Clipmarks | Neurology Clips

Brain School

Thu, 28 Aug 2008 08:28:37 GMT

clipped by: abailart

BRAIN SCHOOL FOR KIDS (GROWN UP KIDS INCLUDED!)

Brains Rule
Neuroscience For Kids
Kids Health
Funderstanding
NeuroMatrix
Brain Boosters
Brainy Kids
Brain Injury Association of America for kids
Kids Health, The Brain

BRAIN SCHOOL FOR ADULTS

Neuroscience Tutorial
Neuroguide
Neuroscience, Psychiatry, Psychology and Psychoanalysis
BrainInfo
News from the Neurosciences
All in the Mind
How your brain works
Brain Imaging Basics
Brain Connection
Brain Glossary
A cup of Neuropsychology?
Alleydog (for Psychology Students)
Martindale’s Brain and NeuroCenter
Internet Handbook of neurology
National Institute of Mental Health
Brain, The world inside your head

Tags: neuroscience

Can Drug Therapy Prevent Parkinson’s Disease?

Tue, 26 Aug 2008 18:19:39 GMT

clipped by: edwardmasen9
clipper's remarks: A recent study has shown that a decreased risk for Parkinson’s disease associated with both cholesterol-lowering medication and blood pressure-lowering medication. So what does this mean to people with Parkinson’s?

Clip Source: brainblogger.com

A recent issue of the journal Neurology published two separate case-controlled studies that showed a decreased risk for Parkinson’s disease associated with both cholesterol-lowering medication and blood pressure-lowering medication.

Tags: anti-inflammatory, atorvastatin, cholesterol, medication, neurology, neuroprotection, parkinson's disease, pravastatin, risk reduction, simvastatin

Cheaper Hospitals And Care- Go Abroad

Tue, 26 Aug 2008 00:46:28 GMT

clipped by: klippety
clipper's remarks: Now, if you are sick and can't afford care in America, why not go to one of these places? Cheaper and accredited hospitals over-seas.....

Clip Source: www.foreignpolicy.com

The Top 5 Countries for Medical Travel

Experts project the international market for medical travel to explode in the coming years as more Americans and others, fed up with high costs and long wait times, seek everything from knee and hip replacements to bypass surgeries. Here’s a look at the five countries best poised to ride the wave.

Singapore

Specialties: cardiac, fertility and reproductive, neurology and spine, orthopedic, oncology, weight treatment, wellness/alternative therapy

Thailand

Specialties: cardiac, cosmetic and plastic surgery, dentistry, fertility and reproductive health, neurology and spine, orthopedic, oncology, sex change and cosmetic, weight treatment

India

Specialties: cardiovascular, cosmetic, dental care, general surgery, ophthalmology, orthopedics, transplants, weight loss

United Arab Emirates

Specialties: cardiovascular, dermatology, orthopedic, oncology

Malaysia

cardiovascular, cosmetic, dental care, fertility and reproductive health, general surgery, ophthalmology,

Limited Value, Using Animals In Pain Research.

Sat, 16 Aug 2008 08:05:45 GMT

clipped by: fewstingscorpio
clipper's remarks: Read the whole article-some was skipped in my clipping! Please read it all.
http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/118418.php

Clip Source: www.medicalnewstoday.com

A panel of UK experts said using animals in pain research has limited value and they should be replaced by neuroimaging techniques based on fMRI, PET and other scanning technologies combined with new approaches such as genome-wide association and tissue research.

UK scientists are required by law to consider non-animal approaches when designing new experiments. Animal experiments in pain research sometimes use animals while they are conscious, and sometimes while under anaesthesia.

Although there have been a lot of studies on human pain disorder, safe and effective treatments are still hard to find; yet animal models, some of which have limited value, because they don't replicate the processes of human pain, still dominate research and they raise ethical questions.

concluded there were lots of opportunities also to combine these methods with other techniques such as microdialysis (a small probe that detects chemicals in the spaces between cells in tissue), genome-wide association researc

Tags: research, animals, pain_research, pain, science, medicine, neurology

Gene Disvovered Increases Stroke Risk

Mon, 11 Aug 2008 21:21:09 GMT

clipped by: zippunkygirl

Clip Source: www.kvoa.com

Gene Could Boost Stroke Risk for Migraine Sufferers

By Serena Gordon, HealthDay Reporter

THURSDAY, July 31 (HealthDay News) -- Scientists say they've spotted a gene that may lessen the risk of migraines with aura.

However, the risk is still there, and if the person goes on to develop migraines with aura, this migraine-protective gene actually boosts their risk for stroke.

"There is a reduced association of migraine with aura with this gene, but if you have migraine with aura, the risk of stroke is magnified," said study senior author, Dr. Tobias Kurth, an assistant professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School and an associate epidemiologist at Brigham and Women's Hospital in Boston.

