Stroke management during the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic: experience from three regions of the north east of Italy (Veneto, Friuli-Venezia-Giulia, Trentino-Alto-Adige).

Background: Efficiency of care chain response and hospital reactivity were and are challenged for stroke acute care management during the pandemic period of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) in North-Eastern Italy (Veneto, Friuli-Venezia-Giulia, Trentino-Alto-Adige), counting 7,193,880 inhabitants (ISTAT), with consequences in acute treatment for patients with ischemic stroke.

Methods: We conducted a retrospective data collection of patients admitted to stroke units eventually treated with thrombolysis and thrombectomy, ranging from January to May 2020 from the beginning to the end of the main first pandemic period of COVID-19 in Italy. The primary endpoint was the number of patients arriving to these stroke units, and secondary endpoints were the number of thrombolysis and/or thrombectomy.

Update on headache and brain tumors.

Headache is one of the leading symptoms often associated with brain tumours. Secondary headaches attributed to intracranial neoplasias have been included in subchapter 7.4 of the third edition of the International Classification of Headache Disorders (ICHD-3).

Migraine in adolescents: validation of a screening questionnaire.

Background: Few studies in adolescents deal with the level of agreement between questionnaire and interview information in relation to headache symptoms.

Objective: To evaluate the validity of a self-administered questionnaire on headache for use in epidemiological studies of Italian high school students.

Methods: The questionnaire incorporated all items required for diagnosing migraine according to the criteria from the 2004 International Classification of Headache Disorders.

Sensory gating deficit assessed by P50/Pb middle latency event related potential in Alzheimer's disease.

Sensory gating is defined as the brain's ability to inhibit repetitive and irrelevant incoming sensory stimuli and is supposed to be related to cholinergic transmission. Indeed, Alzheimer's disease (AD) is characterized by a cholinergic deficit that is believed to be involved in cerebral cortex hyperexcitability and short latency afferent inhibition deficit. Therefore, a sensory gating deficit may be supposed present in AD within the frame of cortex hyperexcitability and loss of cortex modulation of sensory inputs.