Analysis of the impact of a rhinologist-assisted endoscopic approach on a single neurosurgeon's outcomes in transsphenoidal resection of pituitary adenomas.

Objectives: Determine the improvements in outcomes of transsphenoidal pituitary adenoma resection following addition of a skull base rhinologist to the neurosurgical team.

Design: All patients that underwent transsphenoidal resection of pituitary adenoma were identified. Demographic data, Otolaryngology (ENT) involvement, initial adenoma size, extent of resection, hormonal secretion status, visual field exam, post-operative DI, CSF leak, recurrence, need for nasoseptal flap (NSF), re-operation rate were all collected.

Duration of Prophylactic Levetiracetam After Surgery for Brain Tumor: A Prospective Randomized Trial.

Background: Levetiracetam is commonly used as a prophylactic antiseizure medication in patients undergoing surgical resection of brain tumors.

Objective: To quantitate side effects experienced in patients treated with 1 week vs 6 weeks of prophylactic levetiracetam using validated measures for neurotoxicity and depression.

Methods: Patients undergoing surgical resection of a supratentorial tumor with no seizure history were randomized within 48 hours of surgery to receive prophylactic levetiracetam for the duration of either 1 or 6 weeks.

Inflammatory myofibroblastic tumor masquerading as an anterior choroidal artery fusiform aneurysm.

Background: Inflammatory myofibroblastic tumor is a rare, poorly understood tumor that has been found to occur in almost every organ tissue. Its location within the central nervous system is uncommon, and patients tend to present with nonspecific symptoms.

Case Description: A female in her eighth decade presented to neurosurgery clinic with complaints of headache and dizziness.

Nine-year prospective efficacy and safety of brain-responsive neurostimulation for focal epilepsy.

Objective: To prospectively evaluate safety and efficacy of brain-responsive neurostimulation in adults with medically intractable focal onset seizures (FOS) over 9 years.

Methods: Adults treated with brain-responsive neurostimulation in 2-year feasibility or randomized controlled trials were enrolled in a long-term prospective open label trial (LTT) to assess safety, efficacy, and quality of life (QOL) over an additional 7 years. Safety was assessed as adverse events (AEs), efficacy as median percent change in seizure frequency and responder rate, and QOL with the Quality of Life in Epilepsy (QOLIE-89) inventory.

Comparing Standard Performance and Outcome Measures in Hospitalized Pituitary Tumor Patients with Secretory versus Nonsecretory Tumors.

Background: Patient safety indicators (PSIs) and hospital-acquired conditions (HACs) are reported quality measures. We compared their prevalence in patients with secretory and nonsecretory pituitary adenoma using the National (Nationwide) Inpatient Sample (NIS), Healthcare Cost and Utilization Project, Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality.

Methods: The NIS was queried for hospitalizations 2002-2014 involving pituitary adenomas.

Two Groups of eGFP-Expressing Neurons with Distinct Characteristics in the Neocortex of GIN Mice.

GIN (GFP-expressing inhibitory interneuron) transgenic mice are believed to express the enhanced GFP (eGFP) in a subset of somatostatin (SST)-expressing interneurons in the neocortex and have been widely used in the study on SST interneurons. Previous studies showed that eGFP neurons in the neocortex are distributed in the layer II-IV and upper layer V (cortical eGFP neurons) and contain SST. In this study, we reported a new group of eGFP neurons in GIN mice at early postnatal ages, which was located in the deep layer of the lateral neocortex as clusters (cluster eGFP neurons).

An incremental deformation model of arterial dissection.

We develop a mathematical model for a small axisymmetric tear in a residually stressed and axially pre-stretched cylindrical tube. The residual stress is modelled by an opening angle when the load-free tube is sliced along a generator. This has application to the study of an aortic dissection, in which a tear develops in the wall of the artery.

Modelling peeling- and pressure-driven propagation of arterial dissection.

An arterial dissection is a longitudinal tear in the vessel wall, which can create a false lumen for blood flow and may propagate quickly, leading to death. We employ a computational model for a dissection using the extended finite element method with a cohesive traction-separation law for the tear faces. The arterial wall is described by the anisotropic hyperelastic Holzapfel-Gasser-Ogden material model that accounts for collagen fibres and ground matrix, while the evolution of damage is governed by a linear cohesive traction-separation law.

The hippocampus: detailed assessment of normative two-dimensional measurements, signal intensity, and subfield conspicuity on routine 3T T2-weighted sequences.

Purpose: The hippocampus has a critical role in many common disease processes. Currently, routine 3 Tesla structural MRI is a mainstay of clinical diagnosis. The goal of our study is to evaluate the normal variability in size and/or conspicuity of the hippocampal subcomponents in routine clinical 3 Tesla high-resolution T2-weighted images to provide a basis for better defining pathological derangements.

Propagation of dissection in a residually-stressed artery model.

This paper studies dissection propagation subject to internal pressure in a residually-stressed two-layer arterial model. The artery is assumed to be infinitely long, and the resultant plane strain problem is solved using the extended finite element method. The arterial layers are modelled using the anisotropic hyperelastic Holzapfel-Gasser-Ogden model, and the tissue damage due to tear propagation is described using a linear cohesive traction-separation law.

Genetic animal models of malformations of cortical development and epilepsy.

Malformations of cortical development constitute a variety of pathological brain abnormalities that commonly cause severe, medically-refractory epilepsy, including focal lesions, such as focal cortical dysplasia, heterotopias, and tubers of tuberous sclerosis complex, and diffuse malformations, such as lissencephaly. Although some cortical malformations result from environmental insults during cortical development in utero, genetic factors are increasingly recognized as primary pathogenic factors across the entire spectrum of malformations. Genes implicated in causing different cortical malformations are involved in a variety of physiological functions, but many are focused on regulation of cell proliferation, differentiation, and neuronal migration.

