Blood pressure,smoking, and the incidence of lung cancer in hypertensive men in North Karelia,Finland

Few studies have suggested that elevated blood pressure might be associated with increased risk of lung cancer and that this association might vary according to smoking status. The aim of this study was to assess the effect of blood pressure and its possible interaction with smoking on lung cancer incidence in hypertensive patients. Lung cancer incidence was determined for 7,908 men enrolled in the hypertension register of the North Karelia Project between 1972 and 1988 by record linkage to the nationwide Finnish Cancer Registry. In a Cox regression model, both systolic and diastolic blood pressures were significant predictors of lung cancer, with a 10% increase in risk per 10-mmHg increment in blood pressure. In smokers, the age-adjusted hazard ratio associated with a 10-mmHg increment in diastolic blood pressure was 1.17 (95% confidence interval: 1.05, 1.29), and in nonsmokers it was 0.98 (95% confidence interval: 0.80, 1.16). For systolic blood pressure, these hazard ratios were 1.11 (95% confidence interval: 1.05, 1.17) for smokers and 1.04 (95% confidence interval: 0.95, 1.14) for nonsmokers. These findings suggest that high blood pressure levels are associated with increased risk of lung cancer in smoking, hypertensive men.     

Dose-dependent suppression by ethanol of transient auditory 40-Hz response

Rationale: Acute alcohol (ethanol) challenge is known to induce various cognitive disturbances, yet the neural basis of the effect is poorly known. The auditory transient evoked gamma-band (40-Hz) oscillatory responses have been suggested to be associated with various perceptual and cognitive functions in humans; however, alcohol effects on auditory 40-Hz responses have not been investigated to date. Objectives: The objective of the study was to test the dose-related impact of alcohol on auditory transient evoked 40-Hz responses during a selective-attention task. Methods: Ten healthy social drinkers ingested, in four separate sessions, 0.00, 0.25, 0.50, or 0.75 g/kg of 10% (v/v) alcohol solution. The order of the sessions was randomized and a double-blind procedure was employed. During a selective attention task, 300-Hz standard and 330-Hz deviant tones were presented to the left ear, and 1000-Hz standards and 1100-Hz deviants to the right ear of the subjects (P=0.425 for each standard, P=0.075 for each deviant). The subjects attended to a designated ear, and were to detect the deviants therein while ignoring tones to the other ear. Results: The auditory transient evoked 40-Hz responses elicited by both the attended and unattended standard tones were significantly suppressed by the 0.50 and 0.75 g/kg alcohol doses. Conclusions: Alcohol suppresses auditory transient evoked 40-Hz oscillations already with moderate blood alcohol concentrations. Given the putative role of gamma-band oscillations in cognition, this finding could be associated with certain alcohol-induced cognitive deficits. Received: 20 January 1999 / Final version: 9 August 1999     

Thoracic spine CT, diagnostic efficacy

In 67 patients the diagnostic efficacy of thoracic spine CT was assessed. Diagnoses suspected clinically or by other examination methods could be confirmed by CT in 81% and excluded in 18% of cases. In one per cent (one case) the diagnosis, myelopathia vascularis, could not be seen by CT nor by myelography. In 49 cases the results of thoracic spine CT and myelography were compared with each other. CT gave additional information to myelography in 27% (13/49), but not in 73% (36/49). In 27% (18/67) of the whole material CT was able to replace myelography. It seems that CT is useless if myelography is normal, but CT may be useful in tumors, infections and medullary diseases. In traumas CT may replace myelography.     

Impaired preconscious auditory processing and cognitive functions in Alzheimer's disease

Objective: To study whether preconscious auditory processing is deteriorated in patients with Alzheimer's disease (AD) having mild to moderate cognitive symptoms. To investigate whether auditory processing correlates with the impairment of the higher cortical functions.Methods: P50m and N100m responses elicited by a sequence of repetitive tones were recorded with a whole-head magnetometer from 22 patients with probable AD and from 18 healthy age-matched controls. In addition, an extensive neuropsychological test battery assessing main cognitive domains was administered to all subjects.Results: The patients with AD had significantly delayed N100m responses in the left hemisphere that correlated with the impairment of the language functions.Conclusions: N100m auditory responses measured with magnetoencephalography may be useful in evaluating the severity and progression of the cortical dysfunction in dementia.     

Common Variations in 4p Locus are Related to Male Completed Suicide

Suicidal behavior is a multifactorial phenomenon, with a significant genetic predisposition. To assess the contribution of genes in the 4p region to suicide risk, we genotyped 36 single nucleotide polymorphisms from a 49Mb region on the chromosome arm 4p11-16 in a total of 288 male suicide victims and 327 healthy male volunteers. The nonsynonymous variants rs1383180 in EVC gene, rs6811863 in TBC1D1 gene, rs362272 in HTT gene, and rs734312 in WFS1 gene were associated to the male completed suicide. However, only EVC polymorphism remained significant after correcting for multiple comparisons (P < .05 after 10 K permutations). The function of these genes is not clear yet. WFS1 and HTT are related to the unfolded protein response and endoplasmic reticulum stress, and TBC1D1 is a GTPase activator. EVC is a protein with transmembrane and leucine zipper domains, its function has not been elucidated yet. Further studies are required in order to reveal the role of these four polymorphisms in the pathoetiology of suicide. Electronic supplementary material  The online version of this article (doi:) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.