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Biomedical subjects

A Basso

Publications and source records attributed to A Basso.

At least 109 records · Page 6Linked to original sources
PubMed1981

Intelligence and left hemisphere disease. The role of aphasia, apraxia and size of lesion.

The Raven Progressive Matrices and four subtests of the Wechsler-Bellevue Performance Scale were given to 173 left hemisphere patients subdivided according to presence/absence, type (fluent/non-fluent) and severity (moderate/severe) of aphasia. Constructive and ideomotor apraxia scores and CT scan data of each subject entered the statistical analysis. Factors significant in producing a low score on Progressive Matrices and Wechsler-Bellevue were presence of aphasia and constructive apraxia. Site and size of lesion per se failed to account for the intelligence scores. The relationship between aphasia, apraxia, intelligence test scores, and CT scan data were discussed in an attempt to clarify the meaning of these low intelligence test scores in aphasics and to assess the underlying roles of the brain lesions in this deficit. It appears that there are a number of methodological difficulties complicating interpretation of the intellectual deficit based on the Progressive Matrices and Wechsler-Bellevue scores, since performance on these tests is adversely affected by both aphasia and apraxia.

Aphasia↗
PubMed1981

[Surgical treatment in Cushing's disease (authors' translation)].

We are presenting a series of 23 patients with Cushing disease selected from a larger study in which the ectopic production of ACTH (paraneoplastic or tumoral), adrenal adenoma or carcinoma were discarded. Sixteen were female and seven male. Diagnosis was fundamentally realized by clinical manifestations derived from hypercortisolism (obesity, muscular atrophy, diabetes, osteoporosis or polyglubulia). The polytomography demonstrated a deformed sella in 19 patients. Endocrine exams showed an alteration in rhythm of Cortisol and elevated levels of urinary metabolites. Others exams, Liddle Test, Metopirona Test, or stimulation of exogenic ACTH did not always permit diagnosis of pituitary adenoma. Plasmatic dosage of ACTH is the best test although results did not always agree with clinical manifestations. In each case we performed clinical treatment in preparation for surgery and later selective removal of adenoma or total pituitary ablation by transphenoidal approach. Of 21 patients, we found an adenoma during surgery in 15; the other 6 on whom we performed a total hypophysectomy, the pathological study showed an adenoma in 5 and a hyperemic gland with thick capillaries in 1. Another type of treatment was used on 2 due to their age. Nine patients were given post-operative radiotherapy. We conclude that microsurgery by transphenoidal approach offers the best possibilities for patients with Cushing disease.

Adenoma↗
PubMed1980

Factors influencing type and severity of aphasia.

The influence of etiology and sex on aphasia type and the relation of age to the severity and type of language disorders have been assessed in 718 right-handed aphasic patients. Both trauma and neoplasia are associated with fluent aphasia significantly more often, while sex proved to have no influence on aphasia type. The frequency distribution of age according to type and severity of aphasia - studied in vascular patients only (N = 566) - demonstrated that fluency and severity are significantly associated with older age.

Age Factors↗
PubMed1980

Is ideomotor apraxia the outcome of damage to well-defined regions of the left hemisphere? Neuropsychological study of CAT correlation.

A CAT scan was recorded from 123 patients with left hemisphere damage from stroke. They were divided into four groups according to presence or absence of ideomotor apraxia and length of illness (15 to 90 days and over 90 days). The lesions were mapped and compared in the four experimental groups for anteroposterior dimension, lesion depth--deep-seated lesions deing separated from lesions with a superficial component--and position with respect to the Sylvian fissure for lesions encroaching on the surface. In the anteroposterior dimension there is no material difference in the distribution of the lesions with respect to length of illness. Moreover, any difference is hardly detectable between the profiles for patients with and without ideomotor apraxia except for the higher frequency of deep lesions in the non-apraxic group. The same holds true for "small" lesions.

Aged↗
PubMed1979

Influence of rehabilitation on language skills in aphasic patients. A controlled study.

