Sustained performance and regulation of effort in clinical and non-clinical hyperactive children.

Objective: To study sustained performance and its relation to regulation of effort among four different groups of children: two clinical subgroups of children diagnosed with attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD)--one with and one without comorbid oppositional defiant disorder (ODD); a control sample of children without a diagnosis of ADHD but with parental reports of hyperactivity; and a normal control sample.

Methods: Sustained performance was studied (n=64) using a choice reaction time task with long interstimulus intervals, and hyperactive behaviour and regulation of effort was rated throughout the task.

Results: The clinical sample differed from the normal controls regarding all measures of overall, but not initial, performance.

Pentosan polysulfate decreases prostate smooth muscle proliferation and extracellular matrix turnover.

Benign prostatic hyperplasia (BPH) involves proliferation of smooth muscle cells and increased deposition of extracellular matrix (ECM). We recently found that pentosan polysulfate (PPS) has marked effects on growth and ECM of smooth muscle cells derived from vascular tissues. We examined smooth muscle cells cultured from human prostates and the effects of PPS on their growth and ECM production.

Hemispheric asymmetries of memory: the HERA model revisited.

The hemispheric encoding/retrieval asymmetry (HERA) model is a process-specific description of experimental data provided by a large set of functional neuroimaging studies. According to HERA, left prefrontal cortex (PFC) is more involved than right PFC in episodic memory encoding, whereas right PFC is more involved than left PFC in episodic memory retrieval. Recently it has been claimed that this description does not hold for non-verbal materials.

Fall and injury prevention in residential care--effects in residents with higher and lower levels of cognition.

Objectives: To evaluate the effectiveness of a multifactorial fall and injury prevention program in older people with higher and lower levels of cognition.

Design: A preplanned subgroup comparison of the effectiveness of a cluster-randomized, nonblinded, usual-care, controlled trial.

Setting: Nine residential facilities in Umeå, Sweden.

Study design of the Medical Therapy of Prostatic Symptoms (MTOPS) trial.

Alpha-blockers and 5-alpha-reductase inhibitors are medical therapies that are being used as alternatives to surgical interventions to relieve symptoms of benign prostatic hyperplasia (BPH). Taken as monotherapy, alpha-blockers and 5-alpha-reductase inhibitors have each been shown to provide relief from BPH symptoms. Treatment with finasteride over 4 years has been shown to reduce both BPH symptoms and the likelihood of acute urinary retention and the need for surgery.

Time trends in reported prevalence of kidney stones in the United States: 1976-1994.

Background: A body of evidence establishes that the occurrence of kidney stone disease has increased in some communities of industrialized countries. Information on recent temporal trends in the United States is lacking and population-based data on epidemiologic patterns are limited. Study objective was to determine whether kidney stone disease prevalence increased in the United States over a 20-year period and the influence of region, race/ethnicity, and gender on stone disease risk.

Selective adult age differences in an age-invariant multifactor model of declarative memory.

Confirmatory factor analysis was used to test competing models of declarative memory. Data from middle-aged participants provided support for a model comprised of 2 2nd-order (episodic and semantic memory) and 4 1st-order (recall, recognition, fluency, and knowledge) factors. Extending this model across young-old and old-old participants established support for age invariance.

Decreased activity in inferotemporal cortex during explicit memory: dissociating priming, novelty detection, and recognition.

Studies of non-human primates have shown that activity in inferotemporal (IT) brain regions decrease over repeated stimulus exposure, a phenomenon known as repetition suppression. In the present study, repetition suppression was examined during recognition of personally experienced events (explicit memory). Brain activity was measured while subjects encoded and subsequently recognized scenic pictures.

Genetic variation in memory functioning.

On the basis of a review of the literature the contribution of genetic factors for individual differences in memory performance is discussed. Explorations of such influences on memory have just begun. Most of those studies that have been conducted in order to find a quantitative trait locus for memory have focused on ApolipoproteinE (ApoE).

Individual differences in memory enhancement by encoding enactment: relationships to adult age and biological factors.

Numerous studies have demonstrated an age-related decline in episodic memory performance. However, both younger and older adults benefit from various kinds of encoding support, suggesting that memory functioning remains plastic in older age. The present review is concerned with encoding support in the form of enactment.

Attention-related activity during episodic memory retrieval: a cross-function fMRI study.

In functional neuroimaging studies of episodic retrieval (ER), activations in prefrontal, parietal, anterior cingulate, and thalamic regions are typically attributed to episodic retrieval processes. However, these activations are also frequent during visual attention (VA) tasks, suggesting that their role in ER may reflect attentional rather than mnemonic processes. To investigate this possibility, we directly compared brain activity during ER and VA tasks using event-related fMRI.

Common prefrontal activations during working memory, episodic memory, and semantic memory.

Regions of the prefrontal cortex (PFC) are typically activated in many different cognitive functions. In most studies, the focus has been on the role of specific PFC regions in specific cognitive domains, but more recently similarities in PFC activations across cognitive domains have been stressed. Such similarities may suggest that a region mediates a common function across a variety of cognitive tasks.

