The effects of physical activity and exercise on brain-derived neurotrophic factor in healthy humans: A review.

The purpose of this study was to summarize the effects of physical activity and exercise on peripheral brain-derived neurotrophic factor (BDNF) in healthy humans. Experimental and observational studies were identified from PubMed, Web of Knowledge, Scopus, and SPORT Discus. A total of 32 articles met the inclusion criteria. Evidence from experimental studies suggested that peripheral BDNF concentrations were elevated by acute and chronic aerobic exercise. The majority of the studies suggested that strength training had no influence on peripheral BDNF. The results from most observational studies suggested an inverse relationship between the peripheral BDNF level and habitual physical activity or cardiorespiratory fitness. More research is needed to confirm the findings from the observational studies.

Physician extenders in walk-in clinics: a prospective evaluation of the AMOSIST program.

The Automated Military Outpatient System (AMOS) Project was developed to improve the ambulatory care of patients with episodic and chronic illnesses. During the development of its episodic care component, the relative frequency of problems treated by the walk-in clinic staff was analyzed and showed a high volume of acute minor illnesses. A simple, conservative triage system run by non-professionals was developed to screen patients to a clinic for benign, self-limited illnesses run by physician-extenders. This group, the equivalent of civilian licensed practical nurses and nurses' aides, was trained in a task-oriented fashion to treat 44 common minor illnesses. Clinical algorithms for these illnesses were developed and used as training tools, memory aids, and auditing instruments. This program is now operating in 26 US Army hospitals and caring for some 44,000 patients a month in the continetal United States. We report the results of a prospective audit of the corpsmen and a study of the patient attitude and acceptance of the program.

High yield criteria and emergency department skull radiography: two community hospitals' experience.

A retrospective analysis of 75 patients admitted with the diagnosis of skull fracture to two community hospitals revealed that 48% of these patients would not have been diagnosed if the high yield criteria recently proposed by the Food and Drug Administration had been adhered to in selecting patients for skull radiography. This included four patients with depressed skull fractures and 32 with linear fractures. The remaining 39 patients had at least one high yielded criterion, the most common being loss of consciousness (21.3%).

[Moyamoya disease. A rare case of stroke in children?]. / Sykdommen moyamoya. En sjelden årsak til hjerneslag hos barn?

Moyamoya disease is a rare cerebrovascular disease with a wide variety of clinical outcomes. The main signs of the disease are progressive occlusion of the main intracerebral arteries and development of a special network of collateral vessels, Symptomatology can be intermittent, with light neurologic symptoms, or the disease can progress step-wise, with eventual physical and mental deterioration. Several operative methods have been evolved to improve cerebral bloodflow in this disease. We describe three children with Moyamoya disease. Two of them were the first patients offered operation for their disease in Norway. The article describes diagnostic measures, possible pathogenic mechanisms, and treatment.