Poststroke dementia: incidence and relationship to prestroke cognitive decline.

Objective: To evaluate the 3-year incidence of poststroke dementia (PSD) and the influence of prestroke cognitive decline.

Methods: The authors evaluated prestroke cognitive functions in 202 consecutive stroke patients > or =40 years old using the Informant Questionnaire on Cognitive Decline in the Elderly (IQCODE), with a cut-off of 104 for the diagnosis of dementia. Six months and then annually after stroke, dementia was reassessed.

Recurrence of the T666M calcium channel CACNA1A gene mutation in familial hemiplegic migraine with progressive cerebellar ataxia.

Familial hemiplegic migraine (HM) is an autosomal dominant migraine with aura. In 20% of HM families, HM is associated with a mild permanent cerebellar ataxia (PCA). The CACNA1A gene encoding the alpha1A subunit of P/Q-type voltage-gated calcium channels is involved in 50% of unselected HM families and in all families with HM/PCA.

Systemic vascular smooth muscle cell impairment in cerebral autosomal dominant arteriopathy with subcortical infarcts and leukoencephalopathy.

Cerebral autosomal dominant arteriopathy with subcortical infarcts and leukoencephalopathy (CADASIL) is characterized by a cerebral non-atherosclerotic, nonamyloid angiopathy mainly affecting the small arteries penetrating the white matter. In the brain vessels of two patients with CADASIL, abnormal patches of granular osmiophilic material have recently been described. Here we report the observation of similar granular osmiophilic material within the vessel walls of muscle and skin biopsies from a 54-year-old woman belonging to a CADASIL family, who suffered from subcortical dementia with leukoencephalopathy demonstrated on neuroimaging.