Systemic oxidative stress and cognitive function in Parkinson's disease with different PWMH or DWMH lesions.

BACKGROUND: Parkinson's disease (PD), frequently accompanied by cognitive impairments, is associated with systemic oxidative stress and abnormal structural changes on brain images. We aimed to identify the correlation between systemic oxidative stress and cognitive function in PD patients with different periventricular white matter hyperintensities (PWMH) and deep white matter hyperintensities (DWMH). METHODS: A total of 146 participants with idiopathic PD underwent brain MRI, which revealed PWMH and DWMH. The number of lesions were evaluated using the Fazekas criteria. Systemic oxidative stress was determined as early or late phase changes in leukocyte apoptosis and its subsets by flow cytometry. Cognitive functions, including attention, executive function, memory, language, and visual space, were assessed. RESULTS: For different DWMH, the leukocyte apoptosis and its subsets were significantly different.. However, there were no significant differences in oxidative stress biomarkers in PD patients with different PWMH. Attention and memory were significantly decreased in patients with more advanced DWMH injuries. Attention, memory, and language were significantly impaired in patients with worse PWMH lesions. CONCLUSION: Significant oxidative stress biomarker alternations in PD patients with DWMH, but not PWMH, might be associated with white matter injury. Systemic inflammatory responses may contribute to deep white matter damage in PD. Further, more cognitive deficits were seen in PD patients with worse deep white matter lesions, especially in moderate to severe periventricular white matter injury. TRIAL REGISTRATION: Retrospective study.

Patients with Kawasaki Disease Have Significantly Low Aerobic Metabolism Capacity and Peak Exercise Load Capacity during Adolescence.

INTRODUCTION: Kawasaki disease (KD) is a childhood illness causing blood vessel inflammation. Children with KD have similar cardiopulmonary function to healthy children, but lower moderate-to-vigorous activity and exercise self-efficacy-possibly harming their cardiopulmonary function in adolescence. The purpose of this study is to investigate the cardiopulmonary function, exercise behaviors, exercise motivations, and self-efficacy of adolescents who once had KD. METHODS: adolescents who once had KD and adolescents matched to the KD group in age and sex were enrolled. The cardiopulmonary exercise test was used to assess cardiopulmonary function. Weekly exercise behavior, exercise motivation, and self-efficacy were assessed with questionnaires. RESULTS: this study recruited 50 and 30 participants, respectively, to the KD and control groups. The KD group had a lower ratio of VO2/kg at the anaerobic threshold and peak to the predicted VO2/kg at the peak (p = 0.021 and 0.043, respectively). No significant differences were found in questionnaire scores. The correlations of weekly exercise behavior scores with exercise motivation and self-efficacy scores were stronger in the KD group. CONCLUSIONS: adolescents with KD history had significantly lower aerobic metabolism capacity and peak exercise load capacity than controls. The correlations of amount of weekly exercise with exercise motivation and self-efficacy were stronger in the KD group.