Levels of processing: a view from functional brain imaging.

This paper briefly reviews two central assumptions of the levels-of-processing framework in the light of findings from recent PET and fMRI studies: First, to address the suggestion that memory traces can be seen as records of analyses carried out for the purposes of perception and comprehension, studies on encoding-retrieval overlap in brain activation patterns are considered. Second, to address the suggestion that deeper, more semantic, processing results in more durable traces, studies of how encoding activity relates to processing depth and subsequent memory performance are examined. The results show that some of the sensory regions that are activated during initial perception are subsequently reactivated during retrieval, and activity in frontal and medial-temporal brain regions is related to depth of processing and level of memory performance.

Predisposing and precipitating factors for falls among older people in residential care.

Falls and their consequences are serious health problems among older populations. To study predisposing and precipitating factors for falls among older people in residential care we used a cross-sectional study design with a prospective follow up for falls. Fifty-eight women and 25 men, with a mean age of 79.

Memory functions and rCBF (99m)Tc-HMPAO SPET: developing diagnostics in Alzheimer's disease.

Alzheimer's disease (AD) is a primary degenerative disease of the brain. The prevalence increases with age, with devastating consequences for the individual and society. The aim of this study was to evaluate whether patients with early AD show an altered regional cerebral blood flow (rCBF) compared with control persons.

Immune thrombocytopenic purpura in patients with chronic hepatitis C virus infection.

Objective: Hepatitis C virus (HCV) infection has been associated with the production of autoantibodies and the development of several autoimmune disorders. Immune thrombocytopenic purpura (ITP) is an immune-mediated syndrome of unknown etiology characterized by the presence of autoantibodies against platelet membrane proteins.

Methods: Retrospective chart review.

Leukocyte and bacterial counts do not correlate with severity of symptoms in men with chronic prostatitis: the National Institutes of Health Chronic Prostatitis Cohort Study.

Purpose: We examine whether leukocytes and bacteria correlate with symptom severity in men with chronic prostatitis/chronic pelvic pain syndrome.

Materials And Methods: All 488 men screened into the National Institutes of Health Chronic Prostatitis Cohort Study before close of recruitment on August 22, 2001 were selected for analysis. The National Institutes of Health Chronic Prostatitis Symptom Index, including subscores, were used to measure symptoms.

Demographic and clinical characteristics of men with chronic prostatitis: the national institutes of health chronic prostatitis cohort study.

Purpose: We describe the study design of the National Institutes of Health Chronic Prostatitis Cohort (CPC) study characterizing men with chronic prostatitis/the chronic pelvic pain syndrome.

Materials And Methods: All 488 men screened into the CPC study before close of recruitment on August 22, 2001 were selected for analysis. The National Institutes of Health Chronic Prostatitis Symptom Index, including subscores, was used to measure symptoms.

Prevalence of and racial/ethnic variation in lower urinary tract symptoms and noncancer prostate surgery in U.S. men.

Objectives: To estimate the proportion of U.S. men affected by specific lower urinary tract symptoms (LUTS) and to assess whether the prevalence of LUTS varies by race/ethnicity.

Design of a multicenter randomized clinical trial for chronic prostatitis/chronic pelvic pain syndrome.

Objectives: To describe the study design and rationale for the first placebo-controlled, randomized clinical trial to be conducted by the Chronic Prostatitis Collaborative Research Network sponsored by the National Institutes of Health.

Methods: The clinical trial will use a 2 by 2 factorial design to evaluate four treatments: placebo, tamsulosin hydrochloride alone, ciprofloxacin alone, and tamsulosin hydrochloride and ciprofloxacin combined. The primary objectives are to compare the efficacy and safety endpoints in patients with chronic prostatitis/chronic pelvic pain syndrome.

Similarities and differences in the neural correlates of episodic memory retrieval and working memory.

Functional neuroimaging studies have shown that different cognitive functions activate overlapping brain regions. An activation overlap may occur because a region is involved in operations tapped by different cognitive functions or because the activated area comprises subregions differentially involved in each of the functions. To investigate these issues, we directly compared brain activity during episodic retrieval (ER) and working memory (WM) using event-related functional MRI (fMRI).

Fall and injury prevention in older people living in residential care facilities. A cluster randomized trial.

Background: Falls and resulting injuries are particularly common in older people living in residential care facilities, but knowledge about the prevention of falls is limited.

Objective: To investigate whether a multifactorial intervention program would reduce falls and fall-related injuries.

Design: A cluster randomized, controlled, nonblinded trial.

Brain imaging of human memory systems: between-systems similarities and within-system differences.

There is much evidence for the existence of multiple memory systems. However, it has been argued that tasks assumed to reflect different memory systems share basic processing components and are mediated by overlapping neural systems. Here we used multivariate analysis of PET-data to analyze similarities and differences in brain activity for multiple tests of working memory, semantic memory, and episodic memory.