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Biomedical subjects

F Yokochi

Publications and source records attributed to F Yokochi.

At least 19 recordsLinked to original sources

Relationship between lesion location and the outcome of pallidotomy for Parkinson's disease.

The relationships between lesion location and clinical outcome following posteroventral pallidotomy for Parkinson's disease were studied. Forty-four patients were operated forty-six times and studied with neurological and psychological examinations before and after pallidotomy. Lesion location was confirmed using films with a coagulation electrode which were X-rayed during the operation. Changes of intelligence were observed in the patients with anteromedial lesions. Wearing-off phenomenon in four patients and dopa-induced dyskinesia in three patients were not improved following pallidotomy in twenty patients with severe wearing-off and dyskinesia. Lesions in the patients with no improvement of wearing off were located more lateral and those in the patients with sustained severe dyskinesia were located more dorsal in the internal part of the globus pallidus. It may be concluded that clinical outcome is related to lesion location.

Antiparkinson Agents↗

[Pharmacological treatment of parkinsonian tremor].

Tremor is the most common initial symptom and one of the cardinal features of Parkinson's disease. Mild tremor causes only minimal disability, but severe tremor causes more significant disability and distress for the patient than rigidity and/or bradykinesia. Anticholinergic agents, levodopa/DCI and dopamine agonists are most common and beneficial in parkinsonian tremor, but efficacies of these medications are variable among patients. Rigidity and bradykinesia are more responsive to levodopa/DCI therapy than tremor. Clozapine is an atypical neuroleptic agent, not on the market in Japan, and has been reported to decrease or ameliorate parkinsonian tremor through the studies of open label and double blind crossover as a new drug for parkinsonian tremor.

Adrenergic beta-Antagonists↗

[A case of chorea-acanthocytosis successfully treated with posteroventral pallidotomy].

We described a 41-year-old man with chorea-acanthocytosis, who presented severe choreoathetosis in all the limbs, neck, face and tongue. Especially, the oral area was affected most strikingly. He had difficulty in eating, because he pushed foods out of the mouth with the tongue. He received left posteroventral pallidotomy (PVP). His involuntary movements became much less enough for the patient to eat with a spoon in a sitting position by himself. Six months after the first operation, although involuntary movement on the right hand remained reduced, choreoballistic movement appeared on the left side. He received PVP on the right side. The choreoballistic movement was remarkably improved after the right PVP. No neurological aggravation has been found for 7 months after the second PVP. Bilateral PVP was fully effective as for the improvement of the activity of daily life. The output from the internal globus pallidus (GPi) is well-known to be inhibitory. Therefore, it is understandable that the coagulation of GPi results in improvement of hypokinesia and rigidity in patients with Parkinson's disease. However, some clinical reports, including ours, have described the significant reduction of hyperkinetic choreoballistic movement after PVP. The exact mechanism of these surgical effects has not been elucidated yet, and further clinical and basic studies are needed to answer this question.

Acanthocytes↗

[A long-term clinical effect of selegiline hydrochloride on Parkinson's disease].

A long-term follow-up evaluation on the clinical usefulness of selegiline hydrochloride (selegiline) was performed in 13 patients with Parkinson's disease. All patients, except one case, subjected to the study were symptomatically improved by combination therapy of selegiline with L-DOPA in the preceding short-term evaluation. One patient continued the therapy after an evaluation of no symptomatic improvement in the short-term study, because this patient strongly requested continuation of medication, expecting to stop the progression of the disease. The average daily dose of selegiline at the last evaluation was 7.0 +/- 2.8 mg. The average daily dose of L-DOPA at each evaluation point in the patients who continued the therapy for 12 months remained low compared to that prior to the therapy (before: 450 +/- 138 mg, at the 12th month: 383 +/- 98 mg). In the analysis of individual parkinsonian symptoms, the improvement in the mean score for most of the symptoms, especially the wearing-off phenomenon and frozen gait, persisted for the entire period of study. Global improvement rates (moderately improved) at the 6th and 12th month, and the last evaluation were 60.0%, 50.0% and 50.0%, respectively. Among 10 patients, therapy was discontinued only in one case due to hallucination. Although the global improvement rate declined in the course of the therapy, selegiline seems to be useful for improving L-DOPA responsive symptoms in long-term therapy for Parkinson's disease.

Aged↗

[A 65-year-old man with Parkinsonism, gaze palsy, and dementia].