During nearly 12 years of follow-up, 625 women had a cardiovascular event, such as a stroke, according to the study, which appears in the July 30 online issue of Neurology.

Geschwind's territory

Sun, 10 Aug 2008 02:34:17 GMT

clipped by: leevonk

Clip Source: www.eurekalert.org

Brain imaging reveals new language circuits

The authors dubbed this language area "Geschwind's territory" in honor of the American neurologist Norman Geschwind who championed its linguistic significance decades ago.

"There are clues that the parallel pathway network we found is important for the acquisition of language in childhood," said Catani. "Geschwind's territory is the last area in the brain to mature, the completion of its maturation coinciding with the development of reading and writing skills.

published December 13, 2004 in the online edition of Annals of Neurology

two classical language areas were densely connected to a third area,

Diffusion tensor (DT) MRI

these pathways appear to exist – in more rudimentary forms – in the brains of monkeys

Perisylvian Language Networks of the Human Brain," Marco Catani, Derek K. Jones,

ratey

Thu, 17 Jul 2008 21:14:07 GMT

clipped by: skatesurf

Clip Source: unex.uci.edu

The Mind that Changes the Brain: Wellness in the Second Millennium (Section 1)

Adrian Preda, M.D. is an Assistant Professor of Psychiatry and Human Behavior in the UC Irvine School of Medicine. His expertise in human behavior, psychology and spirituality is based on years of experience working as a psychiatrist, psychotherapist, teacher and researcher in a variety of academic clinical and non-clinical settings, including Yale Psychiatric Institute, Yale New Haven Hospital, Yale Health Plan, UT Southwestern and UC Irvine Neuro-Psychiatric Research. Dr. Preda also has extensive contemplative experience in Raja Yoga and mantra meditation, and in the Christian Eastern Orthodox tradition of the Prayer of the Heart. He is Board Certified by the American Board of Psychiatry and Neurology.

Tags: ratey

Dopamine shown to induce both desire and dread

Sat, 12 Jul 2008 22:30:38 GMT

clipped by: seaj11

Clip Source: www.kurzweilai.net

Dopamine shown to induce both desire and dread

KurzweilAI.net, July 9, 2008

University of Michigan researchers have found that dopamine, the neurotransmitter associated with motivation and positive rewards, can also promote negative feeling like fear and dread.

The researchers had previously found that desire and dread functions were anatomically close together in the nucleus accumbens (a tiny section of the brain--one-fifth of an inch long--associated with desire and reward). In their new research, they found that the effect of dopamine depended on where it was concentrated in the nucleus accumbens. Injections to the front of the nucleus accumbens caused rats to eat three times as much food as normal, but injections to the back caused them to display fearful behavior normally shown in response to a predator.

It was previously assumed that fear and desire came from different neurotransmitters, but the new study shows that anatomy alone can determine a single neurotransmitter's role.

Tags: psychology, brain, neurology, drugs, fear, addiction, science

Cause of Alzheimer's-Related Memory Loss Discovered

Fri, 11 Jul 2008 22:45:07 GMT

clipped by: seaj11

Clip Source: www.kurzweilai.net

Toxic Key To Alzheimer's Disease Memory Loss Identified

ScienceDaily, June 27, 2008

International researchers have found that a specific amyloid protein--amyloid-beta--appears to be the pathogenic (disease-causing) agent for Alzheimer's disease, and is not just a side-effect of the disease.

Soluable amyloid-beta taken from the brains of Alzheimer's patients and given to rats caused multiple disease symptoms, including reduced dendritic spine density.

Alzheimer's disease affects some 29.8 million people worldwide.

Tags: neurology, neuroscience, brain, alzheimers, memory, disease

Scients Prevent Neural Apoptosis to Keep Songbirds Singing

Fri, 11 Jul 2008 22:27:00 GMT

clipped by: seaj11

Clip Source: blog.wired.com

Some birds, caged or not, only sing when they really need to, namely, during the breeding season. After it's over, their musical neurons die-off, and they are left tune-less.

But now, scientists at the University of Washington have shown they can keep the birds singing, temporarily, by stopping the action of an enzyme key to their brains' natural cell-death processes. As cell-death mechanisms are similar across species, the research could open up new avenues of research on degenerative and age-related diseases like Alzheimer's.

Programmed cell death, or apoptosis, is common in multicellular organisms and aids important biological processes, like maintaining homeostasis and acting as the chisel in skeletal development. While there are many reasons that a cell could sense it is supposed to die, the actual suicide process is generally the same: A group of enzymes called caspases execute on the order for cellular degeneration.

Tags: nature, animals, neurology, neuroscience, research, alzheimers

Low cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) levels of hypocretin are diagnostic for narcolepsy.

