Publications by authors named "Freedman M"

Background: Mild Behavioral Impairment (MBI) is a condition characterized by neuropsychiatric symptoms (NPS) in older adults without dementia, serving as a precursor to various forms of dementia. This study explores the association between NPS and functional connectivity (FC) within the default mode network (DMN), executive control network (ECN), and salience network (SN) across three high-risk cohorts: mild cognitive impairment (due to Alzheimer's) (MCI, n = 79), cerebrovascular disease (CVD, n = 144), and Parkinson's disease (PD, n = 132).

Method: A total of 367 participants were recruited from the Ontario Neurodegenerative Disease Research Initiative (ONDRI).

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Androgen receptor (AR) splice variants, of which ARv7 is the most common, are increased in castration-resistant prostate cancer, but the extent to which they drive AR activity is unclear. We generated a subline of VCaP cells (VCaP16) that is resistant to the AR inhibitor enzalutamide (ENZ). AR activity in VCaP16 is driven by ARv7, independently of full-length AR (ARfl), and its cistrome and transcriptome mirror those of ARfl in VCaP cells.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Background: CLASSIC-MS explored long-term outcomes of patients treated with cladribine tablets.

Objective: Assess long-term efficacy in patients previously enrolled in ORACLE-MS, a Phase III parent trial.

Methods: ORACLE-MS included patients with a first clinical demyelinating event (FCDE or clinically isolated syndrome) who received ⩾1 course of cladribine tablets or placebo.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Background And Objectives: Early treatment of multiple sclerosis (MS) reduces disease activity and the risk of long-term disease progression. Effectiveness of ocrelizumab is established in relapsing MS (RMS); however, data in early RMS are lacking. We evaluated the 4-year effectiveness and safety of ocrelizumab as a first-line therapy in treatment-naive patients with recently diagnosed relapsing-remitting MS (RRMS).

View Article and Find Full Text PDF
Article Synopsis
  • The study aimed to assess how well certain biomarkers in blood (sNfL, sGFAP) and cerebrospinal fluid (cNfL, cGFAP) can predict long-term disability outcomes in Multiple Sclerosis (MS) patients after over 15 years of follow-up.
  • Results showed that while cNfL and cGFAP were good predictors of confirmed disability worsening (CDW), sGFAP was not effective on its own.
  • The combination of cNfL and cGFAP provided better predictions for CDW compared to either biomarker alone, suggesting these biomarkers could work together to indicate patient prognosis in MS.
View Article and Find Full Text PDF

There is increasing interest in the use of home-based monitoring in people with chronic lung diseases to improve access to care, support patient self-management, and facilitate the collection of information for clinical care and research. However, integration of home-based monitoring into clinical and research settings requires careful consideration of test performance and other attributes. There is no published guidance from professional respiratory societies to advance the science of home-based monitoring for chronic lung disease.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF
Article Synopsis
  • - The study aimed to see if structural network parameters provide additional insights into the effectiveness of MS treatment after immunoablation and autologous stem cell transplantation, focusing on patients whose relapses were suppressed.
  • - Researchers analyzed data from 24 MS patients before and after treatment, assessing brain health markers like N-acetylaspartate to creatine ratio (NAA/Cr) and serum neurofilament light chain (sNfL) in relation to network parameters.
  • - Results showed that changes in network parameters post-treatment were significantly linked to improved measures of neuronal injury, suggesting these parameters could serve as valuable indicators of disease severity in progressive MS.
View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Androgen receptor (AR)-mediated transcription plays a critical role in development and prostate cancer growth. AR drives gene expression by binding to thousands of cis-regulatory elements (CRE) that loop to hundreds of target promoters. With multiple CREs interacting with a single promoter, it remains unclear how individual AR bound CREs contribute to gene expression.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Background/objective: Disclosing individual research results to participants is not standard practice. The return of individual research results to participants may increase recruitment, retention, and engagement in research. This study's objective was to explore the preferences, expectations, and experiences of research participants receiving individual research results.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

We analyzed genomic data from the prostate cancer of African- and European American men to identify differences contributing to racial disparity of outcome. We also performed FISH-based studies of Chromodomain helicase DNA-binding protein 1 (CHD1) loss on prostate cancer tissue microarrays. We created CHD1-deficient prostate cancer cell lines for genomic, drug sensitivity and functional homologous recombination (HR) activity analysis.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Background: It is unknown whether people with aquaporin-4 antibody positive (AQP4-IgG+) neuromyelitis optica spectrum disorder (NMOSD) experience a prodrome, although a few cases report AQP4 + serology up to 16 years before the first attack.

