Diaphragmatic myoclonus post cerebellar hemorrhage: a case report.

BACKGROUND: Diaphragmatic myoclonus is a rare motor disorder that affects muscle tone. It is characterized by involuntary movements of the abdominal wall and rhythmic, repetitive contractions of the accessory or respiratory muscles, all of which are innervated by the cervical nerve roots. CASE DESCRIPTION: We reviewed the case of a 57-year-old male patient who underwent surgery for a left cerebellar hemorrhage. He exhibited persistent myoclonus in the palate, jaw, and thoracoabdominal region. Following treatment, there was a significant reduction in flutter amplitude in these areas. CONCLUSION: The clinical rarity and variability of presentations often make diagnosis challenging and delayed. It is believed that this condition stems from abnormal excitation within the central nervous system or neural pathways that involve the phrenic nerve. Another potential mechanism is the direct irritation of the diaphragm. Ultrasound, chest fluoroscopy, and electromyography (EMG) can support the diagnosis. Various pharmacological and surgical treatments have been tried, yet specific treatment guidelines are still lacking.

A transcranial sonography study of brainstem and its association with depression in idiopathic generalized epilepsy with tonic-clonic seizures.

Brainstem raphe (BR) hypoechogenicity in transcranial sonography (TCS) has been depicted in patients with depression. But, up to date, the association of BR alterations in TCS with depression in patients with epilepsy has never been reported. This study was to investigate the possible role of BR examination via TCS in patients with idiopathic generalized epilepsy with tonic-clonic seizures (IGE-TCS) and depression. Forty-six patients with IGE-TCS and 45 healthy controls were recruited. Echogenicity of the caudate nuclei (CN), lentiform nuclei (LN), substantia nigra (SN), and BR and widths of the lateral ventricle (LV) frontal horns and the third ventricle (TV) were assessed via TCS. The determination of depression was based on the criteria of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders IV (DSM-IV), and depression severity measured by Chinese version Neurological Disorders Depression Inventory for Epilepsy (C-NDDI-E) and Beck Depression Inventory-II (BDI-II). The width of TV in patients with epilepsy was found significantly larger than that in healthy controls (p = 0.001), but there was no significant difference in TV width between patients with IGE-TCS with and without depression. There were no significant differences between patients with IGE-TCS and healthy controls in LV frontal horn width, as well as in SN, CN, LN, and BR echogenicity. Here, it seems that patients with IGE-TCS were detected with smaller SN echogenic area compared with controls though they had no statistical significance. Patients with IGE-TCS with hypoechogenic BR had significantly higher C-NDDI-E and BDI-II scores than those with normal BR signal, and most patients with IGE-TCS with depression exhibited hypoechogenic BR, but few patients with IGE-TCS without depression exhibited hypoechogenic BR. In conclusion, BR echogenic signal alterations in TCS can be a biomarker for depression in epilepsy, but it might not be associated with epilepsy itself. The alterations of SN echogenic area and TV width in TCS may reflect a potential role of SN and diencephalon structure in the pathogenesis of epilepsy, which needs to be further elucidated.

Erratum: Association of 3 Common Polymorphisms of IL-27 Gene with Susceptibility to Cancer in Chinese People: Evidence from an Updated Meta-Analysis of 27 Studies.

The authors informed the journal that an error occurred in their manuscript.Figure 3C was mistakenly merged by the authors.The new version of the Figure 3C is as below.Reference:1. Meng Zhang, Xiuxiu Tan, Junjie Huang, Zekai Ke, Yukun Ge, Hu Xiong, Wei Lu, Lu Fang, Zhiming Cai, Song Wu: Association of 3 Common Polymorphisms of IL-27 Gene with Susceptibility to Cancer in Chinese: Evidence From an Updated Meta-Analysis of 27 Studies. Med Sci Monit 2015; 21: 2505-2513. DOI: 10.12659/MSM.895032.

Association of 3 Common Polymorphisms of IL-27 Gene with Susceptibility to Cancer in Chinese: Evidence From an Updated Meta-Analysis of 27 Studies.

BACKGROUND: Many epidemiology studies have indicated that several functional polymorphisms of the IL-27 gene may contribute to individual susceptibility to cancer. Nevertheless, the data arising from these studies were inconclusive. Therefore, we conducted the current meta-analysis aiming to elucidate the effects of IL-27 polymorphisms (rs153109, rs17855750, and rs181206) on cancer susceptibility. MATERIAL AND METHODS: We searched the CNKI (Chinese National Knowledge Infrastructure), Wanfang database, PubMed, Web of Science, and Google Scholar for all eligible publications. We used odds ratios (ORs) corresponding with 95% confidence intervals (CIs) by using the random/fixed-effects model to evaluate the association. Finally, a total of 12 publications, including 27 case-control studies comprising of 7570 patients and 9839 controls, were enrolled in our meta-analysis. RESULTS: Our work demonstrates that IL-27 rs17855750 polymorphism is significantly associated with cancer susceptibility, particularly for bladder cancer. However, no association between IL-27 rs153109 and rs181206 polymorphisms and cancer susceptibility was identified. When a stratification analysis was performed by cancer type, we identified an increased susceptibility of bladder cancer in rs153109 polymorphism. Moreover, in the stratification analysis by genotyping method, we identified an increased susceptibility for PCR-RFLP group in rs17855750 polymorphism, whereas a decreased susceptibility was identified in rs153109 polymorphism. CONCLUSIONS: Our study shows that IL-27 rs17855750 polymorphism is significantly associated with increased susceptibility to cancer in Chinese.

