Long-term effects of eating sucrose on metabolic control of type 1 (insulin-dependent) diabetic outpatients

Summary The aim of the study was to investigate the effects of regularly eating a moderate amount of sucrose (30 g/day) in 12 type 1 (insulin-dependent, IDDM) diabetic outpatients in fair blood glucose and lipid control. Two diets, each lasting two month, were compared in a randomized cross-over study. The former was a high-carbohydrate high-fiber diet for diabetic patients with Italian alimentary habits, the latter had the same composition except that 30 g of sucrose replaced 30 g of complex carbohydrates with high glycemic index (bread). The two diets contained equal amounts of carbohydrates, proteins and lipids; the only difference being the contribution of oligosaccharides to total carbodhydrates (22%vs 34%) and cholesterol amount. During the control diet, glycosylated hemoglobin was substantially unchanged in both control and sucrose diet periods (control diet: 6.91±0.29 (SE)vs 6.80±0.25%; sucrose diet: 6.75±0.31vs 6.91±0.36%). This was true also for fructosamine (control diet: 3.92±0.21vs 3.76±0.18%; sucrose diet: 3.50±0.14vs 3.64±0.20 mmol/l). Circulating blood lipid levels, body weight and daily insulin dose did not show any significant variations during the study. Moderate amounts of sucrose may be allowed to IDDM patients with Italian alimentary habits without worsening diabetic control.     

The role of ultrasonography in the assessment of peri-prosthetic hip complications

Purpose

Total hip arthroplasty (THA) is a widespread option for treating hip osteoarthritis. Peri-prosthetic complications after THA represent a common event influencing patient outcome and costs. The purpose of this paper is to report the use of ultrasonography (US) to detect peri-prosthetic complications in symptomatic patients who underwent THA.

Methods

We retrospectively reviewed the records of patients with THA who underwent imaging evaluation between January 2009 and December 2012 at two different institutions. We evaluated the presence/absence of superficial and/or deep peri-prosthetic collections as well as the presence/absence of a cutaneous sinus tract. For patients who underwent both MRI and US, a concordance correlation analysis between US and MR findings was performed.

Results

In the reference period, 532 symptomatic patients (mean age ± standard deviation 74 ± 12 years) underwent X-ray and MRI examinations for suspected peri-prosthetic complications. Among them, 111 (20.9 %) underwent also US. Overall, 108 patients underwent both US and MRI. US findings included 67 superficial collections, 48 subcutaneous fistulas, 74 deep peri-prosthetic collections. Twenty-four patients had solid, mass-like peri-prosthetic collections. In 11 patients, no peri-prosthetic complications were seen. MRI findings included 68 superficial collections, 49 subcutaneous fistulas, 79 deep peri-prosthetic collections. Twenty-four patients had solid, mass-like peri-prosthetic collections. In four patients, no peri-prosthetic complications were seen. Concordance analysis between US and MRI findings showed almost perfect agreement (k ≥ 0.89).

Conclusion

US is an efficient and practical imaging modality to evaluate peri-prosthetic complications in patients with THA, being almost comparable to MRI in detecting and characterizing these complications.     

A topographical organization for action representation in the human brain

How the human brain represents distinct motor features into a unique finalized action still remains undefined. Previous models proposed the distinct features of a motor act to be hierarchically organized in separated, but functionally interconnected, cortical areas. Here, we hypothesized that distinct patterns across a wide expanse of cortex may actually subserve a topographically organized coding of different categories of actions that represents, at a higher cognitive level and independently from the distinct motor features, the action and its final aim as a whole. Using functional magnetic resonance imaging and pattern classification approaches on the neural responses of 14 right‐handed individuals passively watching short movies of hand‐performed tool‐mediated, transitive, and meaningful intransitive actions, we were able to discriminate with a high accuracy and characterize the category‐specific response patterns. Actions are distinctively coded in distributed and overlapping neural responses within an action‐selective network, comprising frontal, parietal, lateral occipital and ventrotemporal regions. This functional organization, that we named action topography, subserves a higher‐level and more abstract representation of finalized actions and has the capacity to provide unique representations for multiple categories of actions. Hum Brain Mapp 36:3832–3844, 2015. © 2015 The Authors Human Brain Mapping Published by Wiley Periodicals, Inc.     

Is conceptual implicit memory impaired in schizophrenia? Evidence from lexical decision and category verification

Introduction. Implicit memory tasks differ along two orthogonal dimensions, tapping the relative involvement of perceptual/conceptual and identification/production processes. Previous studies have documented a dissociation between perceptual (spared) and conceptual (impaired) implicit memory, using in the latter case a production task (category exemplar generation), in which there is high response competition during the retrieval phase. The present study sought to determine whether the perceptual/conceptual dissociation held when comparing two identification tasks, in which there is no response competition at retrieval.

Methods. In two experiments, repetition priming was assessed in 44 schizophrenic patients and 46 healthy controls in lexical decision (a test based on perceptual identification processes) and category verification (a test based on conceptual identification processes).

Results. Schizophrenic patients achieved a priming as high as that of controls in the lexical decision task. In contrast, only controls exhibited significant priming in the category verification task.

Conclusions. It is concluded that schizophrenia is associated with a specific deficit in conceptual implicit memory, irrespective of the degree of response competition in the test phase.