COVID-19 and stroke in women: impact on clinical, psychosocial and research aspects.

Despite the growing interest in gender medicine, the influence of sex and gender on human diseases, including stroke, continues to be underestimated and understudied. The COVID-19 pandemic has overall impacted not only the occurrence and management of stroke but has also exacerbated sex and gender disparities among both patients and healthcare providers. This paper aims to provide an updated overview on the influence of sex and gender in stroke pathophysiology and care during COVID-19 pandemic, through biological, clinical, psychosocial and research perspectives.

Flutemetamol-PET Aided Classification of Cerebral Amyloid Angiopathy: A Multicenter Study.

Objectives: Cerebral amyloid angiopathy (CAA)-related features on neuroimaging often coexist with signs of arteriolosclerosis-small vessel disease on neuroimaging in people with intracranial hemorrhage (ICH). This study aimed at defining the value of amyloid pathology detected by flutemetamol PET in reclassification and stratification of risk of bleeding in people with mixed CAA-arteriolosclerosis features.

Methods: We included consecutive patients admitted to 2 institutions (2018-2023) with spontaneous symptomatic ICH, subarachnoid hemorrhage (SAH), transient focal neurologic episodes (TFNE), or cognitive impairment and MRI showing CAA hallmarks.

Cognitive and psychological characteristics in patients with Cerebral Amyloid Angiopathy: a literature review.

Aim: To review the current data on cognitive and psychological characteristics of patients with CAA and on the instruments used for their evaluation.

Methods: A systematic search was performed in Embase, Scopus and PubMed with terms related to "cerebral amyloid angiopathy", "neuropsychological measures" and "patient-reported outcome measures" from January 2001 to December 2021.

Results: Out of 2851 records, 18 articles were selected.

Iatrogenic cerebral amyloid angiopathy: A multinational case series and individual patient data analysis of the literature.

Background: The transmission of amyloid β (Aβ) in humans leading to iatrogenic cerebral amyloid angiopathy (iCAA) is a novel concept with analogies to prion diseases. However, the number of published cases is low, and larger international studies are missing.

Aims: We aimed to build a large multinational collaboration on iCAA to better understand the clinical spectrum of affected patients.

Iatrogenic cerebral amyloid angiopathy: An illustrative case of a newly introduced disease.

Background And Purpose: Iatrogenic cerebral amyloid angiopathy (iCAA) is a specific type of cerebral amyloid angiopathy which is becoming increasingly diagnosed. It has been hypothesized that iCAA might arise as a late consequence of past neurosurgical interventions involving dural patch grafts. Positron emission tomography (PET) scans with amyloid tracers and the assay of beta-amyloid levels in cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) are auxiliary criteria, however, definite diagnosis remains histopathologically determined.

Rare forms of cerebral amyloid angiopathy: pathogenesis, biological and clinical features of CAA-ri and iCAA.

Thanks to a more widespread knowledge of the disease, and improved diagnostic techniques, the clinical spectrum of cerebral amyloid angiopathy (CAA) is now broad. Sporadic CAA, hereditary CAA, CAA-related inflammation (CAA-ri) and iatrogenic CAA (iCAA) create a clinical and radiological continuum which is intriguing and only partially discovered. Despite being relatively rare, CAA-ri, an aggressive subtype of CAA with vascular inflammation, has gained growing attention also because of the therapeutic efficacy of anti-inflammatory and immunomodulating drugs.

Immunological Profile of Vasospasm after Subarachnoid Hemorrhage.

Subarachnoid hemorrhage (SAH) carries high mortality and disability rates, which are substantially driven by complications. Early brain injury and vasospasm can happen after SAH and are crucial events to prevent and treat to improve prognosis. In recent decades, immunological mechanisms have been implicated in SAH complications, with both innate and adaptive immunity involved in mechanisms of damage after SAH.

Production and reception of human resource management practices for health promotion.

Organizations thrive when there is a healthy relationship between people, i.e., where there is high social capital.

On the Advent of Super-Resolution Microscopy in the Realm of Polycomb Proteins.

The genomes of metazoans are organized at multiple spatial scales, ranging from the double helix of DNA to whole chromosomes. The intermediate genomic scale of kilobases to megabases, which corresponds to the 50-300 nm spatial scale, is particularly interesting, as the 3D arrangement of chromatin is implicated in multiple regulatory mechanisms. In this context, polycomb group (PcG) proteins stand as major epigenetic modulators of chromatin function, acting prevalently as repressors of gene transcription by combining chemical modifications of target histones with physical crosslinking of distal genomic regions and phase separation.

Hypoglycemic Encephalopathy Manifesting with Cortical Hemichorea-Hemiballismus Syndrome: A Case Report.

Hyper-/hypoglycemic states are rare but well-established causes of hyperkinetic movements, including chorea and ballismus, usually associated with brain lesions in the basal ganglia. We report a case of hemichorea-hemiballismus (HCHB) syndrome that developed after a severe hypoglycemic episode in a 71-year-old man with poorly controlled type 2 diabetes mellitus. Uncommonly, brain MRI showed contralateral cortical-subcortical T2 and T2-FLAIR-hyperintense frontoparietal lesions, with cingulate gyrus involved, while the basal ganglia were unaffected.

