of tachycardia-induced cardiomyopathy (TIC). However, which patients with AF are prone to developing TIC remains unclear. In this study, we investigated the clinical features of AF patients with TIC. ⋯ A multivariable analysis found that persistent AF [odds ratio (OR), 3.19; 95% confidence interval (CI), 1.94-5.24], renal dysfunction (OR, 1.87; 95% CI, 1.06-3.32), and type 2 diabetes (OR, 2.30; 95% CI, 1.31-4.05) were significantly associated with TIC. Conclusion Comorbid renal dysfunction and type 2 diabetes were clinical features of AF patients with TIC. Persistent AF, and short AVNERP may be involved in the development of TIC.
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Case Reports
A Case of COVID-19 Infection Raising Suspicions of a Connection between Vascular Damage and Thrombus Formation.
Although endothelial damage has been hypothesized to be associated with coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19)-related cerebral infarction based on the specificity of the viral cellular invasion pathway, no case has been reported to date. We herein report a 51-year-old Japanese woman who presented with neck pain one week after COVID-19 infection. ⋯ Ultrasonography revealed multiple flap-like structures that were assumed to be thrombi. Although the patient had no cerebral infarction, this could be an important case of vascular damage and thrombus formation in a COVID-19 patient.