Behavioral and electrophysiological characterization of Dyt1 heterozygous knockout mice.

DYT1 dystonia is an inherited movement disorder caused by mutations in DYT1 (TOR1A), which codes for torsinA. Most of the patients have a trinucleotide deletion (ΔGAG) corresponding to a glutamic acid in the C-terminal region (torsinA(ΔE)). Dyt1 ΔGAG heterozygous knock-in (KI) mice, which mimic ΔGAG mutation in the endogenous gene, exhibit motor deficits and deceased frequency of spontaneous excitatory post-synaptic currents (sEPSCs) and normal theta-burst-induced long-term potentiation (LTP) in the hippocampal CA1 region.

Functional integration of human neural precursor cells in mouse cortex.

This study investigates the electrophysiological properties and functional integration of different phenotypes of transplanted human neural precursor cells (hNPCs) in immunodeficient NSG mice. Postnatal day 2 mice received unilateral injections of 100,000 GFP+ hNPCs into the right parietal cortex. Eight weeks after transplantation, 1.

Long-term Outcome After Fractionated Radiotherapy for Pituitary Adenoma: The Curse of the Secretory Tumor.

Objectives: To determine the influence of secretory status on long-term outcome after fractionated radiotherapy (RT) for gross residual pituitary adenoma.

Materials And Methods: This is a retrospective study of 116 consecutively treated patients who met the following inclusion criteria: tissue diagnosis of pituitary adenoma, visible tumor at the time of RT, treatment with fractionated RT, and imaging follow-up of ≥2 years. Hypersecretion of growth hormone, adrenocorticotrophic hormone, prolactin, or thyroid-stimulating hormone was documented in 30 patients (26%).

Reduced chemical and electrical connections of fast-spiking interneurons in experimental cortical dysplasia.

Aberrant neural connections are regarded as a principal factor contributing to epileptogenesis. This study examined chemical and electrical connections between fast-spiking (FS), parvalbumin (PV)-immunoreactive (FS-PV) interneurons and regular-spiking (RS) neurons (pyramidal neurons or spiny stellate neurons) in a rat model of prenatal irradiation-induced cortical dysplasia. Presynaptic action potentials were evoked by current injection and the elicited unitary inhibitory or excitatory postsynaptic potentials (uIPSPs or uEPSPs) were recorded in the postsynaptic cell.

TRPC3 mediates hyperexcitability and epileptiform activity in immature cortex and experimental cortical dysplasia.

Neuronal hyperexcitability plays an important role in epileptogenesis. Conditions of low extracellular calcium (Ca) or magnesium (Mg) can induce hyperexcitability and epileptiform activity with unclear mechanisms. Transient receptor potential canonical type 3 (TRPC3) channels play a pivotal role in neuronal excitability and are activated in low-Ca and/or low-Mg conditions to depolarize neurons.

Cavernoma-related epilepsy: review and recommendations for management--report of the Surgical Task Force of the ILAE Commission on Therapeutic Strategies.

Cerebral cavernous malformations (CCMs) are well-defined, mostly singular lesions present in 0.4-0.9% of the population.

Assessing the driving performance of a person with epilepsy presurgery and postsurgery.

Occupational therapists and certified driving rehabilitation specialists are uniquely skilled to assess functional abilities underlying driving performance. However, little information exists on the utility of clinical assessments to determine driving performance in people with epilepsy. This case study demonstrates how an occupational therapy evaluation battery was used to examine differences in visual and cognitive abilities and simulated driving performance before and after epilepsy surgery.

Reduced densities of parvalbumin- and somatostatin-expressing interneurons in experimental cortical dysplasia and heterotopia in early postnatal development.

Cortical dysplasia (CD) is strongly associated with intractable epilepsy, probably due to hyperexcitability of neuronal networks. However, the underlying mechanisms are not completely understood. GABAergic interneurons provide major inhibitory function in the CNS and have different subtypes, but it is not clear how each subtype is affected in CD during early post-natal development.

Neurogenic potential of progenitor cells isolated from postmortem human Parkinsonian brains.

The success of cellular therapies for Parkinson's disease (PD) will depend not only on a conducive growth environment in vivo, but also on the ex vivo amplification and targeted neural differentiation of stem/progenitor cells. Here, we demonstrate the in vitro proliferative and differentiation potential of stem/progenitor cells, adult human neural progenitor cells ("AHNPs") isolated from idiopathic PD postmortem tissue samples and, to a lesser extent, discarded deep brain stimulation electrodes. We demonstrate that these AHNPs can be isolated from numerous structures (e.

Enhanced hippocampal long-term potentiation and fear memory in Btbd9 mutant mice.

Polymorphisms in BTBD9 have recently been associated with higher risk of restless legs syndrome (RLS), a neurological disorder characterized by uncomfortable sensations in the legs at rest that are relieved by movement. The BTBD9 protein contains a BTB/POZ domain and a BACK domain, but its function is unknown. To elucidate its function and potential role in the pathophysiology of RLS, we generated a line of mutant Btbd9 mice derived from a commercial gene-trap embryonic stem cell clone.

Impaired hippocampal memory function and synaptic plasticity in experimental cortical dysplasia.

Purpose:   Memory impairment is a common comorbidity in people with epilepsy-associated malformations of cortical development. We studied spatial memory performance and hippocampal synaptic plasticity in an animal model of cortical dysplasia.

Methods:   Embryonic day 17 rats were exposed to 2.