OBJECTIVE: The integrity of the motor pathways can be assessed objectively and quantitatively by measuring the motor evoked potentials (MEPs). However, the early prognostic application of MEPs for assessing the motor and functional recovery of patients with acute ischemic stoke has yielded contradictory results. Therefore, we assessed the value of MEPs for predicting the clinical outcomes of acute ischemic stroke patients. METHODS: Thirty three stroke patients with different degrees of hemiparesis were enrolled in this study. The stroke severity and outcome were assessed using the National Institute of Health Stroke Scale (NIHSS) and the modified Rankin Scale (mRS) at admission and at 3 months. The MEPs were measured at the adductor pollicis brevis and adductor hallucis muscles and the relationships between the NIHSS, the mRS and the MEP findings were analysed. RESULTS: In the acute phase of stroke, the presence of MEPs in the upper or lower extremities was correlated with a better clinical outcome (NIHSS: 9.12+/-5.86->2.81+/-1.47, mRS: 2.81+/-1.47->1.62+/-1.31) than the absence of an MEP in at least one extremity (NIHSS: 11.47+/-5.53->8.88+/-6.02, mRS: 3.70+/-1.31->2.94+/-1.67). Especially, there was significant clinical improvement after 3 months in the large territorial infarction patients according to the presence of MEPs. The sensitivity of the presence of MEPs for predicting clinical improvement (motor grade> or =III) was 71.4%, while the specificity was 72.7% in severe hemiplegic patients (motor grade Efferent Pathways ; Evoked Potentials, Motor ; Extremities ; Hemiplegia ; Humans ; Infarction ; Lower Extremity ; Muscles ; Paresis ; Prognosis ; Sensitivity and Specificity ; Stroke

BACKGROUND: Dizziness due to brain lesions manifests mainly in infratentorial lesions, with few cases related to supratentorial lesions having been reported. This study aimed to elucidate the clinical characteristics and demographic factors of patients with dizziness caused by cerebral infarction and to determine the site of the brain where supratentorial lesions are most prevalent. METHODS: Patients with prominent dizziness who visited the emergency room of Gachon University Gil Hospital between July 2006 and July 2007 were included. Among them, 101 patients with acute cerebral infarction were categorized into supratentorial (n=51) and infratentorial (n=50) groups based on brain MRI. Demographics and clinical characteristics of dizziness in each group were compared, and common brain sites of the supratentorial group were assessed. RESULTS: The nature of the dizziness differed between the supratentorial group (vertigo, 27.4%; presyncope, 5.9%; disequilibrium, 29.4%; ocular, 11.8%; and nonspecific, 25.5%) and the infratentorial group (vertigo, 50.0%; presyncope, 6.0%; disequilibrium, 32.0%; ocular, 0%; and nonspecific, 12.0%; p=0.02). The duration of dizziness was shorter in the supratentorial than the infratentorial group (p<0.01). In the supratentorial group, common sites of the lesion were the thalamus (19.6%) and frontoparietal lobe (15.7%). The lesion usually appeared in the left hemisphere (60.8%). CONCLUSIONS: Dizziness from supratentorial lesions manifests in different ways, and its duration is shorter than that from infratentorial lesions. The central vestibular pathway may be located in the thalamus and frontoparietal lobe.
Brain ; Cerebral Infarction ; Demography ; Dizziness ; Emergencies ; Humans ; Infarction ; Syncope ; Thalamus

Myasthenia gravis (MG), one of the autoimmune diseases, is occasionally associated with various other autoimmune diseases. Although thyroid disease is most frequently associated with MG, the case of MG with Hashimoto's thyroiditis has been scarcely reported. We report a case of a 72-year-old female with MG, which coexisted with Hashimoto's thyroiditis by diffuse thyroid enlargement, anti-thyroglobulin and anti-microsomal antibodies. This coexistence supports that MG is associated with other autoimmune diseases and we suggest that a complete antibody test be performed especially in the elderly with MG.
Aged ; Antibodies ; Autoimmune Diseases ; Female ; Humans ; Myasthenia Gravis* ; Thyroid Diseases ; Thyroid Gland* ; Thyroiditis*

No abstract available.