Objectives: To evaluate whether individuals with AQP4-IgG + NMOSD have prodromal neurologic symptoms preceding the first attack.

Methods: We reviewed medical records of participants meeting the 2015 diagnostic criteria for AQP4-IgG + NMOSD from four demyelinating disease centres in the Canadian NMOSD cohort study CANOPTICS.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF
Article Synopsis
  • A study investigated the possibility of a prodromal phase in aquaporin-4 antibody positive neuromyelitis optica spectrum disorder (NMOSD) and myelin oligodendrocyte glycoprotein antibody disease (MOGAD) using health data from Ontario, Canada.
  • The research involved comparing outpatient visits and hospitalizations of individuals with NMOSD and MOGAD to matched general population controls over five years prior to their first incident attack.
  • Results indicated that NMOSD patients had significantly higher healthcare use before their incident attack, suggesting a potential prodromal phase that could allow for earlier diagnosis and management of the condition.
View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Background: eHealth interventions have proven to be valuable resources for users with diverse mental and behavioral health concerns. As these technologies continue to proliferate, both academic researchers and commercial app creators are leveraging the use of features that foster a sense of social connection on these digital platforms. Yet, the literature often insufficiently represents the functionality of these key social features, resulting in a lack of understanding of how they are being implemented.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF
Article Synopsis
  • * Analysis of data from 52 Alzheimer’s patients revealed that those with Aβ+ status had worse cognitive scores and higher neuropsychiatric inventory scores, with the NPI-Q being a strong predictor of β-amyloid positivity.
  • * A new scoring system called Clinical β-Amyloid Positivity Prediction Score (CAPS) was introduced, which can identify Aβ+ individuals accurately in 86.7% of cases, aiding in efficient referrals for appropriate therapies in primary care settings.
View Article and Find Full Text PDF
Article Synopsis
  • The SPIROMICS Study of Early COPD Progression (SOURCE) aims to investigate the biological reasons behind early-stage COPD in younger individuals who smoke, addressing a gap in current medical knowledge that hinders treatment development.
  • The study plans to enroll 649 participants aged 30-55 with a history of smoking, alongside 40 never-smoker controls, to collect comprehensive health data and analyze potential mechanisms of disease progression.
  • SOURCE seeks to use advanced imaging and biospecimen collection methods over three years to enhance understanding of COPD and contribute to better prevention and treatment strategies.
View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Diroximel fumarate (DRF), ozanimod (OZA) and interferon beta-1a (IFN) are disease-modifying therapies approved for the treatment of relapsing multiple sclerosis. No randomized trials have compared DRF versus OZA and IFN. We compared DRF versus OZA and DRF versus IFN using matching-adjusted indirect comparisons for efficacy outcomes, including annualized relapse rate (ARR), 12- and 24-week confirmed disability progression (CDP) and absence of gadolinium-enhancing (Gd+) T1 lesions and new/newly enlarging T2 lesions.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Unlabelled: Phenotypic plasticity is a recognized mechanism driving therapeutic resistance in patients with prostate cancer. Although underlying molecular causations driving phenotypic plasticity have been identified, therapeutic success is yet to be achieved. To identify putative master regulator transcription factors (MR-TF) driving phenotypic plasticity in prostate cancer, this work utilized a multiomic approach using genetically engineered mouse models of prostate cancer combined with patient data to identify MYB proto-oncogene like 2 (MYBL2) as a significantly enriched transcription factor in prostate cancer exhibiting phenotypic plasticity.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Introduction: We investigated the effect of perivascular spaces (PVS) volume on speeded executive function (sEF), as mediated by white matter hyperintensities (WMH) volume and plasma glial fibrillary acidic protein (GFAP) in neurodegenerative diseases.