Wed, 02 Jul 2008 03:38:08 GMT

clipped by: fewstingscorpio
clipper's remarks: A little prick in the back goes a long way...Sounds like a good tool if you happen to be having one anyway.
For the whole article in it's entirety:
http://www.medscape.com/viewarticle/443623

Clip Source: www.medscape.com

Low cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) levels of hypocretin are diagnostic for narcolepsy,

Because hypocretin neurons are positioned to drive monoaminergic activity across the sleep cycle, loss of this excitatory input may explain the abnormalities seen in narcolepsy.

n this case series of 274 patients with sleep disorders seen in specialty clinics from 1999 to 2002, diagnoses included narcolepsy, hypersomnia, obstructive sleep apnea, restless legs syndrome, insomnia, and atypical hypersomnia cases such as familial cases, narcolepsy without cataplexy or without HLA-DQB1*0602, recurrent hypersomnias, and symptomatic cases secondary to Parkinson disease, depression, Prader-Willi syndrome, or Niemann-Pick disease type C. The subject group also included 296 controls

either healthy or who had neurological disorders.

Frequency of HLA type HLA-DQB1*0602 was increased in narcolepsy with typical cataplexy (93% vs. 17% in controls), narcolepsy without cataplexy (56%), and in essential hypersomnia (52%).

Tags: narcolepsy, "sleep disorders", cataplexy, health, research, hypocretin, "cerebrospinal fluid", neurology

Hand-held Magnetic Device Eases Migraines

Fri, 27 Jun 2008 06:22:04 GMT

clipped by: A53GG4

Clip Source: health.usnews.com

Hand-held Magnetic Device Eases Migraines

Experimental treatment tool is found to alleviate symptoms of headache with aura

By January W. Payne

Posted June 26, 2008

Anyone who's ever experienced a migraine knows how excruciating these headaches can be—sometimes pushing you into a dark room, curtains drawn, in hopes of a quick end to the throbbing, painful misery.

Migraines are caused by abnormal brain activity, typically brought on by certain foods, stress, or another trigger. In addition to being painful, the headaches can involve nausea, vomiting, and other symptoms. Some nerve pathways and chemicals in the brain appear to contribute to the symptoms, and it's this role in the process that the magnetic device is designed to interrupt, says Yousef Mohammad, professor of neurology at Ohio State University Medical Center, who is lead author of the new study.

The study showed it eliminated the headache within two hours for 39 percent of participants

Tags: health

Will a Computer “Symbiote” be Implanted in Future Human Brains?

Thu, 26 Jun 2008 13:26:15 GMT

clipped by: papananook
clipper's remarks: A not-so-imaginary friend in yer brain! Could cause some interesting psychological problems...

Clip Source: www.dailygalaxy.com

Will future humans have computers implanted in their brains? Researchers are developing a neural implant that can think independently—just like the human brain does. Creepy? Yeah. Cool? Definitely. Scientists at the University of Florida aren’t just creating a neural implant that can translate human brain signals, but one that can act independently to increase its efficiency and synergy with the brain as it learns new things.

"In the grand scheme of brain-machine interfaces, this is a complete paradigm change," said Justin C. Sanchez, Ph.D., a UF assistant professor of pediatric neurology and the study's lead author. "This idea opens up all kinds of possibilities for how we interact with devices. It's not just about giving instructions but about those devices assisting us in a common goal. You know the goal, the computer knows the goal and you work together to solve the task."

Will a Computer “Symbiote” be Implanted in Future Human Brains?

Thu, 26 Jun 2008 11:30:38 GMT

clipped by: wildcat

Clip Source: www.dailygalaxy.com

These “brain computers” are programmed with complex algorithms that can interpret thoughts

Tags: brain, implants, future, neurology, interface

Targeting epilepsy at the source

Wed, 25 Jun 2008 08:50:23 GMT

clipped by: pokkets

Clip Source: www.abc.net.au

Dani Cooper

People who suffer epileptic seizures could be treated using drug-infused polymer implants in their brain, according to an Australian researcher.

Speaking at the Asia-Pacific Symposium on Nanobionics in Wollongong this week, Professor Mark Cook, of St Vincent's Hospital in Melbourne, says tests on rats shows the polymer implants reduce the frequency, length and severity of seizures.

Cook, who is also attached to the University of Melbourne's Department of Neurology, says by delivering drugs close to the source of the seizure in the brain the amount of drug used is reduced and side effects are therefore kept to a minimum.

Cook told the conference that epilepsy is the second-most common neurological illness with 1% of sufferers having recurrent seizures.

But he says, the toxicity and dose levels of most epilepsy drugs creates major issues for users, with 31% of patients reporting adverse side effects from the drugs, with50% of those being clinically significant.