Mortality trend and predictors of mortality in dysphagic stroke patients postpercutaneous endoscopic gastrostomy.

Background: Percutaneous endoscopic gastrostomy (PEG) feeding is widely used in stroke patients suffering from persistent dysphagia; however, predicting the risks and benefits of PEG insertion in the individual patient is difficult. The aim of our study was to investigate if candidate risk factors could predict short-term mortality risk in poststroke patients who had PEG tube insertion for persistent dysphagia.

Methods: This was a retrospective study of 3504 consecutive stroke patients admitted to two metropolitan hospitals during the period January 2005 to December 2013 and who also underwent PEG insertion for feeding due to persistent dysphagia.

Staging of argyrophilic grains: an age-associated tauopathy.

We have reported that the ambient gyrus is the site with the greatest accumulation of argyrophilic grains (AGs) and that the degeneration of the ambient gyrus is responsible for dementia with grains. Here we analyzed 1,405 serial autopsy cases from 2 hospitals and detected AGs only in cases older than 56 years of age. The distribution of AGs followed a stereotypic regional pattern.

Lewy body-related alpha-synucleinopathy in aging.

To clarify the significance of Lewy body (LB)-related alpha-synucleinopathy in aging, we investigated the incidence of LBs in 1,241 consecutive autopsy cases (663 males and 578 females). LB pathology was identified histologically in sections stained with hematoxylin and eosin and with anti-ubiquitin and anti-alpha-synuclein antibodies. Cases without LBs were classified as LB stage 0 (987 cases).

Association of estrogen receptor alpha gene polymorphisms with neurofibrillary tangles.

Estrogen receptor alpha (ERalpha) may be implicated in the pathogenesis of Alzheimer's disease (AD). The aim of this study was to clarify the association between ERalpha gene polymorphisms and AD-related pathologic changes. The staging of neurofibrillary tangles (NFT) and senile plaques (SP) was performed according to the method by Braak and Braak and two polymorphisms, PvuII (P or p) and XbaI (X or x), of the ERalpha gene were typed in 551 Japanese cadavers (294 men and 257 women; mean age, 80.

Granulomatous meningitis as a late complication of iodized oil myelography.

The present report is an autopsy case of an 83 year old man with severe kyphoscoliosis and granulomatous meningitis as a late complication of iodized oil myelography. He suffered from mild cognitive impairment and died of pneumonia. At autopsy, the brain showed yellow-brown granular material on its surface, mainly in the Sylvian fissure.

In situ detection of apolipoprotein E epsilon 4 in archival human brain.

A monoclonal antibody specific to apolipoprotein E 4 (apoE4) was applied immunohistochemically to archival human brain tissue. The examined 30 cases comprised four epsilon/epsilon4, 10 epsilon3/epsilon4, one epsilon2/epsilon4, 10 epsilon3/epsilon3 and five epsilon2/epsilon3 genotypes. The anti apoE4 antibody visualized senile plaques, neurofibrillary tangles and reactive astrocytes, as well as serum in the blood vessels and vascular smooth muscle cells in the cases of epsilon4.

Accumulation of phosphorylated alpha-synuclein in aging human brain.

Alpha-synuclein in Lewy bodies (LBs) is phosphorylated at Ser129. We raised monoclonal and polyclonal antibodies to this phosphorylation site (psyn) and examined 157 serial autopsy brains from a geriatric hospital. Anti-psyn immunoreactivity was observed in 40 of these cases (25.