Neurophysiological evaluation of visual function in iRBD: potential role in stratifying RBD conversion risk.

Study Objectives: To evaluate neurophysiological alterations of visual function in idiopathic REM sleep Behavior Disorder (iRBD) both as markers and predictors of neurodegenerative disorders.

Methods: In a longitudinal follow-up study of 46 consecutive iRBD patients (follow-up duration 8.4 ± 3.

Ocular vestibular evoked myogenic potentials in response to air-conducted 500 Hz short tones: Effect of stimulation procedure (monaural or binaural), age and gender.

Background: The ocular vestibular myogenic potentials (oVEMP) can be elicited by monaural air-conducted sound stimulation, and are usually recorded from the contralateral eye. In clinical setting a binaural stimulation would save time and require less effort from the subjects.

Objective: We evaluated the differences between monaural and binaural stimulation, and the possible effect of age and gender on oVEMP parameters.

The N3 potential compared to sound and galvanic vestibular evoked myogenic potential in healthy subjects and in multiple sclerosis patients.

Both sound (s-) and galvanic (g-) vestibular-evoked myogenic potential (VEMP) enable us to study the saccular pathways. However, the VEMP can be abnormal for non-vestibular factors, such as insufficient activation of the sterno-cleido-mastoid (SCM) muscle or a lesion that involves the accessory nucleus and/or nerve or the SCM muscle. These drawbacks do not affect another technique that evaluates the saccular function: the N3 potential.

Fatigue in multiple sclerosis: multidimensional assessment and response to symptomatic treatment.

Sixty relapsing remitting multiple sclerosis (MS) patients were selected on the basis of their score on the Fatigue Severity Scale (FSS) and formed two groups: 40 patients (fatigued MS; MSf) scored above the 75th percentile of a previously assessed representative MS sample (100 patients), and 20 age- and sex-matched patients (nonfatigued MS patients; MSnf) scored below the 25th percentile. The patients underwent clinical evaluation (Expanded Disability Status Scale (EDSS)), further assessment of fatigue (Fatigue Impact Scale), scales evaluating depression (Hamilton Depression Rating Scale (HDRS) and Beck's Depression Inventory (BDI)) and neuropsychological tests. All patients were evaluated for muscle fatigability and central activation by means of a biomechanical test of sustained contraction; they also underwent somatosensory evoked potentials (SSEPs) and transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS).

The effects of collinearity and orientation on texture visual evoked potentials.

Objective: The aim of the research was to study the effects of stimulus orientation at both the local (textons) and the global (segregated elements) level on texture visual evoked potentials (tVEPs).

Methods: Two tVEP paradigms were presented to 10 volunteers. The paradigms were characterized by alternating uniform textures (random mixture of square dots and lines) and textures in which stripes of randomly disposed lines segregated from a square dots' background.