Polysomnographic versus video scoring of large muscle group movements during sleep in children with restless sleep.

Background: Restless sleep is a common complaint in children with sleep and other disorders, when it occurs as an isolated symptom it can depict a separate condition called restless sleep disorder (RSD). A key diagnostic feature of RSD is the polysomnographic (PSG) scoring of five or more large muscle movements (LMM) per hour of sleep. Initial publications on RSD used video-PSG (vPSG) analysis to count LMM.

Diversity and Relationships among Neglected Apricot ( L.) Landraces Using Morphological Traits and SSR Markers: Implications for Agro-Biodiversity Conservation.

Apricot ( L.) is an economically important tree species globally cultivated in temperate areas. Italy has an ample number of traditional varieties, but numerous landraces are abandoned and at risk of extinction because of increasing urbanization, agricultural intensification, and varietal renewal.

Multiple connections between Amazonia and Atlantic Forest shaped the phylogenetic and morphological diversity of Chiasmocleis Mehely, 1904 (Anura: Microhylidae: Gastrophryninae).

Chiasmocleis is the most species-rich genus of Neotropical microhylids. Herein, we provide the first comprehensive multilocus phylogeny for the genus, including all but 3 of the 34 recognized species and multiple individuals per species. We discuss cryptic speciation, species discovery, patterns of morphological evolution, and provide a historical biogeographic analysis to account for the current distribution of the genus.

Sex-specific issues in eating disorders: a clinical and psychopathological investigation.

Objective: To highlight the characteristics of eating disorders (ED) in males, with particular attention to sex-related clinical features and psychiatric co-morbidities.

Method: Out of 280 persons, referred to our outpatients ED clinic between January 2011 and June 2014, 267 with complete information were included in this retrospective observational study.

Results: The men/women ratio was one to five (male 16.

Never too late to be anxious: validation of the Geriatric Anxiety Inventory, Italian version.

Aim: The aim of this work was to validate the Italian version of GAI (GAI-It) and its short form (GAI-It SF) in an over 65-population.

Methods: In 3 recruitment areas across Italy, two raters reciprocally blind to results assessed eligible subjects; a semi-structured diagnostic clinical interview was performed by a psychiatrist.

Results: Among the 76 enrolled subjects (mean age 72.

Molecular and morphological data reveal three new cryptic species of (Mehely 1904) (Anura, Microhylidae) endemic to the Atlantic Forest, Brazil.

Three new cryptic species of from the Atlantic Forest of Brazil are described. Two of these species occur in the northeastern states of Sergipe and Bahia, whereas the third species is found in the southeastern state of São Paulo. The new species can be distinguished from other congeneric species by the molecular data, as evidenced in the phylogeny, and by a combination of morphological characters including: size, foot webbing, dermal spines, and coloration patterns.

Oximetry in obese children with sleep-disordered breathing.

Background: Obesity is an important risk factor for obstructive sleep apnea syndrome (OSAS), and obese children with OSAS have frequently shown oxygen desaturations when compared with normal-weight children. The aim of our study was to investigate the oximetry characteristics in children with obesity and sleep-disordered breathing (SDB).

Methods: Children referred for suspected OSAS were enrolled in the study.

Cognitive function in preschool children with sleep-disordered breathing.

Purpose: The purposes of this study were to assess cognitive functions in preschool children with sleep-disordered breathing (SDB) and to compare them with matched control children.

Methods: A clinical sample of 2.5- to 6-year-old children with SDB was recruited.

Impact of obesity on cognitive outcome in children with sleep-disordered breathing.

Objectives: The objective of this study was to evaluate the impact of obesity on cognitive impairment, in children with obstructive sleep apnoea (OSA), children with OSA and obesity, and in normal controls.

Methods: Thirty-six children with OSA (group 1), 38 children with OSA and obesity (group 2) and 58 normal controls (group 3) were studied. The Total intelligence quotient (T-IQ), Verbal IQ (V-IQ) and the Performance IQ (P-IQ) scores were obtained using the Wechsler Intelligence Scale for Children - Third Edition Revised.

A three-dimensional ankle kinetostatic model to simulate loaded and unloaded joint motion.

