Obsessive-compulsive disorder in callers to the Anxiety Disorders Association of America.

BACKGROUND: Obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) is a chronic, impairing and often comorbid disorder. METHODS: 1000 subjects who called the Anxiety Disorders Association of America (ADAA) were surveyed and divided in three groups: (a) callers with OCD (OCD) and two overlapping control groups: (b) callers with no axis I disorder (NAC) and (c) with no-OCD (NOC) using a 97-item questionnaire. RESULTS: The rate of OCD was 14.5% (N = 145). Relative to the NOC group, OCD subjects were more likely to be female, White, younger and not married. Relative to the NAC group, subjects with OCD were more likely to be White, not married and younger. OCD was accompanied by significant comorbidity and was associated with an increased number of visits to health professionals than NAC subjects. There was no significant difference regarding unemployment rates among the three groups. However, OCD callers were more likely than both control groups to have missed work or have decreased productivity due to their mental condition. OCD subjects took an average of 1 psychotropic medication in the past year and were statistically more likely than the control groups to experience sleepiness and nervousness as side effects. CONCLUSIONS: OCD was fairly prevalent among ADAA callers and presented high levels of comorbidity, impairment, health care utilization and sensitivity to psychotropic side effects.     

Altered functional status of the hypothalamic dopaminergic tone in patients with chronic graft-versus-host disease after allogeneic hematopoietic stem cell transplantation: a pilot study.

We compared the functional status of the hypothalamic dopaminergic tone in patients given an allogeneic hematopoietic stem cell transplantation (allo-HSCT) with chronic graft-versus-host disease (GVHD) with that observed in patients with allo-HSCT without chronic GVHD and in healthy controls. The effect of acute dopaminergic blockade with intravenous metoclopramide on serum prolactin (PRL) concentrations was evaluated. Twenty volunteers, 20 to 52 years of age, seronegative for both hepatitis C virus and the human immunodeficiency virus, were studied: (1) 10 clinically healthy men (group 1), and (2) 9 patients with leukemia, and 1 patient with refractory aplastic anemia who underwent allo-HSCT, 5 of whom (3 men and 2 women) developed chronic GVHD (group 2), and 5 (3 men and 2 women) who did not develop chronic GVHD (group 3). Serum PRL concentrations were measured both fasting and after intravenous administration of metoclopramide (10-mg bolus). The area under the PRL curve was calculated. Patients in group 2 were older than those in groups 1 and 3 (P<.018), but their body mass index was similar. Fasting serum PRL concentrations were similar among the 3 groups; however, group 2 had higher PRL concentrations throughout the test (P<.001) and a greater area under the PRL curve than groups 1 and 3 (P<.001), without differences between the last 2 groups. The differences remained significant after adjustment for age (P<.01). Our results in a small group of patients with chronic GVHD after allo-HSCT suggest the existence of an increased functional level of their hypothalamic dopamine tone, which would favor a tendency toward a diminished endogenous production, release of pituitary PRL, or both. This could represent an adaptive mechanism aiming to maintain circulating PRL concentrations within a physiological range.     

New advances in treating osteoporotic compression fractures.

Osteoporosis is a chronic and potentially debilitating disease. A painful consequence of osteoporosis is a compression fracture of a vertebral body of the spine. These fractures can lead to physical deformities and emotional trauma. Treatment options for these fractures are limited and occasionally ineffective. New surgical advances in treating vertebro-compression fractures are evolving. Kyphoplasty is a new surgical procedure now being used to treat the painful compression fracture.     

Cast syndrome

The term cast syndrome is used to denote duodenal obstruction occurring after application of a corrective plaster cast to patients with scoliosis. We report a classical case in a 14-year-old female who required surgical intervention after conservative treatment failed. Six months later the patient had no further gastrointestinal symptoms. Clinical, radiological, and pathological details as well as the surgical treatment are described and discussed. Offprint requests to: M. E. Martín Hortigüela     

Porphyrins and pentachlorophenol in rat-liver mitochondria in hexachlorobenzene-induced porphyria

This study investigated the extent of impairment in functional parameters of liver mitochondria from rats treated for 60 days with hexachlorobenzene (HCB). A constant amount of mitochondrial uncoupling was found throughout the treatment period. At the same time a nearly constant amount of pentachlorophenol was detected in these mitochondria. In contrast, the level of mitochondrial porphyrins increased progressively. There was good correlation between the concentration of mitochondrial pentachlorophenol and the degree of uncoupling of oxidative phosphorylation.     

Phylogenetic relationships of snake venom toxic proteins

Two kinds of distance matrices have been formed from minimum mutational distances and absolute hydrophobicity differences obtained by comparison of aligned homologous sequences of 56 toxins from venom of snakes belonging to 7 genera. Phylogenetic trees were constructed from these distance matrices, employing the unweighted pair-group method using arithmetic averages (UPGMA). The Pearson product-moment correlation coefficient has been used to estimate the agreement between the original distance matrix and that obtained directly from the dendrogram. For all these procedures the set of computer programs PHYTREE (written in BASIC for micro-computer, and available from the author) has been used.