Three montages for Transcranial electric stimulation in predicting the early post-surgery outcome of the facial nerve functioning.

Objective: We assessed the Transcranial Electrical Stimulation (TES)-induced Corticobulbar-Motor Evoked Potentials (Cb-MEPs) evoked from Orbicularis Oculi (Oc) and Orbicularis Oris (Or) muscles with FCC5h/FCC6h-Mz, C3/C4-Cz and C5/C6/-Cz stimulation, during IntraOperative NeuroMonitoring (IONM) in 30 patients who underwent skull-base surgery.

Methods: before (T0) and after (T1) the surgery, we compared the peak-to-peak amplitudes of Cb-MEPs obtained from TES with C3/C4-Cz, C5/C6-Cz and FCC5h/FCC6h-Mz. Then, we compared the response category (present, absent and peripheral) related to different montages.

Topographic mapping of the sensorimotor qualities of empathic reactivity: A psychophysiological study in people with spinal cord injuries.

The experience of empathy for pain is underpinned by sensorimotor and affective dimensions which, although interconnected, are at least in part behaviorally and neurally distinct. Spinal cord injuries (SCI) induce a massive, below-lesion level, sensorimotor body-brain disconnection. This condition may make it possible to test whether sensorimotor deprivation alters specific dimensions of empathic reactivity to observed pain.

Steering-by-leaning facilitates intuitive movement control and improved efficiency in manual wheelchairs.

Background: Manual wheelchair propulsion is widely accepted to be biomechanically inefficient, with a high prevalence of shoulder pain and injuries among users. Directional control during wheelchair movement is a major, yet largely overlooked source of energy loss: changing direction or maintaining straightforward motion on tilted surfaces requires unilateral braking. This study evaluates the efficiency of a novel steering-by-leaning mechanism that guides wheelchair turning through upper body leaning.

Steering-by-leaning: Feasibility of Utilising Dynamic Backrests to Control Steering in Manual Wheelchairs.

Objective: Steering-by-leaning is a promising innovation for manual wheelchairs. It may enable improved energy efficiency, one-handed manoeuvrability, and increased trunk activity during wheelchair use in daily life. To explore the feasibility of this concept, the lateral trunk function of active wheelchair users was assessed before comparing 3 preliminary dynamic backrest designs in a virtual steering exercise.

A 2D lightweight instrumented wheel for assessing wheelchair functionality/activity.

Introduction: Force measurement wheels are essential instruments for analysing manual wheelchair propulsion. Existing solutions are heavy and bulky, influence propulsion biomechanics, and are limited to confined laboratory environments. In this paper, a novel design for a compact and lightweight measurement wheel is presented and statically validated.

Neurophysiology-Guided Laser Interstitial Thermal Therapy: A Synergistic Approach For Motor Function Preservation. Technical Note.

Background: Laser interstitial thermal therapy (LITT) is a minimally invasive ablative technique with specific indications for neuro-oncology, especially in the case of lesions in eloquent areas. Even being performed through a small catheter under stereotactic conditions, the risk of damaging vital structures such as white matter tracts or cortical eloquent areas is not negligible. The mechanism of damage can be related to catheter insertion or to excessive laser ablation.

Turning in Circles: Understanding Manual Wheelchair Use Towards Developing User-Friendly Steering Systems.

For people with physical disabilities, manual wheelchairs are essential enablers of mobility, participation in society, and a healthy lifestyle. Their most general design offers great flexibility and direct feedback, but has been described to be inefficient and demands good coordination of the upper extremities while critically influencing users' actions. Multiple research groups have used Inertial Measurement Units (IMUs) to quantify physical activities in wheelchairs arguing that knowledge over behavioural patterns in manual wheelchair usage can guide technological development and improved designs.

A Novel Modeling Approach for Plastics Melting within a CFD-DEM Framework.

Existing three-dimensional modeling approaches to single-screw extrusion can be classified according to the process sections. The discrete element method (DEM) allows describing solids transport in the feed section. The melt flow in the melt section can be calculated by means of computational fluid dynamics (CFD).

Embodying their own wheelchair modifies extrapersonal space perception in people with spinal cord injury.

Despite the many links between body representation, acting and perceiving the environment, no research has to date explored whether specific tool embodiment in conditions of sensorimotor deprivation influences extrapersonal space perception. We tested 20 spinal cord injured (SCI) individuals to investigate whether specific wheelchair embodiment interacts with extrapersonal space representation. As a measure of wheelchair embodiment, we used a Body View Enhancement Task in which participants (either sitting in their own wheelchair or in one which they had never used before) were asked to respond promptly to flashing lights presented on their above- and below-lesion body parts.

Wheelchair Tilt-in-Space and Recline Functions: Influence on Sitting Interface Pressure and Ischial Blood Flow in an Elderly Population.

Pressure ulcers (PUs) result from localised injury to the skin and underlying tissue and usually occur over a bony prominence as a result of pressure, often in combination with shear forces. Both pressure magnitude and duration are thought to be key risk factors in the occurrence of PUs, thus exposing wheelchair-bound subjects to high risk of PU development. As a result, wheelchairs that incorporate tilt-in-space and recline functions are routinely prescribed to redistribute pressure away from their ischial tuberosities.

Intestinal paracoccidioidomycosis resembling Crohn's disease in a teenager: a case report.

Background: Differential diagnosis of inflammatory bowel disease is often very challenging. Paracoccidioidomycosis is a fungal disease that can mimic manifestations of Crohn's disease.

Case Presentation: We report a case of a 13-year-old Caucasian boy with abdominal pain for 1.

