Case of recurrent paracoccidioidomycosis in female. 10 years after initial treatment

This report describes a case of recurrence of chronic paracoccidioidomycosis 10 years following the initial diagnosis. A 56-year-old female was admitted to the Dental Clinic of the Pontifical Catholic University of Paraná complaining of oral soreness. Mulberry-like ulcerations were observed on the gingiva, right labial comissura, and vermillion of the lip. The patient reported persistent chronic cough, weight loss, appetite loss and fever. The anamnesis revealed that the patient had developed and been treated for paracoccidioidomycosis 10 years earlier. A biopsy was performed and microscopic examination revealed microabscesses, collections of macrophages organized into granulomas, multinucleated giant cells and Paracoccidioides brasiliensis. The patient was treated with Itraconazole and, the oral lesions disappeared within 3 months. Persistent follow-up examination in patients with a history of paracoccidioidomycosis is essential in the management of this disease.     

Surgical treatment of the substernal goitre.

This report describes the surgical experience gained from 32 patients with substernal goitre, operated on during January 1995 to December 1997. The material corresponds to 15.7% of the total thyroidectomies performed. The diagnosis was clinical. In spite of 65.6% of the patients being asymptomatic, breathing problems, dysphagia and hyperthyroidism were observed. The patients underwent tests of thyroid function, simple chest radiograph and computerized tomography of mediastinum. All patients underwent surgical treatment through a transverse cervical incision. Two patients (6.25%) needed median sternotomy. Vocal cord palsy (3.12%), transient hypocalcemia (6.25%) and one death due to cardiac causes (3.12%) were the complications that occurred.     

Screening for inborn errors of metabolism in high-risk children from Rio de Janeiro, Brazil

From 1988 to 1995, our laboratory at the Institute of Chemistry of the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro, in Rio de Janeiro, screened 2650 samples from 2000 high-risk patients (mostly children) for Inborn Errors of Metabolism (IEM). Chemical tests, various chromatographic techniques and enzyme assays were performed on urine, plasma and in some cases, cerebrospinal fluid (CSF). A total of 145 cases of IEM (7.2%) was identified. These were related to: the metabolism of amino acids (41) and carbohydrates (17), organic acids (7), lysosomal enzymes (61), membrane transport system (16), metals (2), intestinal disaccharidases (1) and porphyrin metabolism (3). Furthermore, a relevant number of patients with abnormal findings is still under investigation. Biochemical results and clinical symptoms are presented and the importance of reference laboratories for the detection of IEM is stressed.     

Disrupting Short-Term Memory Maintenance in Premotor Cortex Affects Serial Dependence in Visuomotor Integration

Human behavior is biased by past experience. For example, when intercepting a moving target, the speed of previous targets will bias responses in future trials. Neural mechanisms underlying this so-called serial dependence are still under debate. Here, we tested the hypothesis that the previous trial leaves a neural trace in brain regions associated with encoding task-relevant information in visual and/or motor regions. We reasoned that injecting noise by means of transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) over premotor and visual areas would degrade such memory traces and hence reduce serial dependence. To test this hypothesis, we applied bursts of TMS pulses to right visual motion processing region hV5/MT+ and to left dorsal premotor cortex (PMd) during intertrial intervals of a coincident timing task performed by twenty healthy human participants (15 female). Without TMS, participants presented a bias toward the speed of the previous trial when intercepting moving targets. TMS over PMd decreased serial dependence in comparison to the control Vertex stimulation, whereas TMS applied over hV5/MT+ did not. In addition, TMS seems to have specifically affected the memory trace that leads to serial dependence, as we found no evidence that participants'' behavior worsened after applying TMS. These results provide causal evidence that an implicit short-term memory mechanism in premotor cortex keeps information from one trial to the next, and that this information is blended with current trial information so that it biases behavior in a visuomotor integration task with moving objects.SIGNIFICANCE STATEMENT Human perception and action are biased by the recent past. The origin of such serial bias is still not fully understood, but a few components seem to be fundamental for its emergence: the brain needs to keep previous trial information in short-term memory and blend it with incoming information. Here, we present evidence that a premotor area has a potential role in storing previous trial information in short-term memory in a visuomotor task and that this information is responsible for biasing ongoing behavior. These results corroborate the perspective that areas associated with processing information of a stimulus or task also participate in maintaining that information in short-term memory even when this information is no longer relevant for current behavior.     

Effect of root perforation repair with mineral aggregate-based cements on the retention of customized fiberglass posts

Odontology - The purpose of this study was to investigate whether the root perforation repair with mineral aggregate-based cements affects the retention of customized fiberglass posts to bovine...     

In vivo protection of striatal dopaminergic system against 1-methyl-4-phenylpyridinium neurotoxicity by phenobarbital

We have studied the effect of a semichronic and acute treatment of phenobarbital on in vivo 1-methyl-4-phenylpyridinium ion- (MPP+)-induced neurotoxicity. A group of rats were intraperitoneally injected for 12 days with phenobarbital (80 mg/Kg of body weight, semichronic treatment) in order to induce cytochrome P450 levels in brain. At day 10 of treatment, rats received unilateral left striatal injections of 1 or 2 μg of MPP+. Two days after the injection of the toxin a dose-dependent loss of dopamine uptake along with a concomitant decrease of dopamine levels and its metabolites was produced in control rats. In phenobarbital treated animals striatal injection of 1 μg of MPP+ did not produce any effect on dopaminergic parameters but injection of 2 μg of MPP+ caused losses of dopamine levels and dopamine transporter although smaller than in control rats. TH immunohistochemistry in semichronic phenobarbital treated rats also demonstrated the protective effect of this drug against MPP+ toxicity. Dopamine uptake in synaptosomes from semichronic phenobarbital treated rats did not change with respect to the controls, thereby diminished MPP+ toxicity in phenobarbital treated rats is not due to an alterated uptake of the toxin. Neuroprotection found by intraperitoneal injection of phenobarbital 30 min before MPP+ intrastriatal injection (acute treatment) could discard the induction of cytochrome P450 as responsible for this suppressed neurotoxicity of MPP+. The neuroprotective effect of phenobarbital could be produced by its action as an excitatory amino acid antagonist or as a GABA agonist. J. Neurosci. Res. 49:301–308, 1997. © 1997 Wiley-Liss, Inc.     

Differential proteomic serum pattern of low molecular weight proteins expressed by adenocarcinoma lung cancer patients

Based on the assumption that proteins can emanate from tumour to serum, we investigated whether serum low molecular weight proteins (LMW) can discriminate lung cancer patients from healthy donors. Pooled sera from 20 lung cancer patients matched in sex (men), histological type (adenocarcinoma) and stage (IIIB and IV) and from 20 healthy donors (men) were submitted to 2-DE coupled to MALDI-TOF peptide mass fingerprinting. Results of 2D-E/ MALDI-TOF showed five up regulated proteins (immunoglobulin lambda chain, transthyretin monomer, haptoglobin-alfa 2 and two isoforms of serum amyloid protein) and one down regulated (fragment of apolipoprotein A-I) in patients. All differentially expressed proteins, except immunoglobulin, may be acting as a non-specific sign of inflammation in cancer and transthyretin monomer may act as a possible blood marker to CSF barrier disruption that occurs, e.g., in cerebral metastasis. In conclusion, this work shows the usefulness of 2D-gel electrophoresis and mass spectrometry proteomic techniques for the identification of up- and down-regulated proteins in serum from adenocarcinoma lung cancer patients.