Sustained neural activity to gaze and emotion perception in dynamic social scenes

To understand social interactions, we must decode dynamic social cues from seen faces. Here, we used magnetoencephalography (MEG) to study the neural responses underlying the perception of emotional expressions and gaze direction changes as depicted in an interaction between two agents. Subjects viewed displays of paired faces that first established a social scenario of gazing at each other (mutual attention) or gazing laterally together (deviated group attention) and then dynamically displayed either an angry or happy facial expression. The initial gaze change elicited a significantly larger M170 under the deviated than the mutual attention scenario. At around 400 ms after the dynamic emotion onset, responses at posterior MEG sensors differentiated between emotions, and between 1000 and 2200 ms, left posterior sensors were additionally modulated by social scenario. Moreover, activity on right anterior sensors showed both an early and prolonged interaction between emotion and social scenario. These results suggest that activity in right anterior sensors reflects an early integration of emotion and social attention, while posterior activity first differentiated between emotions only, supporting the view of a dual route for emotion processing. Altogether, our data demonstrate that both transient and sustained neurophysiological responses underlie social processing when observing interactions between others.     

A Disrupted-in-Schizophrenia 1 Gene Variant is Associated with Clinical Symptomatology in Patients with First-Episode Psychosis

Objective

DISC1 gene is one of the main candidate genes for schizophrenia since it has been associated to the illness in several populations. Moreover, variations in several DISC1 polymorphisms, and in particular Ser704Cys SNP, have been associated in schizophrenic patients to structural and functional modifications in two brain areas (pre-frontal cortex and hippocampus) that play a central role in the genesis of psychotic symptoms. This study tested the association between Ser704Cys DISC1 polymorphism and the clinical onset of psychosis.

Methods

Two hundred and thirteen Caucasian drug-naive patients experiencing a first episode of non-affective psychosis were genotyped for rs821616 (Ser704Cys) SNP of the DISC1 gene. The clinical severity of the illness was assessed using SAPS and SANS scales. Other clinical and socio-demographic variables were recorded to rule out possible confounding effects.

Results

Patients homozygous for the Ser allele of the Ser704Cys DISC1 SNP had significantly (p<0.05) higher rates at the positive symptoms dimension (SAPS-SANS scales) and hallucinations item, compared to Cys carriers.

Conclusion

DISC1 gene variations may modulate the clinical severity of the psychosis at the onset of the disorder.     

Non-invasive high-speed blinking kinematics characterization

Graefe's Archive for Clinical and Experimental Ophthalmology - The objective of this study was to analyze the differences in blinking kinematics of spontaneous and voluntary blinks using for...     

Video-Assisted Surgery Implementation in the Public Health System of a Developing Country

Background

Over the last two decades, video-assisted surgery has become the preferential access route for many procedures. Despite cholecystectomy being the laparoscopic procedure most frequently performed in Brazilian public hospitals from 2008 to 2012, the lack of population-based studies led us to conduct a survey on the prevalence of video-assisted surgery in the treatment of patients using the Sistema Único de Saúde (SUS) (Unified Health System), which is the universal, free, and public healthcare system of Brazil.

Methods

By analyzing the DATASUS (national public health registry database), the prevalence of laparoscopic cholecystectomy and open cholecystectomy (OC) was calculated in the period from January to December in 2008, 2010 and 2012, taking into consideration their geographic distribution throughout Brazil.

Results

At the end of the study period, an increase in the number of laparoscopic cholecystectomies was observed, with a variation of 125.7 %. However, OC was more prevalent despite an increase in the use of video-assisted surgery over the 5-year study period, increasing from 12 to 25 % in 2012.

Conclusions

In spite of a trend toward increased use of video-assisted surgery for treating SUS patients during the period under study, the data from 2012 are still far from being ideal. For this population, OC via laparotomy is still the most prevalent option in all regions. This information must encourage the Brazilian surgical societies to push for an improvement in the supply of the treatment provided by the public health system.