The influence of language rehabilitation on specific language skills (speaking, understanding, writing, and reading) was investigated in 281 aphasic patients (162 reeducated and 119 controls) who were subjected to a second examination no less than six months after the first. The relationship of the following factors to improvement was studied: (a) time between onset of aphasia and first examination; (b) type of aphasia; (c) overall severity of aphasia on first examination; (d) presence or absence of rehabilitation between first and subsequent examination. It was found that rehabilitation has a significant positive effect on improvement in all language skills. Time between onset and first examination and overall severity of aphasia were negatively related to improvement. The relationship of type of asphasia to improvement was not significant. Additional evidence of the efficacy of rehabilitation is provided by experience with patients who began language therapy several months or years after the onset of their language disorder.

Adolescent↗
PubMed1978

Thymus-dependent reversibility of physiological and isoproterenol evoked age-related parameters in athymic (nude) and old normal mice.

In order to assess the relationship between the thymus and aging processes, a linear age-dependent parameter in mice such as the response of the submandibular gland to an injection with isoproterenol has been evaluated in athymic (nude) and thymectomized Balb/c mice. The IPR-induced DNA synthesis is reduced in both experimental groups when compared to untreated normal littermates and is recovered by grafting a neonatal thymus. Moreover, the impairment of IPR response in old animals is recovered to young levels by grafting one neonatal thymus one month before test. Neonatal thymus grafts in old recipients are also able to correct their abnormal serum levels of triiodothyronine and insulin. The influence of neonatal thymus on such non-immunological and age-related parameters suggests that this gland can control aging processes, probably through its implication with the endocrine system.

Age Factors↗
PubMed1978

Dissociated disorders of speaking and writing in aphasia.

Of 500 left brain-damaged patients with educational level above elementary school investigated with a standard quantitative battery for dissociation between oral and written expression, speech was found to be selectively impaired in seven (three with "pure anarthria," two with anarthria in the context of Broca's aphasia, and two with fluent aphasia with remarkable sparing of writing), and writing in another seven (two with "pure" agraphia, two with "agraphia with mild alexia," and three with "agraphia with mild fluent aphasia.") The nature of three conditions (pure anarthria, fluent aphasia with sparing of writing, and pure agraphia) is discussed, with evidence of a selective association between pure agraphia and lesions of the upper left parietal lobule.

Adult↗
PubMed1977

Phonemic identification defect in aphasia.

Eight-four right-handed patients with unilateral hemispheric damage (50 aphasics, 12 non-aphasic left brain-damaged and 22 right brain-damaged patients) and 53 control patients without cerebral lesions were given a test of phoneme identification which examined the S's ability to identify the acoustic boundary between the two phonemes, /d/ and /t/, expressed in terms of voice-onset time (VOT). Phonemic identification defect (PID), defined with reference to the performance of the control group, was found to be virtually limited aphasics; in over 70 per cent of them, the identification of the boundary zone between voiced and voiceless consonants along the VOT continuum was either impossible or abnormal, While neither the fluency - nonfluency dimension of speech nor the level of comprehension seemed to be crucially associated with PID, some evidence pointed to disordered phonemic output as to one dimension of aphasia that is specifically related to it.

Aphasia↗
PubMed1977

Decision in ambiguity: hemispheric dominance or interaction?

Fifty-eight subjects were shown tachistoscopically grey rectangles, at the centre of the field of vision. The rectangles extended equally to the left and right of the visual fixation point, and were presented under four background conditions: all white, all black, white in the left half of the field and black in the right half, black in the left and white in the right half. "Chimerical" backgrounds were assumed to create an interhemispheric ambiguity in the perception of the greyness of the stimuli as a consequence of opposed brightness contrasts. The reported birghtness was therefore expected to reflect a hemispheric dominance or an interhemispheric averaging of information. The results of the experiment supported the second hypothesis.

Discrimination, Psychological↗
PubMed1977

Passage of mannitol from mother to amniotic fluid and fetus.