Epilepsy in cerebral amyloid angiopathy: an observational retrospective study of a large population.

Objective: Cerebral amyloid angiopathy (CAA) is a major cause of spontaneous intracranial hemorrhage in older adults. Epilepsy represents a possible sequela of the disease. To date, studies on epilepsy in CAA are lacking, and the few data available mainly focus on CAA-related inflammation (CAA-ri), the inflammatory form of the disease.

The Octopus Trap of Takotsubo and Stroke: Genetics, Biomarkers and Clinical Management.

Takotsubo cardiomyopathy (TC) is a reversible cardiomyopathy mimicking an acute coronary syndrome, usually observed in response to acute stress situations. The association between acute ischemic stroke and TC is already known, since it has been previously reported that ischemic stroke can be both a consequence and a potential cause of TC. However, the precise pathophysiological mechanism linking the two conditions is still poorly understood.

An Efficient Green Fluorescent Protein for Stimulated Emission Depletion Super-Resolution Microscopy.

In spite of their value as genetically encodable reporters for imaging in living systems, fluorescent proteins have been used sporadically for stimulated emission depletion (STED) super-resolution imaging, owing to their moderate photophysical resistance, which does not enable reaching resolutions as high as for synthetic dyes. By a rational approach combining steady-state and ultrafast spectroscopy with gated STED imaging in living and fixed cells, we here demonstrate that F99S/M153T/V163A GFP (c3GFP) represents an efficient genetic reporter for STED, on account of no excited state absorption at depletion wavelengths <600 nm and a long emission lifetime. This makes c3GFP a valuable alternative to more common, but less photostable, EGFP and YFP/Citrine mutants for STED imaging studies targeting the green-yellow region of the optical spectrum.

A spatial multi-scale fluorescence microscopy toolbox discloses entry checkpoints of SARS-CoV-2 variants in Vero E6 cells.

We exploited a multi-scale microscopy imaging toolbox to address some major issues related to SARS-CoV-2 interactions with host cells. Our approach harnesses both conventional and super-resolution fluorescence microscopy and easily matches the spatial scale of single-virus/cell checkpoints. After its validation through the characterization of infected cells and virus morphology, we leveraged this toolbox to reveal subtle issues related to the entry phase of SARS-CoV-2 variants in Vero E6 cells.

Identification of a targetable KRAS-mutant epithelial population in non-small cell lung cancer.

Lung cancer is the leading cause of cancer deaths. Tumor heterogeneity, which hampers development of targeted therapies, was herein deconvoluted via single cell RNA sequencing in aggressive human adenocarcinomas (carrying Kras-mutations) and comparable murine model. We identified a tumor-specific, mutant-KRAS-associated subpopulation which is conserved in both human and murine lung cancer.

ALS Mimics due to Affection of the Cervical Spine: From Common Compressive Myelopathy to Rare CSF Epidural Collection.

Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) is a clinically heterogeneous disease, with chameleon presentations and several mimics. Considering the poor prognosis of ALS, their precise and timely identification is pivotal. Affection of the cervical spine represents one potential source of ALS mimics that should never be missed, since it is potentially treatable.

Electrophysiological features of acute inflammatory demyelinating polyneuropathy associated with SARS-CoV-2 infection.

Objective: To assess whether patients with acute inflammatory demyelinating polyneuropathy (AIDP) associated with SARS-CoV-2 show characteristic electrophysiological features.

Methods: Clinical and electrophysiological findings of 24 patients with SARS-CoV-2 infection and AIDP (S-AIDP) and of 48 control AIDP (C-AIDP) without SARS-CoV-2 infection were compared.

Results: S-AIDP patients more frequently developed respiratory failure (83.

Case Report: Concomitant Massive Cerebral Venous Thrombosis and Internal Iliac Vein Thrombosis Related to Paucisymptomatic COVID-19 Infection.

Thrombotic complications are common in COVID-19 patients, but cerebral venous system involvement, timing after infection, optimal treatment, and long-term outcome are uncertain. We report a case of massive cerebral venous thrombosis and concomitant internal iliac vein thrombosis occurring in the late phase of paucisymptomatic COVID-19 infection. Mild respiratory symptoms, without fever, started 3 weeks before headache and acute neurological deficits.

Who is really blind in the time of coronavirus: the patient or the doctor? A rare case of Balint's syndrome.

Background: Selective bilateral lesions of the parietal-occipital lobes can lead to an uncommon and incompletely understood clinical entity, Balint' syndrome, which consists of simultanagnosia, oculomotor apraxia, optic ataxia and difficulty in perceiving distances between objects.

Case Presentation: We herein report a rare presentation of Balint's syndrome in a 65-year-old woman suffering from stroke and SARS-CoV2 infection.

Conclusion: During SARS-CoV2 pandemic, Italian physicians were forced to work with less instrumental diagnostic resources, relying on their clinical knowledge mostly.