Methods: A mediation analysis was performed to assess the relationship between neuroimaging markers and plasma biomarkers on sEF in 333 participants clinically diagnosed with Alzheimer's disease/mild cognitive impairment, frontotemporal dementia, or cerebrovascular disease from the Ontario Neurodegenerative Disease Research Initiative.

Results: PVS was significantly associated with sEF (c = -0.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF
Article Synopsis
  • Burnout is a significant issue for healthcare workers, impacting their wellbeing and the quality of care they provide, necessitating both systemic changes and personal resilience skills.
  • A trial was conducted with 554 healthcare workers to assess the feasibility and effectiveness of the PARK program, an online self-guided coping skills intervention designed to help combat burnout during the COVID-19 pandemic.
  • Results indicated that participants receiving PARK showed significant improvements in anxiety levels compared to those in a waitlist group, even though overall burnout and wellbeing changes between the two groups were not statistically significant.
View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Purpose: Histologic transformation to small cell lung cancer (SCLC) is a mechanism of treatment resistance in patients with advanced oncogene-driven lung adenocarcinoma (LUAD) that currently requires histologic review for diagnosis. Herein, we sought to develop an epigenomic cell-free DNA (cfDNA)-based approach to noninvasively detect small cell transformation in patients with EGFR mutant (EGFRm) LUAD.

Experimental Design: To characterize the epigenomic landscape of transformed (t)SCLC relative to LUAD and de novo SCLC, we performed chromatin immunoprecipitation sequencing (ChIP-seq) to profile the histone modifications H3K27ac, H3K4me3, and H3K27me3; methylated DNA immunoprecipitation sequencing (MeDIP-seq); assay for transposase-accessible chromatin sequencing; and RNA sequencing on 26 lung cancer patient-derived xenograft (PDX) tumors.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Background: Multiple sclerosis (MS) is a clinically and biologically heterogenous disease with currently unpredictable progression and relapse. After the development and success of neurofilament as a cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) biomarker, there is reinvigorated interest in identifying other markers of or contributors to disease. The objective of this study is to probe the predictive potential of a panel of brain-enriched proteins on MS disease progression and subtype.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Renal cell carcinoma with sarcomatoid differentiation (sRCC) is associated with poor survival and a heightened response to immune checkpoint inhibitors (ICIs). Two major barriers to improving outcomes for sRCC are the limited understanding of its gene regulatory programs and the low diagnostic yield of tumor biopsies due to spatial heterogeneity. Herein, we characterized the epigenomic landscape of sRCC by profiling 107 epigenomic libraries from tissue and plasma samples from 50 patients with RCC and healthy volunteers.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF
Article Synopsis
  • Early treatment with immunomodulating therapy improves short-term clinical outcomes in multiple sclerosis (MS) patients, reducing the risk of conversion to clinically definite MS (CDMS) by 30.5%.
  • In a study of patients with clinically isolated syndrome (CIS), those who received early treatment demonstrated fewer relapses and maintained stable disability over 15 years compared to a delayed treatment group.
  • By the 15-year mark, 66.3% of patients treated early remained employed, further indicating the benefits of starting treatment early in the disease course.
View Article and Find Full Text PDF

A PHP Error was encountered

Severity: Warning

Message: A non-numeric value encountered

Filename: controllers/Author.php

Line Number: 219

Backtrace:

File: /var/www/html/application/controllers/Author.php
Line: 219
Function: _error_handler

File: /var/www/html/index.php
Line: 316
Function: require_once

A PHP Error was encountered

Severity: Warning

Message: A non-numeric value encountered

Filename: libraries/Pagination.php

Line Number: 413

Backtrace:

File: /var/www/html/application/controllers/Author.php
Line: 274
Function: create_links

File: /var/www/html/index.php
Line: 316
Function: require_once