Diagnosis and treatment of pain in plexopathy, radiculopathy, peripheral neuropathy and phantom limb pain. Evidence and recommendations from the Italian Consensus Conference on Pain on Neurorehabilitation.

Pain may affect all aspects of social life and reduce the quality of life. Neuropathic pain (NP) is common in patients affected by plexopathy, radiculopathy, mononeuropathy, peripheral neuropathy. Phantom limb pain (PLP) is a painful sensation that is common after amputation, and its pathophysiological mechanisms involve changes in the peripheral and central nervous system.

Long-term facial improvement after repeated BoNT-A injections and mirror biofeedback exercises for chronic facial synkinesis: a case-series study.

Background: Only few studies have considered the effects of the combined treatment with onabotulinumtoxinA (BoNT-A) injections and biofeedback (BFB) rehabilitation in the recovery of postparetic facial synkinesis (PPFS).

Aim: To explore the presence of a persistent improvement in facial function out of the pharmacological effect of BoNT-A in subjects with established PPFS, after repeated sessions of BoNT-A injections combined with an educational facial training program using mirror biofeedback (BFB) exercises. Secondary objective was to investigate the trend of the presumed persistent improvement.

Developmental writing disorders: assess to rehabilitate.

Background: Writing ability requires to use and control several processes of visual and phonological information processing and an adequate programming and coordination of motor sequences. We studied a writing precursor gesture in children with developmental dysorthography and/or developmental dysgraphia in order to point out anomalies to be treated with specific rehabilitative interventions.

Methods: Twenty-five children affected by developmental dysortography (ICD 9 CM: 315.

The role of diagnostic laparoscopy in gynecology.

Context And Objectives: Laparoscopy is a diagnostic method that is currently becoming consolidated for therapeutic use. It consists of endoscopically viewing the abdominal cavity. The aim here was to evaluate the indications for diagnostic videolaparoscopy and the intraoperative findings in an endoscopic gynecology clinic at a tertiary-level hospital over the last five years.

Arm trajectories and writing strategy in healthy children.

Background: Evaluation of elementary writing skills in children is usually obtained with high resolution (and high cost) techniques or with low resolution pen-and-paper tests. In this observational study we tested a quantitative method to obtain normative data to describe arm movement during a writing precursor gesture.

Methods: We recruited 226 healthy children (mean age 9,1 years [range: 6.

Improved multiplex ligation-dependent probe amplification analysis identifies a deleterious PMS2 allele generated by recombination with crossover between PMS2 and PMS2CL.

Heterozygous PMS2 germline mutations are associated with Lynch syndrome. Up to one third of these mutations are genomic deletions. Their detection is complicated by a pseudogene (PMS2CL), which--owing to extensive interparalog sequence exchange--closely resembles PMS2 downstream of exon 12.

Microsatellite instability in hepatocellular carcinoma in non-cirrhotic liver in patients older than 60 years.

Aim: Hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) in otherwise normal liver is rare, its pathogenesis remains obscure and the literature on the subject is scarce. We investigated microsatellite instability (MSI) in eight elderly patients (median age 70.7, range 63-76 years) without a clinical history of liver disease and who underwent liver resection for HCC in otherwise normal background liver between 2001 and 2005 at King's College Hospital, London.

The Veneto Region's Barrett's Oesophagus Registry: aims, methods, preliminary results.

Background: The natural history of Barrett's Oeosphagus is not completely clarified and Barrett's Oeosphagus Registries are considered useful tools to expand our knowledge on this disease. A Barrett's Oeosphagus Registry has been therefore established in the Veneto Region and neighbouring provinces.

Aims: The aims of the Registry are to assess the demographical, endoscopical and histological characteristics of Barrett's Oeosphagus patients; the prevalence of non-invasive neoplasia and Barrett's Adenocarcinoma and the timing and incidence of Barrett's Oeosphagus progression to malignancy.

Classification tool for the systematic histological assessment of hepatocellular carcinoma, macroregenerative nodules, and dysplastic nodules in cirrhotic liver.

Aim: To design a classification tool for the histological assessment of hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC), dysplastic nodules (DN), and macroregenerative nodules (MRN) in cirrhotic liver.

Methods: Two hundred and twelve hepatocellular nodules (106 HCC; 74 MRN; 32 DN) were assessed systematically, quantitatively, and semiquantitatively as appropriate for 10 histological features that have been described as helpful in distinguishing small HCC, DN, and MRN in cirrhotic livers. The data were analyzed by multiple correspondence analysis (MCA).

Detection of nodal micrometastases using immunohistochemistry and PCR in melanoma of the arm and trunk.

Sentinel node (SN) mapping and biopsy seems at present the best way to assess the nodal status in cutaneous melanoma without removing the lymphatic chain. The procedure is minimally invasive, safe and low cost, and allows selection of patients who can benefit from elective node dissection. From March 1997 up to July 1999 we examined 112 SNs excised after lymphatic mapping from 95 patients (48 males and 47 females) with stage I cutaneous melanoma affecting the trunk or limbs.

Prevalence of intestinal metaplasia in the distal oesophagus, oesophagogastric junction and gastric cardia in symptomatic patients in north-east Italy: a prospective, descriptive survey. The Italian Ulcer Study Group "GISU".

Background: Incidence of adenocarcinoma of distal oesophagus and gastric cardia, probably arising from areas of intestinal metaplasia, has been increasing rapidly.

Aims: To define prevalence of intestinal metaplasia of distal oesophagus, oesophagogastric junction and gastric cardia and to evaluate potential associated factors, by means of a prospective multicentre study including University and teaching hospitals, and primary and tertiary care centres.

Patients: Each of 24 institutions involved in study enrolled 10 consecutive patients undergoing first-time routine endoscopy for dyspeptic symptoms.