Mult Scler Relat Disord
December 2024
Background: Although depression and anxiety are common in people with multiple sclerosis (pwMS), access to psychotherapy remains limited.
Objectives: This study aimed to identify clinical factors that predict use of psychotherapy among pwMS.
Methods: From a retrospective chart review of a tertiary neuropsychiatry clinic in Toronto, Canada, data were obtained for 267 pwMS who received neuropsychiatric treatment (either with antidepressants or psychotherapy).
Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A
December 2024
Small bodies are capable of delivering essential prerequisites for the development of life, such as volatiles and organics, to the terrestrial planets. For example, empirical evidence suggests that water was delivered to the Earth by hydrated planetesimals from distant regions of the Solar System. Recently, several morphologically inactive near-Earth objects were reported to experience significant nongravitational accelerations inconsistent with radiation-based effects, and possibly explained by volatile-driven outgassing.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFBackground: There is heterogeneity of aerobic fitness (VO) changes with a standardized exercise training stimulus in the general population (i.e. some participants demonstrate improvements, others no change, and some a reduction in VO).
View Article and Find Full Text PDFAstronomers have found more than a dozen planets transiting stars that are 10-40 million years old, but younger transiting planets have remained elusive. The lack of such discoveries may be because planets have not fully formed at this age or because our view is blocked by the protoplanetary disk. However, we now know that many outer disks are warped or broken; provided the inner disk is depleted, transiting planets may thus be visible.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFObjective: To determine the mental health of Iranian citizens protesting the actions of their country's Morality Police. Street protests across Iran were met with violent suppression that included security forces reportedly targeting protestors' eyes.
Method: A group of 63 Iranian protestors (58.
Protein kinase R (PKR) functions in the eukaryotic innate immune system as a first-line defense against viral infections. PKR binds viral dsRNA, leading to autophosphorylation and activation. In its active state, PKR can phosphorylate its primary substrate, eIF2α, which blocks the initiation of translation in the infected cell.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFBackground: Fatigue is common in people with multiple sclerosis (MS). Understanding the relationship between fatigue, physical and neurobehavioural factors is important to inform future research and practice. Few studies explore this explicitly in people with progressive MS (pwPMS).
View Article and Find Full Text PDFHot Jupiters are among the best-studied exoplanets, but it is still poorly understood how their chemical composition and cloud properties vary with longitude. Theoretical models predict that clouds may condense on the nightside and that molecular abundances can be driven out of equilibrium by zonal winds. Here we report a phase-resolved emission spectrum of the hot Jupiter WASP-43b measured from 5 μm to 12 μm with the JWST's Mid-Infrared Instrument.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFBackground: Previous studies have investigated the influence of cannabis on cognition among people with MS (pwMS), yet the influence of sex in the context of cannabis use remains unexplored. We aim to fill this gap by investigating cannabis-sex related differences in verbal learning, memory and processing speed in association with fMRI (resting state, and task-based) metrics.
Method: Our sample consisted of 19 long-term, frequent cannabis users (8 males, 11 females).
Introduction: Multiple sclerosis (MS) is an immune-mediated demyelinating disease with a significant burden of neuropsychiatric sequelae. These symptoms, including depression and anxiety, are predictors of morbidity and mortality in people with MS. Despite a high prevalence of obsessive-compulsive disorder in MS, potentially shared pathophysiological mechanisms and overlap in possible treatments, no review has specifically examined the clinical dimensions of people with obsessive-compulsive and related disorders (OCRD) and MS.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFWe previously reported that people with multiple sclerosis (pwMS) who have been using cannabis frequently over many years can have significant cognitive improvements accompanied by concomitant task-specific changes in brain activation following 28 days of cannabis abstinence. We now hypothesize that the default Mode Network (DMN), known to modulate cognition, would also show an improved pattern of activation align with cognitive improvement following 28 days of drug abstinence. Thirty three cognitively impaired pwMS who were frequent cannabis users underwent a neuropsychological assessment and fMRI at baseline.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFBackground: Research on cognitive rehabilitation (CR) and aerobic exercise (EX) to improve cognition in progressive multiple sclerosis (PMS) remains limited. CogEx trial investigated the effectiveness of CR and EX in PMS: here, we present MRI substudy volumetric and task-related functional MRI (fMRI) findings.
Methods: Participants were randomised to: 'CR plus EX', 'CR plus sham EX (EX-S)', 'EX plus sham CR (CR-S)' and 'CR-S plus EX-S' and attended 12-week intervention.
Protein kinase R (PKR) functions in the eukaryotic innate immune system as a first-line defense against viral infections. PKR binds viral dsRNA, leading to autophosphorylation and activation. In its active state, PKR can phosphorylate its primary substrate, eIF2 , which blocks initiation of translation in the infected cell.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFThere are conflicting findings about the relationships between depression, anxiety, and cognitive dysfunction in people with multiple sclerosis (MS), and a paucity of research has examined the cumulative influence on cognition of depression plus anxiety. This study aimed to determine whether elevated symptoms of depression and anxiety alone or in combination are associated with worse cognition in people with MS. In this cross-sectional analysis, people with MS consecutively seen at a tertiary neuropsychiatry clinic completed the Hospital Anxiety and Depression Scale for symptoms of depression (HADS-D) and anxiety (HADS-A), and the Minimal Assessment of Cognitive Function in MS for cognitive indices.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFMelioidosis is caused by a gram-negative bacillus , which is found in water and soil in endemic areas. There are indicators that is increasing in endemic regions and expanding into new locations. It is unclear whether this is because of expanded boundaries or improved detection capabilities.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFBackground: People living with multiple sclerosis (MS) face a higher likelihood of being diagnosed with a depressive disorder than the general population. Although many low-cost screening tools and evidence-based interventions exist, depression in people living with MS is underreported, underascertained by clinicians, and undertreated.
Objective: This study aims to design a closed-loop tool to improve depression care for these patients.
Introduction: Depression occurs in over 50% of individuals living with multiple sclerosis (MS) and can be treated using many modalities. Yet, it remains: under-reported by patients, under-ascertained by clinicians and under-treated. To enhance these three behaviours likely to promote evidence-based depression care, we engaged multiple stakeholders to iteratively design a first-in-kind digital health tool.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFThe recent inference of sulfur dioxide (SO) in the atmosphere of the hot (approximately 1,100 K), Saturn-mass exoplanet WASP-39b from near-infrared JWST observations suggests that photochemistry is a key process in high-temperature exoplanet atmospheres. This is because of the low (<1 ppb) abundance of SO under thermochemical equilibrium compared with that produced from the photochemistry of HO and HS (1-10 ppm). However, the SO inference was made from a single, small molecular feature in the transmission spectrum of WASP-39b at 4.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFPurpose: Cognitive behavioural therapies (CBTs) are a standard of care for treatment of many 'hidden symptoms' in people with MS (PwMS), such as stress, depression, and fatigue. However, these interventions can vary widely in formatting and may not be tailored for PwMS. To optimize CBTs for MS, understanding the experiences of PwMS and clinicians is essential.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFBackground: We previously demonstrated the convergent validity of a fully automated voice recognition analogue of the Symbol Digit Modalities Test (VR-SDMT) for evaluating processing speed in people with multiple sclerosis (pwMS).
Objective/methods: We aimed to replicate these results in 54 pwMS and 18 healthy controls (HCs), demonstrating the VR-SDMT's reliability.
Results: Significant correlations were found between the VR-SDMT and the traditional oral SDMT in the multiple sclerosis (MS) ( = -0.