Ten pregnant women and three pregnant sheep received mannitol intravenously. The results show that during late pregnancy this substance appears in amniotic fluid, and when the fetus is alive, its concentration increases with time, reaching values which are higher than those simultaneously obtained in maternal plasma. The experiments performed in sheep show that in fetal urine the concentration of mannitol reached values 10 to 20 times higher than those found in fetal plasma. This supports the hypothesis that the fetal kidney has an important role in the transference of this type of substance from the mother to the amniotic fluid.

Amniotic Fluid↗
PubMed1976

Disappearance of para-amino-hippurate from amniotic fluid.

Eight pregnant women and three pregnant sheep received 400 mg of para-amino-hippurate (PAH) intraaminotically. Serial samples of amniotic fluid and maternal blood were obtained. In sheep samples of fetal blood were also withdrawn. PAH appeared in maternal plasma in all the cases. In all pregnant women PAH disappeared slowly from amniotic fluid (50% in 4 hours). In one ewe the study was performed as in humans and showed the same pattern of disappearance. In the other two, fetal urine was drained outside the amniotic fluid and PAH disappeared from it at a much faster rate (90% in 4 hours). PAH concentration in fetal urine was 100 times higher than in fetal plasma. Our findings in pregnant women seem to suggest that PAH disappears from the amniotic sac by a diffusion mechanism. On the other hand the results found in sheep also suggest that the fetus may have an active role in PAH concentration in amniotic fluid, eliminating part of the substance into maternal blood across the placenta but returning a major portion to the amniotic fluid with fetal urine.

Aminohippuric Acids↗
PubMed1976

Transference of para-amino-hippurate from the mother to the amniotic fluid.

There are few studies in which substances mainly cleared by the kidney are injected to the mother and the time course of their concentrations in amniotic fluid is analyzed. This type of studies may contribute to the knowledge of the transference of substances through the mother-fetus-amniotic fluid complex. Thirteen pregnant women were studied. Eleven with normal term pregnancies, and the remaining two mothers were at the 36th week of gestation and their fetuses were dead. A saturation dose of para-amino-hippurate (PAH) (8 mg/kg) was administered intravenously to all subjects. This dose was followed by a continuous infusion at a rate of 380 mcg/min/kg during 30 minutes in 11 mothers. In one of the remaining subjects, the infusion rate was 240 mcg/min/kg during 160 minutes and in the other, it was 50 mcg/min/kg for 450 minutes. Samples of maternal blood and amniotic fluid were simultaneously obtained, before PAH administration and at variable intervals thereafter. In mothers with live fetuses, PAH concentration in amniotic fluid increased not only during the infusion but also for at least two hours after its interruption (Fig. 2, Tab. I). When the infusion lasted enough and with stabilized PAH concentration in maternal plasma, amniotic fluid concentration of PAH attained higher values than in the mother (Fig. 1). Disappearance of PAH from amniotic fluid was very slow (45% in 5 hours) (Fig. 2). In cases with dead fetuses, the pattern of PAH concentration in amniotic fluid was completely different. The highest concentration was observed already in the first sample at the end of the infusion. From there on, no increment was recorded, and as soon as maternal blood concentration fell below the values of amniotic fluid, PAH began to disappear from this compartment at a much faster rate (45% in 1 hour) (Fig 3). The progressive rise of PAH in amniotic fluid may be explained as follows: (Fig. 5). PAH diffuses from maternal blood to fetal blood through the placenta. The fetal kidney removes PAH from fetal blood and concentrates it in urine. Periodic fetal micturition causes the rise of PAH in amniotic fluid. PAH may return from amniotic fluid to fetal blood mainly because of fetal swallowing; and the larger part of this PAH will be again excreted by the kidney into the amniotic compartment. This mechanism would explain the slow disappearance of the substance from amniotic fluid after the end of the infusion, and also the lack of correlation between concentrations in maternal plasma and amniotic fluid. Diffusion of PAH between blood and amniotic fluid may also exist through the walls of the vessels of the ovular membranes and the vessels of the umbilical cord; this mechanism would play a minor role in the concentration of PAH in amniotic fluid in subjects with live fetuses. Our results also show that mean PAH concentration in amniotic fluid increases as a linear function of time until 150 minutes after the onset of PAH administration to the mother (Fig. 4).

Aminohippuric Acids↗