1,720,973 research outputs found
General intellectual impairment in chronic right hemisphere damaged patients with anosognosia: A group study
No full textThe study evaluates the possible relations between cognitive impairment, persisting anosognosia for hemiplegia and peripersonal neglect. Thirty eight chronic right hemisphere stroke patients were divided in three age-and education-matched groups: A (n=13) patients with left hemiparesis, peripersonal neglect, and anosognosia for hemiplegia; B (n = 12) patients with left hemiparesis and peripersonal neglect, and C (n=13) patients with left hemiparesis only. We used MMSE and WAIS Verbal IQ and verbal subtests to assess cognitive impairment in patients, in order to avoid a bias due to visuospatial deficit, which is common in patients with neglect. VIQ, Information, Digit Span and Vocabulary WAIS subtests as well as MMSE were found to be significantly lower in group A versus group B. No difference was found in any test between groups B and C, indicating a general worse cognition in patients compared to those without anosognosia for hemiplegia. Patients with anosognosia for hemiplegia also showed larger brain lesions and, more frequently, frontal, parietal, temporal and basal ganglia involvement, particularly if they had low verbal IQ, indicating a relationship between cognitive impairment, persisting anosognosia for hemiplegia and large right hemisphere lesions. © 2012 Psychology Press
Persistence of the effects of attention and executive functions intensive rehabilitation in relapsing remitting multiple sclerosis
No full textBackground: Neuropsychological rehabilitation efficacy in multiple sclerosis (MS) is a currently investigated issue. We reported, in a single blind controlled study, that an intensive short duration cognitive training of attention and executive functions significantly improves the treated functions and reduces depression in MS. The persistence of these effects over time are unknown. Objective: To evaluate the persistence over time of neuropsychological improvement due to cognitive training nine months after rehabilitation onset. Methods: This is a single blind randomized controlled study. 24 MS patients were randomly assigned to experimental group (n=13) and received PC assisted neuropsychological treatment for three months, or to control group (n=11), receiving no treatment. Patients were submitted to neuropsychological evaluation, depression and quality of life questionnaires at baseline, three months and nine months later. Results: Nine months follow up compared to baseline evaluation shows a statistically significant improvement (p<0.05) in attention, information processing and executive functions tests (PASAT 3′′, COWA/S, WCSTpe), in depression and quality of life questionnaires in rehabilitated patients only. reliable change index (RCI) and modified RCI confirmed the clinical significance of this improvement in rehabilitated patients. Conclusions: Three months intensive neuropsychological rehabilitation of attention, information processing and executive functions induces a long lasting and clinically relevant neuropsychological improvement over time and a persistent depression and quality of life amelioration in patients with RR MS. © 2012 Elsevier B.V
Natalizumab Significantly Improves Cognitive Impairment over Three Years in MS: Pattern of Disability Progression and Preliminary MRI Findings
Full text linkPrevious studies reported that Multiple Sclerosis (MS) patients treated with natalizumab for one or two years exhibit a significant reduction in relapse rate and in cognitive impairment, but the long term effects on cognitive performance are unknown. This study aimed to evaluate the effects of natalizumab on cognitive impairment in a cohort of 24 consecutive patients with relapsing remitting MS treated for 3 years. The neuropsychological tests, as well as relapse number and EDSS, were assessed at baseline and yearly for three years. The impact on cortical atrophy was also considered in a subgroup of them, and are thus to be considered as preliminary. Results showed a significant reduction in the number of impaired neuropsychological tests after three years, a significant decrease in annualized relapse rate at each time points compared to baseline and a stable EDSS. In the neuropsychological assessment, a significant improvement in memory, attention and executive function test scores was detected. Preliminary MRI data show that, while GM volume did not change at 3 years, a significantly greater parahippocampal and prefrontal gray matter density was noticed, the former correlating with neuropsychological improvement in a memory test. This study showed that therapy with Natalizumab is helpful in improving cognitive performance, and is likely to have a protective role on grey matter, over a three years follow-up
Longitudinal serum neurofilament light chain (sNfL) concentration relates to cognitive function in multiple sclerosis patients
No full textBACKGROUND: Serum neurofilament light chain (sNfL) may be used as a biological marker of disease progression in multiple sclerosis (MS), although longitudinal studies correlating cognitive deficits to sNfL are limited. OBJECTIVE: To longitudinally investigate the relation between cognitive dysfunction, sNfL and MRI brain volume in a relapsing remitting MS patients. METHODS: 18 MS patients (9 males and 9 females, mean age 45 years, mean education 12.6 years) all prescribed with interferon beta 1a (44 mcg 3 times per week), are longitudinally evaluated by means of annual clinical exam with EDSS, neuropsychological evaluation with Brief repeatable battery (BRB) and Delis Kaplan Executive function test (DKEFS), dosage of sNfL (SIMOA) and MRI. RESULTS: Here are reported the results of 1 year follow-up. A significantly higher sNfL in MS compared to healthy controls and higher sNfL in patients with greater cognitive impairment were found. Cognitive Impairment Index, memory, executive function tests correlated with sNfL. Gray matter volume resulted unchanged at 1-year follow-up; a weak correlation between some tests' score and selective cortical brain areas was found. CONCLUSION: Our longitudinal pilot study confirms that sNfL are related to cognitive abilities, confirming data of other authors from retrospective studie
Patterns of regional gray matter and white matter atrophy in cortical multiple sclerosis
No full textChanges of brain resting state functional connectivity predict the persistence of cognitive rehabilitation effects in patients with multiple sclerosis
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Going Beyond Counting First Authors in Author Co-citation Analysis
Full text linkThe present study examines one of the fundamental aspects of author co-citation analysis (ACA) - the way co-citation
counts are defined. Co-citation counting provides the data on which all subsequent statistical analyses and mappings
are based, and we compare ACA results based on two different types of co-citation counting - the traditional type that
only counts the first one among a cited work's authors on the one hand and a non-traditional type that takes into
account the first 5 authors of a cited work on the other hand. Results indicate that the picture produced through this non-traditional author co-citation counting contains more coherent author groups and is therefore considerably clearer. However, this picture represents fewer specialties in the research field being studied than that produced through the traditional first-author co-citation counting when the same number of top-ranked authors is selected and analyzed. Reasons for these effects are discussed
Variations on the Author
Full text link“Variations on the Author” discusses two of Eduardo Coutinho’s recent films (Um Dia na Vida, from 2010, and Últimas Conversas, posthumously released in 2015) and their contribution to the general question of documentary authorship. The director’s filmography is characterized by a consistent yet self-effacing form of authorial self-inscription: Coutinho often features as an interviewer that rather than express opinions propels discourses; an interviewer that is good at listening. This mode of self-inscription characterizes him as an author who is not expressive but who is nonetheless markedly present on the screen. In Um Dia na Vida, however, Coutinho is completely absent form the image, while Últimas Conversas, on the contrary, includes a confessional prologue that moves the director from the margins to the center of his films. This article examines the ways in which these works stand out in the filmography of a director who offers new insights into the notion of cinematic authorship
Appropriate Similarity Measures for Author Cocitation Analysis
Full text linkWe provide a number of new insights into the methodological discussion about author cocitation analysis. We first argue that the use of the Pearson correlation for measuring the similarity between authors’ cocitation profiles is not very satisfactory. We then discuss what kind of similarity measures may be used as an alternative to the Pearson correlation. We consider three similarity measures in particular. One is the well-known cosine. The other two similarity measures have not been used before in the bibliometric literature. Finally, we show by means of an example that our findings have a high practical relevance.information science;Pearson correlation;cosine;similarity measure;author cocitation analysis
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