OBJECTIVES: This study was conducted to examine the relationships between muscle mass and hand strength in elderly people. METHODS: The study subjects were 659 volunteers aged older than 65 in Jejudo, south Korea. The anthropometric information such as weight, body mass index (BMI) and muscular mass was collected by the body composition analyzer. The hand strength was obtained by the digital grip dynamometer. The fasting blood sugar index called as potential diabetes mellitus (DM) was defined as the condition over 120 mg/dL of the blood sugar. The BMI was classified into under 23, 23-25 and over 25 to analyze the relationships of BMI and muscle mass, hand strength. RESULTS: The factors affecting muscle mass were sex (p<0.001), age (p<0.001) and BMI (p<0.001). The factors affecting hand strength were sex (p<0.001), age (p<0.001) and BMI (p=0.003). And there was a weak association between muscle mass and hand strength after controlling with the affected factors (r2=0.15, p<0.001). CONCLUSIONS: The hand strength is weekly correlated with the muscle mass. So we recommend to use digital grip dynamometer combining with other measurements for diagnosis the sarcopenia in epidemiologic study.
Aged* ; Blood Glucose ; Body Composition ; Body Weight ; Diabetes Mellitus ; Diagnosis ; Epidemiologic Studies ; Fasting ; Hand Strength* ; Humans ; Jeju-do* ; Korea ; Muscle, Skeletal ; Sarcopenia ; Statistics as Topic ; Volunteers

PURPOSE: Early degeneration of articular cartilage is accompanied by a loss of glycosaminoglycan (GAG) and the consequent change of the integrity. The purpose of this study was to biochemically quantify the loss of GAG, and to evaluate the Gd(DTPA)2--enhanced, and T1, T2, rho relaxation map for detection of the early degeneration of cartilage. MATERIALS AND METHODS: A cartilage-bone block in size of 8mmx10 mm was acquired from the patella in each of three pigs. Quantitative analysis of GAG of cartilage was performed at spectrophotometry by use of dimethylmethylene blue. Each of cartilage blocks was cultured in one of three different media: two different culture media (0.2 mg/ml trypsin solution, 1mM Gd (DTPA)2- mixed trypsin solution) and the control media (phosphate buffered saline (PBS)). The cartilage blocks were cultured for 5 hrs, during which MR images of the blocks were obtained at one hour interval (0 hr, 1 hr, 2 hr, 3 hr, 4 hr, 5 hr). And then, additional culture was done for 24 hrs and 48 hrs. Both T1-weighted image (TR/TE, 450/22 ms), and mixed-echo sequence (TR/TE, 760/21-168ms; 8 echoes) were obtained at all times using field of view 50 mm, slice thickness 2 mm, and matrix 256x512. The MRI data were analyzed with pixel-by-pixel comparisons. The cultured cartilage-bone blocks were microscopically observed using hematoxylin & eosin, toluidine blue, alcian blue, and trichrome stains. RESULTS: At quantitation analysis, GAG concentration in the culture solutions was proportional to the culture durations. The T1-signal of the cartilage-bone block cultured in the Gd(DTPA)2- mixed solution was significantly higher (42% in average, p<0.05) than that of the cartilage-bone block cultured in the trypsin solution alone. The T1, T2, rho relaxation times of cultured tissue were not significantly correlated with culture duration (p>0.05). However the focal increase in T1 relaxation time at superficial and transitional layers of cartilage was seen in Gd(DTPA)2- mixed culture. Toluidine blue and alcian blue stains revealed multiple defects in whole thickness of the cartilage cultured in trypsin media. CONCLUSION: The quantitative analysis showed gradual loss of GAG proportional to the culture duration. Microimagings of cartilage with Gd(DTPA)2--enhancement, relaxation maps were available by pixel size of 97.9x195 micrometer. Loss of GAG over time better demonstrated with Gd(DTPA)2--enhanced images than with T1, T2, rho relaxation maps. Therefore Gd(DTPA)2--enhanced T1-weighted image is superior for detection of early degeneration of cartilage.
Alcian Blue ; Cartilage ; Cartilage, Articular* ; Coloring Agents ; Culture Media ; Eosine Yellowish-(YS) ; Hematoxylin ; Magnetic Resonance Imaging* ; Patella ; Relaxation ; Spectrophotometry ; Swine ; Tolonium Chloride ; Trypsin

BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVES: Interleukin-21 receptor (IL-21R) gene polymorphism is related with the development of systemic vasculitis. In this study, we investigated the polymorphisms of IL-21R gene in patients with Kawasaki disease (KD). SUBJECTS AND METHODS: We genotyped the promoter region of IL-21R gene (-2500 bp to +1 bp) in 100 patients with KD and 100 healthy controls. All study subjects were Korean. We designed five pairs of primers and performed polymerase chain reaction (PCR) and direct sequencing. We analyzed whole promoter sequences of 200 individuals with comparison to reference sequences of IL-21R gene (NG_012222.1/NC_000016.9). RESULTS: We found five single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) of which minor allele frequency (MAF) >0.01 in the promoter region of IL-21R gene. Those are -1681 G>T (chromosome site 27411802), -379 G>A (27413104), -332 G>C (27413151, rs2214537), -237 A>T (27413246), and -53 G>A (27413430). There is no significant difference in MAF of each SNP between patients with KD and healthy controls except -237 A>T. Twenty five patients with KD had more than 1 SNP in contrast to only seven healthy controls had. The patients with KD have significantly more IL-21R gene polymorphisms than controls (odds ratio: 3.0, 95% confidence interval: 1.6-5.6, p=0.0005). There was no significant correlation between IL-21R gene polymorphisms and the serum level of IL-21. The serum level of total IgE was not significantly correlated with the presence of IL-21R gene polymorphisms. CONCLUSION: Our data suggest that the genetic susceptibility profile for KD may include IL-21R gene.
Gene Frequency ; Genetic Predisposition to Disease ; Humans ; Immunoglobulin E ; Interleukins ; Mucocutaneous Lymph Node Syndrome ; Polymerase Chain Reaction ; Polymorphism, Genetic ; Polymorphism, Single Nucleotide ; Promoter Regions, Genetic ; Receptors, Interleukin-21 ; Systemic Vasculitis

As the use of the antibiotics, antitumor substances, steroid hormone and immunosuppressive agent have been increased remarkably, the incidence of the fungal infection has also been increased. Aspergillus is a fungus belonged to ascomycetes family and distributed world-widely. Aspergillus infection of the spine is very rare. Mode of vertebral Aspergillosis is direct extension of primary lesion of lung in children, on the other hand, hematogenous metastasis in adults. We report a adult woman who suffered from thoracolumbar pain without any neurological deficit for 6 months prior to admission. Imaging studies revealed irregular bony destruction on the adajacent end plates of T12 and L1 vertebras with kyphotic change. We underwent operation via anterolateral approach using Z-plate fixation. followed by amphotericin-B administration.
Adult ; Anti-Bacterial Agents ; Ascomycota ; Aspergillosis* ; Aspergillus ; Child ; Female ; Fungi ; Hand ; Humans ; Incidence ; Lung ; Neoplasm Metastasis ; Spine*

Skeletal muscle involvement has been well documented and muscular symptoms are common in patients with polyarteritis nodosa (PAN). However, the level of muscle enzyme is uncommonly elevated and overt rhabdomyolysis is very rare. We report a case of PAN presenting as rhabdomyolysis. A 22-year-old man was admitted because of fever, severe myalgia and swelling in all extremities. Laboratory investigations showed markedly increased levels of serum creatine kinase and myoglobin. There was diffusely increased muscular uptake in bone scan. Muscle biopsy from the right deltoid revealed vasculitis involving medium-sized vessel with ischemic necrosis of muscle. On angiography, saccular aneurysms were found in multiple arterities. Therapy with methylprednisolone pulse therapy and cyclophosphamide was followed by improvement of his symptoms.
Aneurysm ; Angiography ; Biopsy ; Creatine Kinase ; Cyclophosphamide ; Extremities ; Fever ; Humans ; Methylprednisolone ; Muscle, Skeletal ; Myalgia ; Myoglobin ; Necrosis ; Polyarteritis Nodosa* ; Rhabdomyolysis* ; Vasculitis ; Young Adult

Dentatorubro-pallidoluysian atrophy (DRPLA) is a rare neurodegenerative disorder with various clinical phenotypes and has a cytosine-adenine-guanine (CAG) trinucleotide repeat in a gene on chromosome 12. It has been known that trinucleotide repeat disorders show strong inverse correlations between the CAG repeat number and the age of onset and genetic anticipation. The purpose of this study was to investigate whether these observations are applicable to Korean patients. This report involved three Korean families and had on file the history of the 15 affected family mem-bers .Seven of the affected members had the diagnosis of DRPLA which was confirmed by a gene study. We observed inverse correlations between the CAG repeat number and the age of onset and genetic anticipation with high intra- and interfamilial variations. Although our study was in general agreement with previously documented features of DRPLA, some features could not be explained by currently understood pathophysiologic mechanisms.
Age of Onset ; Anticipation, Genetic ; Atrophy* ; Chromosomes, Human, Pair 12 ; Diagnosis ; Genes, vif ; Humans ; Molecular Biology* ; Neurodegenerative Diseases ; Phenotype ; Trinucleotide Repeats