Rasagiline,sleep quality and well-being in Parkinson’s disease: a pilot study

Neurological Sciences - Sleep disordersand excessive daytime sleepiness are among the commonest nonmotor symptoms in Parkinson disease (PD) and can contribute to significantly lower quality of life...     

Combination Chemotherapy with Cyclophosphamide,Doxorubicin and Vincristine in the Treatment of Stage III-IV Small-Cell Lung Cancer

Summary

Twenty patients with histologically confirmed small-cell lung cancer were treated with cyclophosphamide 1000 mg/m² i.v. on day 1, vincristine 1.4 mg/m² i.v. day 1, and adriamycin 50 mg/m² i.v. on day 1. This protocol was repeated every 21 days. Out of 17 evaluable patients 2 obtained a complete response (12%) with a mean duration of 11 months, 4 patients achieved a partial response with a mean duration of 6.3 + months, and 1 had a minimal response of 7.2 months. Two patients had a stabilization which lasted a mean of 4 + months, while 8 patients progressed. Although the mean survival was higher in responders than in non-responders, the difference in survival time was not statistically significant. The treatment was quite well tolerated with hematological toxicity in 78% of cases, oral and gastrointestinal toxicity in 83%, alopecia in 78%, and neurotoxicity in 16% of cases.     

Taking decisions on expenditure for high‐cost drugs at the regional level: a model for evaluating the overall impact of Trastuzumab in the Veneto Region of Italy

Introduction Cost‐effectiveness analysis provides a ratio that indicates the value created per unit of money by a given therapy but says nothing about the total expected costs or net health and social impact of this therapy in a particular population of interest. Objective The main objective of this study is to define a methodology to calculate the effects of interventions from a local perspective. This will help determine parameters that provide information about resource planning and management to local decision makers. Methods The described methodology calculates four indicators using local demographic and epidemiological data and a Markovian decision tree approach. Results The method was applied to evaluate the economic, health and social impact of introducing a new cancer drug, Trastuzumab, for the early treatment of breast cancer in the Veneto Region of Italy. Discussion The indicators described in this study allow public policy makers to clearly understand the benefits and costs of a particular health intervention in a local population and to compare it with other strategies.     

Effect of Buthionine Sulfoximine on the Sensitivity to Doxorubicin of Parent and MDR Tumor Cell Lines

Summary

We have studied the interaction of glutathione-depleting concentrations of buthionine sulfoximine (BSO) with the antiproliferative activity of doxorubicin (DXR) in three tumor lines, the mouse B16 melanoma, Friend erythroleukemia and the human K562 leukemia, both as DXR-sensitive and -resistant (with typical multidrug resistance) variants. BSO significantly enhanced the DXR effects in the wild-type Friend and K562 leukemias, and especially in the drug-resistant subline of Friend leukemia. BSO did not modify DXR accumulation and retention in the latter clone. Moreover, neither BSO nor verapamil used alone completely reversed the resistance to DXR of this cell line; their combination was more efficient and increased its drug sensitivity to a level closer to that of the parental counterpart. These results seem to indicate that the status of glutathione and of the enzymes related to it contributes to the resistance of Friend leukemia to DXR. An interesting additional finding was that BSO significantly synergizes with the antiproliferative effects of vincristine in the drug-sensitive variants of Friend and K562 leukemias.     

Self-help group and medication overuse headache: preliminary data

The objective of the study is to investigate the benefits of joining a self-help group for patients with medication overuse headache (MOH). A self-help group is a voluntary gathering of a small number of persons who share a common problem. Little is known about support groups for people with chronic non-malignant pain such as MOH. Eight patients with refractory MOH attended a self-help group twice a month. During the meetings, patients were asked to focus on their headache experiences. Our data showed an increase in resourcefulness in coping with pain and a reduction in cephalalgiophobia. All patients reported general benefits in sharing their headache-related problems. No differences were found for headache frequency or analgesic overuse. To our knowledge, this is the first report on a self-help group for patients with MOH. Joining a self-help group can help patients develop positive attitudes to managing pain.     

Acute kidney injury as a causal factor in mortality associated with hepatorenal syndrome

Purpose  

We examine how acute kidney injury (AKI) contributes to mortality in patients with liver failure.     

Family resemblance in blood pressure measurements

The correlation for diastolic and systolic blood pressure was studied in two samples of quartets each consisting of two pairs. The first sample comprised pairs of sisters and their husbands, and the second sample was comprised of brothers and their wives. All siblings were between 30 and 55 years of age and had been married for at least 5 years. It was found that unrelated men married to sisters had a significant correlation in both diastolic (r = 0.28) and systolic (r = 0.41) pressure. For systolic blood pressure, the correlation between pairs of unrelated men married to sisters was significantly larger than the homologous correlation existing in pairs of brothers married to unrelated women. The correlations of systolic and diastolic pressure in sisters were significantly smaller than the same correlations measured in the wives of brothers. The correlations in height for men, used as an internal control to compare marital and genetic effects, were unaffected by marriage, as expected. The correlations in height for pairs of sisters, however, were no larger than those observed in pairs of unrelated women married to brothers. It was concluded that in adult married men and women of the Ferrara population, aged 30 to 55 years, the influence of genetic factors on blood pressure is less important than the influence of cultural factors.     

Influence of mitoxantrone on the syntheses of DNA and proteins of mouse tissues.

In view of the structural similarity of mitoxantrone to anthracyclines and its ability to intercalate into DNA, we studied its influence on the synthetic processes of DNA and proteins in CD-1 mice tissues. By studying at the DNA level the impairment of 3H-thymidine incorporation and its return to normal, it was found that bone marrow and spleen showed similar behavior, i.e., a rapid return to normal, which occurred before bone marrow cell number and spleen weight returned to basal values. At the cardiac level, the incorporation values of precursors into DNA, reduced by treatment with mitoxantrone, came back very slowly to the control ones. Hepatic DNA showed a lower sensitivity to mitoxantrone. Analysis of 3H-leucine incorporation into three protein fractions of the heart showed that the contractile proteins were the most responsive fractions to mitoxantrone treatment. Experiments on CD-1 mice treated repeatedly with mitoxantrone revealed that the antitumor drug, at the cumulative dose of 8 mg/kg i.v., induced alterations in myocardiac morphology similar qualitatively to those induced by doxorubicin, although smaller quantitatively.