A kinetostatic model able to replicate both the natural unloaded motion of the tibiotalar (or ankle) joint and the joint behavior under external loads is presented. The model is developed as the second step of a sequential procedure, which allows the definition of a kinetostatic model as a generalization of a kinematic model of the joint defined at the first step. Specifically, this kinematic model taken as the starting point of the definition procedure is a parallel spatial mechanism which replicates the ankle unloaded motion.

A new species of Chiasmocleis (Microhylidae, Gastrophryninae) from the Atlantic Forest of Espírito Santo State, Brazil.

Among Neotropical microhylids, the genus Chiasmocleis is exceptionally diverse. Most species of Chiasmocleis were described in recent years based on external morphology, but recent studies using molecular data did not support the monophyly of the species groups clustered based on feet webbing. Furthermore, a phylogeographic study of C.

Anxiety symptoms in 74+ community-dwelling elderly: associations with physical morbidity, depression and alcohol consumption.

Objective: Anxiety among community-dwelling older adults has not been studied sufficiently. The aims of this cross-sectional population-based study were to estimate the point prevalence of clinically relevant anxiety symptoms and to describe their socio-demographic and clinical features, with particular focus on the association with somatic illnesses.

Methods: Three-hundred-sixty-six non-demented older adults (mean age 83.

Epilepsy and sleep-disordered breathing as false friends: a case report.

Because signs of nocturnal seizures can overlap with sleep respiratory events, clinicians can have difficulty distinguishing abnormal events related to sleep disorders from epileptic seizures. We describe the case of a 3-year-old child presenting with ictal electroencephalographic (EEG) activity associated with a particular form of atypical obstructive sleep apnea, characterized by increased respiratory rate, paradoxical breathing, desaturations, and tonic-dystonic posture associated with movement artifacts. Following cardiorespiratory polysomnography, the patient was initially misdiagnosed as having severe obstructive sleep apnea syndrome.

Animal-assisted interventions for elderly patients affected by dementia or psychiatric disorders: a review.

Objective: The aim of this literature review was to assess the effects of Animal-Assisted Interventions (AAI) on elderly patients with dementia or various psychiatric disorders.

Methods: We conducted a comprehensive literature search using the online PubMed network of the US National Library of Medicine & National Institutes of Health, Embase, PsycINFO, with the purpose of investigating AAI effects on cognitive functions, mood, and behaviour.

Results: A total of 18 articles on dementia and 5 on psychiatric disorders were included in the present review.

Molecular phylogeny of microhylid frogs (Anura: Microhylidae) with emphasis on relationships among New World genera.

Background: Over the last ten years we have seen great efforts focused on revising amphibian systematics. Phylogenetic reconstructions derived from DNA sequence data have played a central role in these revisionary studies but have typically under-sampled the diverse frog family Microhylidae. Here, we present a detailed phylogenetic study focused on expanding previous hypotheses of relationships within this cosmopolitan family.

Autonomic cardiovascular tests in children with obstructive sleep apnea syndrome.

Study Objectives: The aim of our study was to investigate cardiovascular autonomic activity during wakefulness, using cardiovascular tests, in a population of children with OSAS.

Design: Prospective study.

Setting: Sleep unit of an academic center.

Sleep cyclic alternating pattern analysis in healthy children during the first year of life: a daytime polysomnographic study.

We evaluated the cyclic alternating pattern (CAP) during the first year of life in order to obtain information on the maturation of arousal mechanisms during NREM sleep and to provide normative data for CAP parameters in this age range (5-16months). Eleven healthy children (mean age 7.9±3.

Investigation of an epistastic effect between a set of TAAR6 and HSP-70 genes variations and major mood disorders.

Epistasis, the interaction between genes, is a topic of current interest in molecular and quantitative genetics. We have further studied a previously investigated sample of 187 major depressive disorder (MDD) patients, 171 bipolar disorder (BD) patients, and 288 controls, and tried to analyze the interaction between a set of variations of independent genes: the trace amine receptor 6 (rs4305745, rs8192625, rs7452939, rs6903874, and rs6937506) and the heat shock protein 70 (rs562047, rs1061581, rs2227956). The multifactor dimensionality reduction (MDR) method was applied and the covariates associated with diagnosis were also controlled.