Publications by authors named "Sliwinski A"

Cognitive reserve is the ability to actively cope with brain deterioration and delay cognitive decline in neurodegenerative diseases. It operates by optimizing performance through differential recruitment of brain networks or alternative cognitive strategies. We investigated cognitive reserve using Huntington's disease (HD) as a genetic model of neurodegeneration to compare premanifest HD, manifest HD, and controls.

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Article Synopsis
  • The study explored the role of the striatum in language processing, particularly in patients with Huntington's disease, which primarily affects this brain region and leads to language difficulties.
  • By comparing carriers of HD mutations and controls on linguistic and non-linguistic discrimination tasks, researchers used the hierarchical drift diffusion model to analyze decision-making and non-decision parameters related to language performance.
  • Findings indicated that decision-making impairments, rather than core language processing deficits, are the primary contributors to language impairment in patients with striatal atrophy, as shown by correlations between decision parameters and gray matter volume in specific brain areas.
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The technique of liquid-based cytology (LBC) is of increasing diagnostic value in non-gynecological cytology. The purpose of the present study was to validate modifications to stages of the LBC process and to assess the diagnostic usefulness of the LBC technique. Between May 2021 and January 2022, a total of 484 samples were prepared from routine cytology tests carried out in the Department of Tumor Pathology of The Greater Poland Cancer Center.

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Patients with Huntington's disease suffer from disturbances in the perception of emotions; they do not correctly read the body, vocal and facial expressions of others. With regard to the expression of emotions, it has been shown that they are impaired in expressing emotions through face but up until now, little research has been conducted about their ability to express emotions through spoken language. To better understand emotion production in both voice and language in Huntington's Disease (HD), we tested 115 individuals: 68 patients (HD), 22 participants carrying the mutant HD gene without any motor symptoms (pre-manifest HD), and 25 controls in a single-centre prospective observational follow-up study.

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Objectives: Using brief samples of speech recordings, we aimed at predicting, through machine learning, the clinical performance in Huntington's Disease (HD), an inherited Neurodegenerative disease (NDD).

Methods: We collected and analyzed 126 samples of audio recordings of both forward and backward counting from 103 Huntington's disease gene carriers [87 manifest and 16 premanifest; mean age 50.6 (SD 11.

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Aphasia is a devastating brain disorder, detrimental for medical care and social interaction. The early diagnosis of language disorders and accurate identification of patient-specific deficits are crucial for patients' care, as aphasia rehabilitation is more effective when focused on patient-specific language deficits. We developed the Core Assessment of Language Processing (CALAP), a new scale combining screening and detailed evaluation to rapidly diagnose and identify patient-specific language deficits.

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Article Synopsis
  • * Analysis of genomes and methylomes revealed that BRCA2-mutant prostate cancers exhibit high genomic instability and a mutational pattern that resembles metastatic cancers, rather than localized ones.
  • * The study identified genetic and epigenetic disruptions in the MED12L/MED12 pathway, common in aggressive prostate cancer, emphasizing the need for more aggressive initial treatments for localized BRCA2-mutant tumors.
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Acute urinary retention (AUR) is a common presentation to emergency departments. This article updates the reader on the appropriate management, investigations and guidelines for AUR. It looks at the mechanism of normal micturition and describes the theories of AUR.

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Ureteroscopy (URS) is a procedure which has been constantly evolving since the development of first generation devices 40 years ago. Progress towards smaller and more sophisticated equipment has been particularly rapid in the last decade. We review the significant steps that have been made toward improving outcomes and limiting morbidity with this procedure which is central to the management of urolithiasis and other upper urinary tract pathology.

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Background: Intraductal carcinoma of the prostate (IDC-P) is a distinct clinicopathologic entity associated with aggressive prostate cancer (PCa). PCa patients carrying a breast cancer 2, early onset (BRCA2) germline mutation exhibit highly aggressive tumours with poor prognosis.

Objective: To investigate the presence and implications of IDC-P in men with a strong family history of PCa who either carry a BRCA2 pathogenic mutation or do not carry the mutation (BRCAX).

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Introduction: Fournier's gangrene is a poly-microbial necrotizing fasciitis that involves the perineum and/or external genitalia. Urgent surgical debridement is well recognized as essential acute treatment yet unique challenges arise for plastic surgical reconstruction to obtain a complete functional recovery. This case describes a successful delayed pedicle flap repair based upon the anterior abdominal wall.

