Allergic rhinitis and risk of erectile dysfunction--a nationwide population-based study.

BACKGROUND: A growing body of evidence has disclosed that allergic rhinitis (AR) is a systemic inflammatory disease. Inflammatory mediators and cells involved in AR have also been reported to be implicated in the process of atherosclerosis, which is relevant to the occurrence of erectile dysfunction (ED). Our objective was to explore the relationship between AR and future ED events. METHODS: From 1 January 2000 to 31 December 2008, we identified male patients, who were aged 18-55 years and newly diagnosed with AR from the Taiwan National Health Insurance Research Database. A control cohort without AR, which was matched for age, comorbidities and medications, was selected for comparison. The two cohorts were followed up until 31 December 2009 and observed for occurrence of ED by registry of ED diagnosis in the database. RESULTS: Of the 128,118 sampled male patients (64,059 AR patients vs 64,059 matched controls), 1455 (1.16%) experienced ED during a mean follow-up period of 5.82 years, including 844 (1.32% of the AR patients) from the AR cohort and 611 (0.95%) from the controls. Kaplan-Meier analysis revealed a tendency of AR patients to develop ED (log-rank test, P < 0.001). After adjusting confounder variables by Cox regression, subjects with AR experienced a 1.37-fold (95% CI, 1.24-1.52; P < 0.001) increase in incident ED. The risk of ED was higher in cases with more frequent clinical visits for AR and in cases needing medication more than 4 weeks. CONCLUSIONS: Patients with AR appeared to be at higher risk of future ED, possibly in a severity-dependent manner.

Regional cerebral blood flow of Alzheimer's disease-like pattern in young patients with Down's syndrome detected by 99Tcm-HMPAO brain SPECT.

Fourteen young patients with Down's syndrome (nine males, five females, age range 8-30 years) were studied. 99Tcm-hexamethylpropylene amine oxime (HMPAO) brain single photon emission computed tomography (SPECT) was performed to evaluate regional cerebral blood flow (rCBF). Two experienced nuclear medicine physicians analysed the results of the SPECT by visual interpretation. The SPECT in all 14 patients with Down's syndrome invariably showed significantly unilateral perfusion defects in the temporal-parietal-occipital region, occasionally combined with small perfusion defects over other discrete cerebral areas. In this preliminary study, 99Tcm-HMPAO brain SPECT in the patients with Down's syndrome were abnormal. Patterns of rCBF in Down's syndrome were similar to the usual images of rCBF in Alzheimer's disease reported in the literature. Our findings provide new evidence of the similarities between Down's syndrome and Alzheimer's disease.