Efficacy and safety of surgical treatment of cluster headache.

Background And Objectives: Cluster headache (CR) is the most severe human headache and is chronic in 10%-20% of patients, and 10% can become refractory to all effective drugs. In this scenario, surgical procedures are indicated: radiofrequencies of the sphenopalatine ganglion ipsilateral to pain (RF-SPG), bilateral stimulation of the occipital nerves (NOM-S) and deep brain stimulation (DBS) of the ipsilateral posterior hypothalamus. The efficacy and safety of each of these procedures has been specifically analyzed, but the progress of a series of patients following this surgical route in order of aggressiveness has not been described.

Ocular ptosis: differential diagnosis and treatment.

Purpose Of Review: The current article provides a brief summary of the clinical approach to congenital and acquired ptosis. An increasing number of publications analyze causes of ptosis or describe diagnostic tests or advances in ptosis genetics. The aim of our work is to summarize these findings and provide an updated algorithm for the diagnosis and treatment of patients with ptosis.

Mutation Spectrum in the CACNA1A Gene in 49 Patients with Episodic Ataxia.

Episodic ataxia is an autosomal dominant ion channel disorder characterized by episodes of imbalance and incoordination. The disease is genetically heterogeneous and is classified as episodic ataxia type 2 (EA2) when it is caused by a mutation in the CACNA1A gene, encoding the α subunit of the P/Q-type voltage-gated calcium channel Ca2.1.

[Changes introduced into the recent International Classification of Headache Disorders: ICHD-III beta classification].

Introduction: The International Headache Society (IHS) has published the third edition of the International Classification of Headache Disorders (ICHD-III beta), the most commonly used guide to diagnosing headaches in the world.

Aims: To review the recent additions to the guide, to explain the new entities that appear in it and to compare the conditions that have had their criteria further clarified against the criteria in the previous edition.

Development: We have recorded a large number of clarifications in the criteria in practically all the headaches and neuralgias in the classification, but the conditions that have undergone the most significant clarifications are chronic migraine, primary headache associated with sexual activity, short-lasting unilateral neuralgiform headache attacks, new daily persistent headache, medication-overuse headache, syndrome of transient headache and neurological deficits with cerebrospinal fluid lymphocytosis.

New subtype of spinocerebellar ataxia with altered vertical eye movements mapping to chromosome 1p32.

Importance: To provide clinical and genetic diagnoses for patients' conditions, it is important to identify and characterize the different subtypes of spinocerebellar ataxia (SCA).

Objective: To clinically and genetically characterize a Spanish kindred with pure SCA presenting with altered vertical eye movements. DESIGN Family study of ambulatory patients.

Pourfour du Petit Syndrome in a Patient with Thyroid Carcinoma.

The clinical presentation of Pourfour du Petit syndrome (PdPs) is the opposite of Horner syndrome. Although all disorders underlying Horner syndrome may potentially present as PdPs, very few cases of the latter have been described in the literature. We report a patient with PdPs due to carotid compression by a thyroid tumor.

[Stimulation of the occipital nerve in the treatment of drug-resistant cluster headache].

Aim: To evaluate the occipital nerve stimulation therapy in as a treatment for drug-resistant cluster headache.

Patients And Methods: Prospective study of four patients, three males and one female. Mean age of 42 years.

Early-onset familial lewy body dementia with extensive tauopathy: a clinical, genetic, and neuropathological study.

We describe a Spanish family in which 3 of 4 siblings had dementia with Lewy bodies, 2 of them starting at age 26 years and the other at 29 years. The father has recently been diagnosed with Lewy body disease, with onset at 77 years. Neuropathological examination of the brain of the index patient disclosed unusual features characterized by diffuse Lewy body disease and generalized neurofibrillary tangle pathology but with no amyloid deposits in any region.

Marketed oral triptans in the acute treatment of migraine: a systematic review on efficacy and tolerability.

Background: In the current literature, there is neither a reported systematic review comparing the efficacy of triptans at 30 minutes and 1 hour after the migraine treatment, nor data related to efficacy of new marketed triptans.

Objective: The main objective of this analysis was to compare the efficacy and tolerability of currently marketed oral, non-reencapsulated triptan formulations vs placebo in the treatment of moderate-to-severe migraine attacks.

Methods: A systematic review of double-blind, randomized clinical trials reporting data after a single migraine attack was conducted.

Rizatriptan 10-mg wafer versus usual nontriptan therapy for migraine: analysis of return to function and patient preference.

Background: More than half of patients with migraine suffer moderate to severe functional disability during migraine attacks.

Objective: To compare effects on functional disability at 2 hours after treating a migraine with rizatriptan 10-mg wafer versus usual nontriptan therapy for triptan-naïve patients with migraine.

Design: Open-label, prospective, two-attack study conducted at 111 neurology clinics.

Diagnostic potential of acoustic startle reflex, acoustic blink reflex, and electro-oculography in progressive supranuclear palsy: a prospective study.

We carried out a prospective study to analyze the diagnostic potential of acoustic startle reflex (ASR), acoustic blink reflex (ABR) and electro-oculography (EOG) in early stages of atypical parkinsonian syndrome. The study was carried out in a consecutive series of 41 patients clinically diagnosed as atypical parkinsonism (mean time from first symptoms of 38 months and follow-up of 26 months). The three procedures were carried out immediately after the first clinical evaluation.