Thyrotoxic periodic paralysis in caucasians. Report of 8 cases.

Background: Periodic paralysis is a well known complication of thytotoxicosis in Chinese and Japanese patients, but has been considered extremely rare in caucasians.

Patients And Methods: Between 1991 and 1996, we admitted 8 caucasian patients to our Hospital due to thyrotoxic periodic paralysis. We retrospectively analysed their clinical manifestations.

Randomised, double-blind, placebo-controlled study of pivagabine in neurasthenia.

One hundred and eighteen patients with neurasthenia, as defined by ICD 10 (International Classification of Diseases), participated in a randomised, double-blind, placebo-controlled trial of pivagabine (4-[(2,2-dimethyl-1-oxopropyl)amino]butanoic acid, CAS 69542-93-4, Tonerg). Pivagabine 1800 mg/d was administered orally for four weeks. At the end of the trial, active medication was significantly superior to placebo on the Clinical Global Impression (CGI) improvement of illness scale.

Epileptic seizures in patients with acute catatonic syndrome.

Acute catatonic syndrome is a condition that can be caused by a variety of metabolic, neurological, psychiatric, and toxic conditions, including neuroleptic malignant syndrome. Although ictal catatonia as a manifestation of non-convulsive status epilepticus has been described, reference to the occurrence of seizures in patients with acute catatonic syndrome is anecdotal. Twenty nine patients with acute catatonic syndrome were reviewed to identify patients with seizures after the onset of acute catatonic syndrome.

The role of fine needle aspiration biopsy cytology in the evaluation of the clinically solitary thyroid nodule.

The imputation that a clinically solitary nodule is a suspicious sign of carcinoma has been the cause of too many surgical procedures as well as the subject of much controversy. This study evaluated the effectiveness of fine needle aspiration (FNA) biopsy cytology in diagnosing the uninodular goiters in 286 patients who presented with clinically solitary nodules. The final diagnoses in these cases included carcinoma (4.

[Enlargement of the cerebral ventricles and cognitive efficiency in chronic schizophrenia].

The cerebral ventricular size of 15 patients with chronic schizophrenia and 20 age and sex matched controls, has been measured on the basis of the TC scan examination. The schizophrenic patients underwent also a psychometric evaluation by means the WAIS and PM 38 tests. The ventricular size was larger in patients than in normal controls.

[Effect of fenfluramine in Huntington Chorea].

Serotoninergic function has been evaluated in 15 H.C. patients.

Neuroendocrinological and clinical data upon trazodone treatment in depressed patients.

Prolactin and somatotropin secretory rhythmicity was studied in 7 inhibited depression male patients, evaluated by the Hamilton Rating Scale for depression, before and after trazodone (400 mg i.v. once daily) treatment.

[HLA and Huntington chorea].

Twenty-three patients with documented Huntington's Chorea were typed for 54 HLA antigens belonging to A, B and C loci. The control group was constituted by 124 healthy subjects of the same ethnic background. Patients and controls were typed with the same antisera.

Mental impairment and intelligence g factor: a psychometric profile.

Correlation among psychometric tests in normal Ss (N = 102) was examined for g factor saturation. A psychometric profile employing a test battery was drawn for use with neuropsychiatric patients (N = 35) to study whether mental impairment is due to a destruction of the general intelligence or of some specific intellectual function. Specific intellectual functions seem to have been involved, albeit at different degrees, Attentive abilities were the most impaired, abstract thinking the least.

[Schizophrenia and HLA antigens].

38 schizophrenic patients (21 hebephrenics and 17 paranoids) and 124 healthy subjects were matched for HLA antigens. HLA typing was determined by the microdroplet lymphocyte toxicity method developed by Terasaki of UCLA. In order to detect 47 HLA antigens as many as 118 antisera were used.

CSF-MHPG in depressive syndromes: basal values and imipramine-induced modifications.

The levels of 3-methoxy-4-hydroxyphenylethylene-glycol (MHPG) in cerebrospinal fluid (CSF), before and after treatment with imipramine, were determined in 12 patients with endogenous depression. No significant change as observed in the whole group of patients, but patients with higher CSF-MHPG basal values showed better therapeutic results and a significant decrease of the norepinephrine catabolyte. The possible relevance of norepinephrine system imbalance to the therapeutic response to imipramine is discussed.

[Depressive syndromes and dementia: clinico-anamnestic study].

The authors report the early psychiatric disturbances in a group of patients, within two years before onset of neurological signs of dementia both of vascular and degeneratarive type. A high incidence of psychiatric impairment, mainly endogenous-like affective disorders has been pointed but particularly in patients who would be affected by atrophic dementia. The hypothesis of a single mechanism, supporting both affective disorders and dementia is discussed.

[Altered plasma lipid and protein patterns in schizophrenic patients (author's transl)].

The plasma lipid and lipoprotein pattern (total cholesterol, triglycerides and total lipid concentration; electrophoretic separation of the lipoproteins) and plasma protein profile (total protein concentration; electrophoretic separation of the plasma proteins) have been determined in a group of 60 chronic schizophrenic patients (47 men and 13 women, mean age 30,3 +/- 22 years). When compared to a control group matched for age and sex, the schizophrenic patients exhibited significantly lower cholesterol concentration and altered distribution pattern of the plasma lipid fractions. Similarly, the plasma a1,- a2,- and beta-globulin patterns are also altered in schizophrenic group.

[Cerebrospinal HVA and 5-HIAA in patients with endogenous depression in the course of treatment].

HVA and 5-HIAA levels were determined in the lumbar CSF of 17 patients affected by endogenous depression. The modification of the amine metabolites after treatment (tryciclics, bromocriptine, trazodone, ECT) were not related to the specific therapy nor to the clinical improvement. In 11 patients, HVA and 5-HIAA showed opposite modificatons.

Alcohol withdrawal syndrome: treatment with trazodone.

Central monoaminergic pathways dysfunction has been shown in the alcohol withdrawal syndrome of experimental animals: noradrenergic hyperfunction and serotonin transmission impairment is suggested by many studies. Trazodone is a new psychotropic drug which has a marked norepinephrine receptor blocking power; moreover, it inhibits serotonin reuptake and was fully effective in the treatment of man's withdrawal syndrome (17 alcoholic inpatients). The good therapeutical results make it conceivable that monoaminergic pathways dysfunction has an important pathophysiological role in the alcohol withdrawal syndrome of man also.

Interactions between central monoaminergic systems: dopamine-serotonin.

Concentration of dopamine and serotonin metabolites (HVA and 5-HIAA) in the CSF was evaluated before and after pharmacological treatment in 19 patients with different neuropsychiatric diseases. In every case a reciprocal modification of the two metabolites occurred after treatment. The result supports the hypothesis of a functional balance between the monoaminergic systems in the central nervous system.

[Neuropsychological aspects of schizophrenic mental deterioration].

The authors have administered a test of intelligence (WAIS) and a test of attention (Color Naming) to a group of patients affected by chronic schizophrenic impairment. The scores give shape to a picture of mental deterioration, especially characterized by a decrease of attentive power. This results validates the possibility of a neuropsychological approach to the etiopatogenesis of schizophrenia and supports the hypothesis that an impairment of mental synthesis power may explain both clinical and psychometric features of the disease.