We report a 65-year-old man with parkinsonism, supranuclear gaze palsy, and dementia. The patient was well until 58 years of the age (1984) when he noted an onset of tremor in his right hand. He visited our neurology service two years after the onset; neurologic examination at that time revealed moderate restriction in down ward gaze, horizontal gaze nystagmus in left and right gaze, stooped posture with loss of arm swing when he walked, slight rigidity in the neck and the right upper and lower extremities, and resting tremor in his right hand and foot; mentation was intact. He was treated with 600 mg of levodopa with carbidopa; his tremor partially improved. He received left Vim thalamotomy on March 14 of 1987. His tremor disappeared after the thalamotomy. Post-operative course was complicated by transient clouding of consciousness due to subdural hematoma which developed after the surgery. Six months after the surgery, he noted increase in the unsteadiness of gait; he also experienced urinary incontinence once in a while, and he became mentally dull. In November of 1988, he had episodes of stiffening of his body. Although his spontaneous speech was very much reduced, he repeatedly hummed a same tune; no one could make him stop humming. In June of 1989, he was totally unable to move his eyes in the vertical direction. He was hospitalized to another hospital in May of 1990 where he died six month after admission because of pneumonia. The clinical course of this patient was characterized by the onset with parkinsonian resting tremor, and supranuclear gaze palsy and dementia in the later course. The patient was discussed in a neurological CPC and the chief discussant arrived at the conclusion that the patient had an overlap syndrome of progressive supranuclear palsy (PSP) and diffuse Lewy body disease. Majority of the participants thought that the patient had progressive supranuclear palsy, but many of them had an impression that parkinsonian tremor responding to levodopa as the initial symptom for PSP is rather unusual. Postmortem examination revealed severe loss of neurons in the substantia nigra, the globus pallidus, and the subthalamic nucleus with reactive gliosis; formy spheroids were seen in the substantia nigra, however, no Lewy bodies or neurofibrillary tangles were observed. Moderate neuronal loss was also seen in the dentate nucleus of the cerebellum. In addition, the precentral gyrus showed moderate neuronal loss, astrocytosis, and spongy change in the second layer; ballooned neurons were seen in the third and the fifth layers. Histologic characteristics were consistent with the pathologic diagnosis of corticobasal degeneration.

Aged↗

[A long-term clinical effect of selegiline hydrochloride on Parkinson's disease].

A long-term follow-up evaluation on the clinical usefulness of selegiline hydrochloride (selegiline) was performed in 13 patients with Parkinson's disease. All patients, except one case, subjected to the study were symptomatically improved by combination therapy of selegiline with L-DOPA in the preceding short-term evaluation. One patient continued the therapy after an evaluation of no symptomatic improvement in the short-term study, because this patient strongly requested continuation of medication, expecting to stop the progression of the disease. The average daily dose of selegiline at the last evaluation was 6.9 +/- 2.5 mg. The average daily dose of L-DOPA at each evaluation point in the patients who continued the therapy for 12 months remained low compared to that prior to the therapy (before: 450 +/- 117 mg, at the 12th month: 389 +/- 89 mg). In the analysis of individual parkinsonian symptoms, the improvement in the mean score for most of the symptoms, especially the wearing-off phenomenon and frozen gait, persisted for the entire period of study. Global improvement rates (moderately improved) at the 6th and 12th month, and the last evaluation were 61.5%, 44.4% and 46.2%, respectively. Among 13 patients, therapy was discontinued only in one case due to hallucination. Although the global improvement rate declined in the course of the therapy, selegiline seems to be useful for improving L-DOPA responsive symptoms in long-term therapy for Parkinson's disease.

Aged↗

[A 75-year-old man with parkinsonism and delirium].

We report a 75-year-old man with a ten-year history of parkinsonism, who developed acute delirium. He was well until 65 years of age, when there was an onset of tremor in his left hand. He had been treated with levodopa and trihexyphenidyl with marked improvement. He was doing well until July of 1991 at his age of 75-year-old, when he noted backache; he was found to have a compression fracture of the third lumbar spine. He had to use a wheel-chair most of the time since then. In December 1991, he started to have visual hallucinations and difficulty in swallowing. On December 25 of that year, he developed fever and delirium, and was admitted to our hospital on December 30. On admission, general physical examination was unremarkable except for low grade fever (37.3 degrees C). Neurologic examination revealed an alert but chronically ill patient. Apparently he had visual hallucinations. He was disoriented to all spheres; he could respond only to simple questions. Apparently he was demented. Cranial nerves were intact except for mumbling speech disturbance and masked face. He was unable to stand or walk. He had flexion contracture in his both knee joints. He had paratonic rigidity in all his limbs and marked bradykinesia. Once in a while, myoclonic jerks were seen in both upper and lower extremities. Deep reflexes were diminished bilaterally, and the plantar reflex was not elicited on either side. On laboratory examination, BUN was increased to 72 mg/dl, creatinine to 3.0 mg/dl, and WBC 16,000/microliter. Cranial CT scans were unremarkable.(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)

