Background To investigate the expression of the early growth response gene-1 ( Egr-1 ) mRNA after focal cerebral ischemia / reperfusion in rats.Methods Ten healthy male SD rats weighing 200 ～ 250 g were used to create model of focal cerebral ischemia. The expression of Egr-1 after focal cerebral ischemia/reperfusion in rats was determined using in situ hybridization and RT-PCR.Results (1) The result of the in situ hybridization: A trace amount of Egr-1 mRNA expressed in the neurons and the glial cells in the sham operated group. The expression of Egr-1 mRNA at the ischemic side increased dramatically following ischemia and reached peaks after 4 hours' reperfusion. Egr-1 expression started to subside following 22 hours' reperfusion and further decreased following 166 hours' reperfusion, which was still significantly higher than that in the sham operated group. (2) The result of RT-PCR: The expression of Egr-1 mRNA at the ischemic side was significantly higher than that in the sham operated group at all time points after ischemia/reperfusion in the rats(P ＜0. 01). Expression of Egr-1 increased 2 h after ischemia and reached the peak 4 h following reperfusion, and then decreased dramatically at 46 h after reperfusion which was still higher than that in the sham operated group (P ＜ 0. 01). As the ischemia/reperfusion period prolonged, the expression of Egr-1 mRNA increased gradually, but still detectable even 166 h following reperfusion. The expression of Egr-1 was significantly higher than that in the sham operated group at all time points (P ＜0. 01).Conclusions The expression of Egr-1 mRNA increase in the neurons and the glial cells after ischemia/reperfusion, which may have protective effects on ischemic brain tissues.

Background Based on prior research in the field, a preliminary questionnaire was created to compare the coping strategies of schizophrenic patients to those of non-ill community residents. Results of the comparison were subsequently used to develop a questionnaire suitable for use in schizophrenic patients.Methods Ninety-one of the 92 items in the preliminary questionnaire were identified from previous questionnaires, and one additional item was created based on information provided in individual interviews with schizophrenic patients. This questionnaire was administered to 315 community controls and 208 schizophrenic inpatients. Exploratory Factor Analyses to identify the factor structure of coping strategies were independently conducted for controls and patients. Based on these results, a revised 65-item instrument was developed and administered to a new group of 287 controls and 219 schizophrenic inpatients. Confirmatory Factor Analyses (CFA) using Linear Structural Relations (LISREL) were independently conducted for the two groups to confirm their respective factor structures.Results Six coping categories identified in normal controls were problem solving, avoidance, cognitive adjustment, emotional adjustment, seeking special support, and denial. Among schizophrenic patients, however,coping strategies of "seeking special support" and "denial" were not independent of the other four coping categories. Their items were distributed among the others. Results of CFA confirmed this four-category model of coping strategies for schizophrenic patients.Conclusions Coping categories employed by schizophrenic patients were different from those employed by normal community controls. Schizophrenic patients lacked the necessary flexibility of selecting appropriate coping strategies.

Background To explore the relationship between polymorphism of APOE gene in traumatic brain injury(TBI)patients suffering from traffic accident and the outcome of TBI.Methods TBI patients were randomly selected in this study with caxe-wntrol trial. The genotype of APOE allele was tested by a polymerase chain reaction-restriction fragment length polymorphism ( PCR-RFLP), and the association between different genotypes of APOE alleles and outcome of TBI patients, were analyed.Results In TBI group frequency of APOE ε2 allele was 0. 1010, and frequency of APOE ε2/ε3 was 0. 1596.Both of these results were significantly higher than that in normal people (APOE epsilon 2 was 0. 0050, APOE ε2/ε3 was 0. 0100) (P＜0.05). Frequency of APOE ε2 and APOE ε2/ε3 in TBI group who died was 0. 1970 and 0. 2727. These were significantly high compared to TBI patients who had good recovery.Conclusions APOE allele ε2 and APOE genotype ε2/ε3alleles indicate a poor prognosis of traumatic brain injury patients.

Background Patients often suffer from a few complications of neurological and psychiatric problems after traumatic brain injury including damage of cognition, mental disorders and behavior problems. Damage of cognition is a common sequela in traumatic brain injury. Numerous researchers were focus on the cognition changes of patients with mild brain injury. But their conclusions are debatable. Executive function is one of the important components of cognition. In this study,we tried to find out the executive functional alterations of the patients with mild brain injury.Methods 159 patients with brain injury caused by transportation events and 68 normal controls were assessed executive function. The executive function tests included the block design in WAIS, the Stroop test, the verbal fluency and the modified version of Wisconsin card sorting test (M-WCST). These tests were applied to compare the scores of traumatic brain injury patients with various severities including mild, moderate, and severe and with different CT/MRI results.Results Patients with mild head injury got significantly lower scores on all tests than normal controls ( P＜0.01 ). But there was no significant difference between mild and moderate brain injury group. Except Stroop test and WCST categories, patients with mild brain injury got significantly lower scores on all other tests than those with severe brain injury ( P ＜0.05). In the brain injury cases with damage signs on CT/MRI, there was no significant difference on scores of all tests except block design tests among brain injury patients with various severities. Among the brain injury cases without any damage signs on CT/MRI, there was no significant difference on scores of all tests among brain injury patients with various severities. The correlation analysis showed that scores of block design and verbal fluency test were negatively related to the severity of brain injury( P＜0.05). The age and the education level of the patients had negative and positive correlation, respectively, to executive function.Conclusions The executive function of patients with mild brain injury was impaired when the medication was terminated. We should pay more attention to patients with mild brain injury by performing various tests for assessment of disability.