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Objective: To ascertain whether D'Amico risk classification is an accurate discriminator of prostate cancer mortality risk in BRCA2 pathogenic mutation carriers and non-carriers from a familial breast cancer cohort.

Patients And Methods: From family cancer pedigrees of patients evaluated through a familial breast cancer cohort all related men with a diagnosis of prostate cancer were identified. Genotyping of each patient or of the dominant familial BRCA2 mutation was undertaken in each instance.

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Thermal transport is critical to the performance and reliability of polymer-based energy devices, ranging from solar cells to thermoelectrics. This work shows that the thermal conductivity of a low band gap conjugated polymer, poly(4,8-bis-alkyloxybenzo[1,2-b:4,5-b']dithiophene-2,6-diyl-alt-(alkylthieno[3,4-b]thiophene-2-carboxylate)-2,6-diyl) (PBDTTT), for photovoltaic applications can be actively tuned through side chain engineering. Compared to the original polymer modified with short branched side chains, the engineered polymer using all linear and long side chains shows a 160% increase in thermal conductivity.

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Objective: To determine whether patients from regional areas undergoing surgery for kidney cancer present with more advanced disease as a result of geographic isolation.

Patients And Methods: Retrospective analysis of 221 patients undergoing surgery for renal cell carcinoma (RCC) from January 2004 to June 2012, from both a metropolitan centre and a large inner regional hospital. Data was collected on age, gender, presentation (incidental or symptomatic), clinical stage and pathological features.

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Some historical features of international cooperation that have been a background for originating the idea to organize since 1980 special international meetings named Spring Schools on Acousto-Optics and Applications and for continuing the events until now are presented. Thanks to the establishment of the Spring Schools, the group of acousto-opticians at the Gdańsk University have had the opportunity to exchange scientific experience and continue mutual cooperation in research with several acousto-optic centers and to publish a number of common papers. A few examples from these achievements and some historical facts illustrating research activity in the field of acousto-optics during past 30 years are recollected.

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A 16-year-old girl was admitted to a hospital after having noticed clearly palpable abdominal mass, without accompanying symptoms. At surgery a tumour superficially attached to the pancreatic tail, well-encapsulated, measuring approx. 8x5x3 cm, had been found and resected.

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It is well established that mammalian skeletal muscles exhibit a considerable degree of plasticity and one of the main determining factors of this plasticity is the activity pattern and duration of motoneurone discharge. Lesions to the right substantia nigra pars compacta (SNpc) of six adult rats were made to determine whether altered output from the SNpc ultimately leads to a change in the expression of proteins in contralateral skeletal muscles. After 4 months, altered motor performance was identified by the administration of amphetamine.

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Among the different steroids found in the brain, pregnenolone sulfate (3beta-hydroxy-5-pregnen-20-one-3-sulfate; PREGS) is known to enhance hippocampal-associated memory. The present study employs rat hippocampal slices to investigate the ability of PREGS to modulate long-term potentiation (LTP), a phenomenon considered as a model of synaptic plasticity related to memory processes. LTP (3 x 100 Hz/1 sec within 2 min), implicated essentially glutamatergic transmission, for which the different synaptic events could be pharmacologically dissociated.

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If light is diffracted by ultrasound in an isotropic medium with acoustically induced birefringence, the state of polarization is modified in each order of diffraction with respect to the initial state of polarization of the incident light wave. In the present paper, some polarization effects are discussed in the case of normal light incidence. In general a rotation of the main polarization plane occurs, together with a change of the ellipticity.

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Forty-four patients, 22 with ankylosing spondylitis (AS) and 22 with Reiter's syndrome (RS) were studied to determine the reliability of C-reactive protein (CRP) levels and erythrocyte sedimentation rate (ESR) as indicators of disease activity. CRP levels were significantly elevated in patients with active disease for both AS and RS while ESR values for active and inactive disease were not statistically different. Misdiagnosis was more likely when ESR rather than CRP was used as the variable for activity.

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The condition of a 43-year-old man fulfilled the strict diagnostic criteria for both ankylosing spondylitis and systemic lupus erythematosus. To our knowledge, this is the fist verified report of the concurrence of these rheumatic diseases. An unusual combination of genetically determined markers seems to have caused an increased risk for the development of both disorders.

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