Aged↗

[A 66-year-old man with backache and progressive difficulty of gait].

We report a 66-year-old man with progressive spinal paraplegia. He was well until June of 1991 when he had an onset of backache and right chest pain. On August 25, he lost sensation to void and he became unable to urinate. On the same day, he noted weakness in his legs which became progressively worse, and he was admitted to our hospital. Past medical history included diabetes mellitus which was found 3 years previously. He had upper gastrointestinal series 2 months before, which revealed a normal study. On admission, he was alert and general physical examination was unremarkable. Neurological examination revealed a mentally sound man with normal higher cerebral functions. Cranial nerves were also intact. He was unable to walk. No muscle atrophy was noted, but he had moderate to marked (2/5) weakness in both legs. No ataxia was noted in the upper extremities. Jaw jerk was normal, however, deep reflexes in the upper extremities were decreased, and absent in the lower extremities Babinski sign was present bilaterally. All sensory modalities were diminished below the Th 6 dermatome. No meningeal sign was present. Emergency myelography was performed on the day of admission, which revealed complete block from the Th4 to Th8 segments. CSF taken at that time was xanthochromic, positive Queckenstedt test containing 1,133 mg/dl of protein, 54 mg/dl of sugar and 1/3 microliters of lymphocyte. On August 31, laminectomy was performed from Th5 to Th7. The spinal bones in this area was very fragile and hemorrhagic. A soft yellowish vascular-rich tissue was surrounding the spinal cord in the epidural space. Despite surgery his weakness in legs worsened, and he became paraplegic by September 10th. He became somnolent with disorientation to time. In the subsequent course, he developed metabolic acidosis on September 26. On September 28, he became anuric and hypotensive. He expired later on that day.(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 400 WORDS)

Aged↗

Total biopterin levels in the ventricular CSF of patients with Parkinson's disease: a comparison between akineto-rigid and tremor types.

Total L-erythro-biopterin (T-BP) levels in the ventricular cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) were measured in 43 patients with Parkinson's disease (PD) and 12 age-matched neurological controls. In 5 of the PD patients and 1 control, lumbar CSF T-BP values were also measured. The mean ventricular CSF T-BP level in the PD patients, 15.6 +/- 0.5 pmol/ml (mean +/- SE), was significantly lower than that in the controls (21.3 +/- 1.4 pmol/ml, P less than 0.0001). The mean T-BP concentration in the ventricular CSF was 1.9 times higher than that in the lumbar CSF (P less than 0.0005), indicating a rostrocaudal gradient for the T-BP value in the CSF. When the PD patients were classified according to their predominant clinical features into 24 akineto-rigid (A-R) type and 19 tremor (T) type, there was a significant negative correlation between the T-BP levels and duration of illness only for the A-R type patients (rho = -0.605, P less than 0.005). No such significant correlation was found in the T type patients. These results may indicate a difference of pathophysiological changes in the brain between the 2 types of PD.

Biopterins↗

[Analysis of L-threo-3, 4-dihydroxyphenylserine effect on motor and psychological symptoms in Parkinson's disease].

Improvement of motor and psychological symptoms by L-DOPS (L-threo-3,4-dihydroxyphenylserine) in totally 20 cases with Parkinson's disease (PD), including 5 cases of juvenile or early onset parkinsonism (JP) and one case of pure akinesia was analysed. Improvement was obtained in about two thirds of the cases on symptoms of freezing in gait, difficulty of postural control, depressive mood and bradyphrenia. Severity of freezing in gait and that of the depressive mood were graded in five stage (from 0 to 4) scale and the improvement was evaluated by A (three stage improvement), B (two stage improvement), C (one stage improvement) and D (no change or worsened). Improvement of psychological symptoms was seen parallel to that of motor symptoms. It seems important that marked effect on both motor and psychological symptoms was obtained mostly in PD cases but not in the cases of JP. In MMPI test, depressive score (D) and hypochondriac score (Hs) were normalized in PD cases but not changed in JP, indicating differences in psychological traits between two groups. It was suggested that JP is a condition of mainly DA deficiency in nigro striatum but PD presents wider spectrum of symptoms covering both DA and NE deficiency. Importance of the role of aging of the brain in each individual patient is discussed and interpreted in relation to the difference of clinical pictures.