Background To construct and analyze the differentially expressed gene library in the SD rat's brain of Parkinson's disease.Methods The lateralization Parkinson's disease model of SD rat was established by stereotaxis injection of 6-OHDA in lateralization corpora striatum. Suppression subtractive hybridization was utilized to isolate the cDNA fragments in both control and experimental groups. Then the cDNA fragments were directly bound to pMD18-T to set up the subtractive library. Amplification of the library was carried out by transformation of E. coli with high voltage electroperforation. Ninety five positive bacteria clones were randomly picked up and identified by colony PCR.Results The amplified library contained more than 1500 positive bacteria clones. Ninety-five clones were analyzed randomly by colony PCR. And there were 81% clones contained 100 ～600 bp DNA fragments. They might be the cDNA fragments of differentially expressed genes of Parkinson's disease.Conclusions A differentially expressed genes subtracted cDNA library of Parkinson's disease of SD rat was constructed successfully with SSH and T/A cloning techniques. The library is efficient and it was useful in screening and cloning new and specific differential expression genes of Parkinson's disease.

Background The severity of difficulty in falling asleep and the insufficiency of the sleeping time in the primary insomniacs always were overestimated, even after medication and improving the objective sleep quality. Moreover, remarkable psychosomatic symptoms were found in patients and the symptoms were significantly linked to the self-reported sleep quality. So in this study, it was designed to explore the differences between objective and subjective sleep quality and its correlative factors in chronic insomniacs.Methods A total of 55 chronic primary insomniac cases diagnosed by DSM-Ⅳ diagnostic criteria for primary insomnia and 15 normal controls were rated with Pittsburgh sleep quality index (PSQI),State-Trait Anxiety Inventory (STAI), and the Subjective General Condition Form. All cases and the controls were then examined by the whole-night polysomnography (PSG) records.Results Compared with the objective parameters of PSG, the subjective parametersiu chronic insomniacs had significantly longer sleep latency and lower total sleep time and sleep efficiency [ (80. 3± 73.7)min v.s. (23.2 ± 25.4) min, (157.8±141.7)min v.s. (332.2±154.7)min , (0.52 ±0. 27) min v.s. (0. 67 ± 0. 28) min, respectively, P ＜0. 001 ]. The difference between subjective and objective sleep latency was related to the total scores of STAI, TAI and SAI ( r = 0. 402,0. 374 and 0. 397, respectively, P ＜ 0. 05).Conclusions There were significant differences between objective and subjective estimations of sleep quality in chronic insomniacs,and they might result in the overestimation of the severity of insomnia. The differences between subjective and objective sleep quality in the chronic insomniacs were significantly correlated with the levels of anxiety.

Background To provide clinical evidence for ablative application by comparison of the analgesic effect following different thalamotomy in rats.Methods Thirty rats were randomly assigned into sham and 4 thalamotomies groups: central medial thalamic nucleus ( CM), parafascicular thalamic nucleus ( PF), ventral posterolateral thalamic nucleus (VPL), and CM +Cigulum (cg). Two μL 10% phenol dissolved in glycerin were used for stereotactic thalamotomy. The thermal pain thresholds before and after procedures were evaluated with the tail stimulate test. The formalin test was carried out in an open field apparatus where the animal formalin-induced responses (licking duration, flexing duration, and flinching frequency of the injected paw) were recorded for 60 min.Results Changes of pain thresholds in all ablative groups were significantly higher than that in the sham group, especially it was higher in VPL group. Differences of the factor thalamotomy were found to be due to the shorter licking in the ablative groups than that in the sham group (P ＜0.01 ), whereas flexing duration and flinching frequency were only slightly affected by thalamotomy. Moreover, licking duration was lower in VPL group than in CM and CM + cg groups ( P ＜0.05), whereas nociceptive responses did not differ between the CM and CM+cg groups (P ＞0.05).Conclusions In acute period, CM, PF, VPL, CM + cg neurolysis all showed to elevate the thermal pain threshold and to reduce the pain-induced behavioral responses related to supraspinal neural circuits (licking of the injected paw). Among them, the damage of VPL might be the most active one. CM + cg damage did not get better antinociceptive effect than single CM ablation.

