Biomedical subjects

Jonathan Fine

Publications and source records attributed to Jonathan Fine.

3 recordsLinked to original sources

PubMed2007

Brief report: a scale for rating conversational impairment in autism spectrum disorder.

There are few well-standardized measures of conversational breakdown in Autism Spectrum Disorders (ASD). The study's objective was to develop a scale for measuring pragmatic impairments in conversations of individuals with ASD. We analyzed 46 semi-structured conversations of children and adolescents with high-functioning ASD using a functional linguistic paradigm. Five constructs were developed that assessed difficulties related to the pragmatics of conversation: atypical intonation; semantic drift; terseness; pedantic speech; perseveration. The scale shows good inter-rater reliability and variation in the scales is not simply a reflection of IQ or language competence. This tool represents a way of characterizing language use in ASD and is an initial step towards developing a tool to evaluate change in degree of social impairments in conversation.

Adolescent↗

PubMed2006

N-terminal pro-brain natriuretic peptide for detection of cardiovascular stress in patients with obstructive sleep apnea syndrome.

Patients with obstructive sleep apnea syndrome (OSAS) have an elevated incidence of cardiovascular events that may be related to an increased ventricular load and hypoxemia caused by apneas and hypopneas. N-terminal pro-brain natriuretic peptide (NTproBNP) appears to be an excellent marker of myocardial stretch and could serve as an indicator of subclinical cardiac stress, thereby identifying a patient population at risk for cardiac effects from OSAS. Adult patients presenting with suspected OSAS and scheduled for nocturnal polysomnography were recruited. Patients with heart or renal failure or severe lung disease were excluded. NTproBNP was measured the evening before and the morning after sleep. Blood pressure (BP) was monitored intermittently throughout the night. Fifteen male and 15 female subjects with a mean +/- SD body mass index of 38.2 +/- 9.8 were studied. Mean Apnea-Hypopnea Index (AHI) was 38.4 +/- 26, with 17 subjects having severe OSAS (AHI > 30). No subject had a significant rise in BP. NTproBNP values overnight decreased in 19 patients and rose in 11 (mean change 3.8 +/- 33 pg mL(-1)), but only one patient had an abnormal morning value. Three patients had an abnormal NTproBNP value prior to sleep, but their levels decreased with sleep. No correlations were detected between the evening baseline or postsleep NTproBNP levels and OSAS. Monitoring pre- and postsleep NTproBNP levels revealed no association with the occurrence or degree of OSAS, making it unlikely that NTproBNP could serve as a marker of cardiac stress in OSAS patients with stable BP and without overt heart failure.

Adult↗

PubMed2005

Schizophrenia and second language acquisition.

Language acquisition involves brain processes that can be affected by lesions or dysfunctions in several brain systems and second language acquisition may depend on different brain substrates than first language acquisition in childhood. A total of 16 Russian immigrants to Israel, 8 diagnosed schizophrenics and 8 healthy immigrants, were compared. The primary data for this study were collected via sociolinguistic interviews. The two groups use language and learn language in very much the same way. Only exophoric reference and blocking revealed meaningful differences between the schizophrenics and healthy counterparts. This does not mean of course that schizophrenia does not induce language abnormalities. Our study focuses on those aspects of language that are typically difficult to acquire in second language acquisition. Despite the cognitive compromises in schizophrenia and the manifest atypicalities in language of speakers with schizophrenia, the process of acquiring a second language seems relatively unaffected by schizophrenia.

Adult↗