Aged↗

Loss of reaction time specificity for movement direction in Parkinson's disease.

Electromyographic (EMG) reaction times (RTs) of the right biceps brachii muscle and its integrated EMG (iEMG) from the onset until 50 msec after the start of activities for elbow flexion and forearm supination in the condition with or without warning signal were examined in seven patients with Parkinson's disease and seven age- and sex-matched normal subjects. In the control group RT of forearm supination with warning tended to be faster than that of elbow flexion and the reverse occurred without warning, and iEMG of forearm supination were significantly small compared to those of elbow flexion in each condition. In the Parkinson group both RT and iEMG of elbow flexion were nearly the same as that of forearm supination regardless the presence or absence of warning signal, indicating the loss of RT and iEMG specificity for the two direction of movement in Parkinson's disease.

Electromyography↗

[Lateral coordinate of the thalamic Vim neurons in the cases with dilated third ventricle].

Precise radiographical measurement of the third ventricle in the first and essential procedure in stereotaxic surgery in order to determine the target point. This is done while referring to an available standard brain atlas such as Schaltenbrand & Bailey. However there have been no criteria established for determining the deviation of the coordinates of the thalamic nuclei, especially in their lateral coordinates when the third ventricle is highly dilated. Therefore, in 109 cases encountered recently (81 parkinsonism, 11 essential tremor, 10 cerebral palsy, 3 thalamic pain, 1 Benedikt's syndrome, 1 torticollis, 1 oral dyskinesia, 1 striato-nigral degeneration), we studied the correlation between the width of the third ventricle and the lateral coordinate of the thalamic point where kinesthetic neurons or tremor-synchronously discharging neurons were detected. These neurons were especially related to the arm. According to the width of the third ventricle, we classified the cases into three types: 18 cases with large ventricles (more than 10 mm), 37 cases with medium-sized ventricles (4-10 mm) and 16 cases with small ventricles (less than 4 mm). By plotting the lateral coordinate of the thalamic point where kinesthetic neuron of the upper extremity was recorded in reference to the radiogram of anteroposterior view, we found that the lateral coordinates of large ventricular cases generally tended to show more lateral displacement than cases where the ventricles were narrower. Their mean lateral coordinate was 16.9 mm from midline in contrast ot 14.0 mm in cases with small ventricular width. There was a linear correlation between the width of the third ventricle and the lateral coordinate of the kinesthetic neuron of the Vim nucleus.(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)

Brain Mapping↗

Long-term follow-up study of nucleus ventralis intermedius and ventrolateralis thalamotomy using a microelectrode technique in parkinsonism.

Long-term observation over 3-8 postoperative years of cases of Parkinson disease operated by stereotactic thalamotomy using a microelectrode recording technique is reported. The procedure is specifically useful in the following four groups: (1) tremor-dominant cases, (2) hemiparkinsonism, (3) cases with marked asymmetry in motor symptoms and (4) juvenile parkinsonism presenting levodopa-induced dyskinesia.

Follow-Up Studies↗

Reaction time of patients with Parkinson's disease, with reference to asymmetry of neurological signs.

Electromyographic reaction times of the left and the right finger extensor muscles in extension movement of the wrist were examined in 42 patients with Parkinson's disease, and 20 normal subjects. Compared to the normal subjects and the patients with neurological signs confined to the right side, the patients with neurological signs on the left side or on both sides showed slowing of reaction times regardless of the side of responding hand. The patients with asymmetry of bilateral neurological signs showed slower RTs on the more affected side.

Electromyography↗

Idiopathic oromandibular dyskinesia treated by Vo complex microstereotactic thalamotomy.

Two cases of oromandibular or buccolingual dyskinesia, which did not respond to medical therapy, had lesions produced in the Vo complex of the thalamus by microstereotactic surgery with almost complete relief of symptoms. It was assumed the symptom, as well as levodopa-induced dyskinesia, may depend on the striato-pallido-thalamic projection.

Facial Muscles↗