Common Polymorphisms in the NFKBIA Gene and Cancer Susceptibility: A Meta-Analysis.

BACKGROUND: NFKBIA encodes the inhibitors of nuclear factor-κB (NF-κB), which regulate the translation of the genes involved in the inflammatory and immune reactions. Polymorphisms (rs2233406, rs3138053, and rs696) of NFKBIA have been implicated in susceptibility to many cancer types. MATERIAL AND METHODS: To evaluate the association between polymorphisms of NFKBIA and cancer susceptibility, a meta-analysis including a total of 7182 cancer cases and 10 057 controls from 28 case-control studies was performed. Data were extracted and pooled odds ratios (ORs) with 95% confidence intervals (CIs) were calculated. RESULTS: Combined data demonstrated that rs3138053 polymorphism of NFKBIA was associated with cancer susceptibility in an allelic model (C vs. T: OR=10.754, 95%CI=4.175-27.697, Pheterogeneity=0.000), while the polymorphism of rs696 appeared to play a protective role in tumorigenesis (CC+CT vs. TT: OR=0.879, 95%CI=0.787-0.982, Pheterogeneity=0.107). When stratification analysis was performed by cancer type, an increased association of rs3138053 was recognized in hepatocarcinoma (C vs. T: OR=42.180, 95%CI=27.970-63.612, Pheterogeneity=0.007), while a decreased association of rs696 was identified in Hodgkin lymphoma (C vs. T: OR=0.792, 95%CI=0.656-0.956, Pheterogeneity=0.116; CC vs. TT: OR=0.658, 95%CI=0.448-0.965, Pheterogeneity=0.076; CC vs. CT+TT: OR=0.734, 95%CI=0.562-0.958, Pheterogeneity=0.347). By ethnicity, rs696 appears to be a protective candidate among Caucasians (CT vs. TT: OR=0.809, 95%CI=0.676-0.969, Pheterogeneity=0.459). CONCLUSIONS: Our data demonstrated that the rs3138053 polymorphism of NFKBIA gene is a candidate for susceptibility to overall cancers, while rs696 plays a protective role.

Ventrolateral Periaqueductal Gray Matter Neurochemical Lesion Facilitates Epileptogenesis and Enhances Pain Sensitivity in Epileptic Rats.

The ventrolateral periaqueductal gray matter (vlPAG) plays a critical role in the pathogenesis of migraine and few studies have shown that vlPAG might be involved in the pathophysiology of epilepsy. But its roles in epileptogenesis and comorbid relationship between migraine and epilepsy have never been reported. In this study, the impairments of vlPAG neuronal network during spontaneous recurrent seizure (SRS) development after status epilepticus (SE) were investigated, and the pain sensitivity as well as the SRS investigated after neurochemical lesion to vlPAG to determine the role of vlPAG in epileptogenesis and in migraine comorbidity with epilepsy. Neuronal loss and alterations of excitatory and inhibitory neural transmission within vlPAG accompanied the development of epileptogenesis induced by SE. On the other hand, neurochemical lesion to vlPAG enhanced frequency and duration of spontaneous seizure event and frequency of epileptiform inter-ictal spike discharges in electroencephalography (EEG), but decreased pain threshold in epileptic rats. This indicates an involvement of the pain regulating structure, vlPAG, in the pathogenesis of epilepsy. This may imply that vlPAG network alterations could be a possible underlying mechanism of the interactive comorbid relationship between epilepsy and migraine.

Association between two interleukin-2 gene polymorphisms and cancer susceptibility: a meta-analysis.

BACKGROUND: Several epidemiological studies have illustrated that polymorphisms in interleukin-2 (IL-2) were associated with diverse cancer types. However, recently published statistics were inconsistent and inconclusive. Therefore, the current meta-analysis was performed to elaborate the effects of IL-2 polymorphisms (rs2069762 and rs2069763) on cancer susceptibility. MATERIAL AND METHODS: A total of 5,601 cancer cases and 7,809 controls from 21 published case-control studies were enrolled in our meta-analysis. Odds ratios (ORs) with 95% confidence intervals (CIs) were estimated to assess the association between IL-2 polymorphisms and cancer susceptibility. RESULTS: Our study demonstrated an increased susceptibility to cancer in rs2069762 (G vs T: OR =1.268, 95% CI =1.113-1.445; GG vs TT: OR =1.801, 95% CI =1.289-2.516; GT vs TT: OR =1.250, 95% CI =1.061-1.473; GG + GT vs TT: OR =1.329, 95% CI =1.118-1.579; GG vs GT + TT: OR =1.536, 95% CI =1.162-2.030). In the subgroup analysis, increased susceptibility to cancer was identified in the hospital-based group and P HWE<0.05 (P-value of the Hardy-Weinberg equilibrium [HWE]) group. In addition, a positive association with cancer susceptibility was observed among both Chinese and non-Chinese. However, no relationship was detected between the rs2069763 polymorphism of IL-2 and cancer susceptibility. CONCLUSION: To conclude, rs2069762 polymorphism of IL-2 contributed to an increased susceptibility to cancer, whereas no association was identified between rs2069763 polymorphism and cancer susceptibility. Further detailed studies are warranted to confirm our findings.