Background Evidences, from recent studies, suggested that Borna disease virus (BDV) infection might be associated with human neuropsychosis, especially psychiatric disorders including depressive disorder(DD). However, controversy existed about the association between BDV infection and pathogenesis of DD. This study was to explore further whether the infection of Borna disease virus (BDV) is associated with the pathogenesis of depressive disorder (DD).Methods The p 24 fragment of BDV RNA in peripheral blood mononuclear cells (PBMCs) from 60DD patients and 120 healthy volunteers was detected by nested reverse transcriptase polymerase chain reaction (nRT-PCR) combined with fluorescence quantitative polymerase chain reaction (FQPCR). Positive products were cloned and sequenced before being compared with Strain V and strain He/80, from humans and animals.Results The positive rate (5%, 3/60) of BDV p 24 in PBMCs from the DD patients was significantly higher than that (0%, 0/120) from healthy volunteers ( P＜0. 05). The gene sequence for the positive products showed BDV p 24 in PBMCs from DD patients in Chongqing was most homophylic with H1766 strain detected from iii horses (97.68%), with 2 situs mutations (nt 1675 T→C, nt 1678 C→T), and also similar to the standard strain V(96. 51%)and He/80(95.35 %), with basic exchanges limited to T- C and A→G.Conclusions There was BDV infection in the DD patients in China, which indicated that the pathogenesis of DD in human beings in Chongqing might be associated with the infection of BDV.

Background In recent years,some researches had been conducted on the pathologic changes of the secondary injury of perihematoma in animal experiments,but only a few studies had been done on the dynamic pathologic and ultrastructural changes of the perihematoma in ICH patients. The unique contribution of our study is to investigate the dynamic pathologic and ultrastructural changes of the perihematoma in ICH patients and provide significant insights into how the pathophysiology and ultrastructures changed after ICH.Methods The written informed consents were obtained from the ICH patients or their relatives. 30 patients (the supertentorial hemotoma volume＞30 mi and the cerebellar hemotoma volume ＞10 mi) were divided into 8 groups according to the time passed after ICH:＜6 h (6 patients), 6 ～ 12 h (7 patients), 12 ～24 h (5 patients), 24～48 h (3 patients), 48 ～72 h (3 patients), 3 ～4 days group (3 patients), 5 days group (2 patients) and 8 days group ( 1 patient) and subjected to craniotomy for hemotoma evacuation. During the operation for the hemotoma's evacuation, a small amount of tissues that must be removed, which located at 1 cm near the hematoma, were taken as experimental groups; And the same tissues of 7 patients (＜12 h), which were far from the hemotoma on the operational way, were taken as control group. The pathologic and ultrastructral changes were observed.Results The tissues of the control group were almost normal while the damages of the tissues from the experimental groups were slight in ＜6 h groups, more severe after 6h and got to the maximum between 24 ～48 h , recovered gradually after 72 h, became similar to the 6 ～ 12 h group on 5 th day, got better on 8 th day and resembled the 6 h group.Conclusions The injury of the perihematoma occurred in early stage, reached the peak level between 24 and 48 hours after ICH; which was consistent to the clinical nervous functional deficits in the ICH patients.

Background Although remarkable progress has been made in microsurgery, surgery of intracranial aneurysm still encounters various complications. Cerebral ischemia and postoperative disorders of nervous system could be induced by various specific operation procedures. To improve the outcomes in intracranial aneurysm surgery and to minimize the occurrence of postoperative ischemic complications, it is necessary to perform real-time monitoring on ischemic damages for the corresponding functional areas. To elevate the sensitivity of Eps changes for the detection of cerebral ischemia induced by operation, we monitored Motion Evoked Potential ( MEPs), Somatosensory Evoked Potential (SSEPs)and Brainstem Auditory Evoked Potential (BAEPs) in microsurgical operations of intracranial aneurysms. And then the correlation between Eps changes and clinical outcome was investigated.Methods MEPs, SSEPs, and BAEPs were recorded intra-operatively for 25 cases in intracranial aneurysms. Monitored results and clinical outcome were analyzed in a prospective observational design.Results The MEPs in 5 of 21 cases, the SSEPs in 5 of 25 cases and the BAEPs in 1 of 3 cases showed inadequate temporary clipping, inadvertent occlusion, inadequate retraction, vasospasm, or compromise to perforating vessels. 3 patients developed advanced weakness, which showed abnormal SSEPs in only one patient while showed abnormal MEPs in all 3 cases.Conclusions The MEPs is more sensitive than SSEPs in monitoring the motor ischemic impairments. The monitoring results were correlated to the clinical outcome closely. Monitoring Eps in keyhole microsurgery of intracranial aneurysms could improve the sensitivity in detecting insufficient distal collateral flow. And then successful completion of potentially hazardous maneuvers would be attained.