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Epidemic Period (epidemic + period)
Selected AbstractsBrain barrier dysfunction in Cuban Epidemic Optic NeuropathyEUROPEAN JOURNAL OF NEUROLOGY, Issue 6 2008A. González-Quevedo Monteagudo Background and purpose:, There are practically no references to cerebrospinal fluid(CSF) studies in tropical or nutritional neuropathies. In the present paper we present the results of CSF studies in patients with Cuban Epidemic Optic Neuropathy (CEON) during epidemic and endemic periods, with an appraisal as to the contribution of brain barriers, function in the pathophysiology of this disease. Methods:, Two hundred and five patients with CEON were studied during the epidemic period (1992,1993) and 12 patients outside the outbreak (1995,1997). CSF protein determination and electrophoresis were carried out, as well as serum and CSF albumin and immunoglobulin G (IgG) quantitation for calculating IgG and Qalb indexes, in order to evaluate intrathecal IgG synthesis and the permeability of the blood,CSF barrier (B-CSF B). Results:, One fourth of the patients had increased permeability of the B-CSF B, but damage was more frequent between 16 and 60 days from onset of disease, disappearing after 120 days. B-CSF B dysfunction was more prevalent in patients with severe neurological impairment, although it was not related to the severity of ophthalmological damage. The group of patients studied outside of the outbreak (endemic period) showed similar results. Discussion:, The possible association of increased permeability of the B-CSF B with oxidative stress, which lies on the basis of this epidemic outbreak, is discussed. [source] Review: Neuropathology of acute phase encephalitis lethargica: a review of cases from the epidemic periodNEUROPATHOLOGY & APPLIED NEUROBIOLOGY, Issue 5 2009L. L. Anderson Introduction: Encephalitis lethargica (EL), an epidemic disease of the early 20th century, has continued to be diagnosed sporadically since that time, including a report of 20 new cases in 2004. Many of the recent case reports state that the primary neuropathology of acute EL consists of inflammatory changes and lesions within the midbrain, basal ganglia and substantia nigra. However, the neuropathology of acute EL cases from the epidemic period was actually much more widespread. Methods: In order to characterize the neuropathology of acute phase EL, we developed a database of EL pathology based on 112 cases from the years 1915 to 1940, of which most died within 2 weeks of EL onset. Results: Our analysis revealed that cortical damage was prevalent in 75% of the 112 cases; damage to the meninges and brainstem occurred in approximately half of the cases; and the substantia nigra was damaged in only 13% of these acute cases. We also found that after 1921, damage to cranial nerve nuclei was not reported. An analysis of the neuropathology and clinical symptoms revealed little correlation. Conclusions: Based on these findings, putative modern cases of acute EL with MRI/CT indicated lesions confined solely to the midbrain, brainstem, and/or basal ganglia should not be considered, consistent with that reported during epidemic period. [source] Large-scale multiple testing under dependenceJOURNAL OF THE ROYAL STATISTICAL SOCIETY: SERIES B (STATISTICAL METHODOLOGY), Issue 2 2009Wenguang Sun Summary., The paper considers the problem of multiple testing under dependence in a compound decision theoretic framework. The observed data are assumed to be generated from an underlying two-state hidden Markov model. We propose oracle and asymptotically optimal data-driven procedures that aim to minimize the false non-discovery rate FNR subject to a constraint on the false discovery rate FDR. It is shown that the performance of a multiple-testing procedure can be substantially improved by adaptively exploiting the dependence structure among hypotheses, and hence conventional FDR procedures that ignore this structural information are inefficient. Both theoretical properties and numerical performances of the procedures proposed are investigated. It is shown that the procedures proposed control FDR at the desired level, enjoy certain optimality properties and are especially powerful in identifying clustered non-null cases. The new procedure is applied to an influenza-like illness surveillance study for detecting the timing of epidemic periods. [source] Determinants of acquiring hepatitis A virus disease in a large Italian region in endemic and epidemic periodsJOURNAL OF VIRAL HEPATITIS, Issue 3 2005P. L. Lopalco Summary., Viral hepatitis A is endemic in Puglia region (southeast Italy). Over the last 13 years, annual incidence rates have ranged from 4 to 138 per 100 000 inhabitants and periodical regional epidemics have been described. Between 1 January 1996 and 31 December 1997 over 11 000 cases of hepatitis A were reported accounting for an annual incidence rate over 130/100 000. To identify exposures during the epidemics, a case,control study was performed in two different rounds and since 1997, an enhanced surveillance system has permitted the monitoring of exposures of subsequent cases. Raw seafood consumption was identified as the major risk factor for hepatitis A. Adjusted odds ratio and 95% confidence intervals for this exposure from the first round of the case,control study was 38.6 (12.2,122.4) and for the second round for consumption of raw mussels it was 30.7 (16.0,52.0). Hepatitis A epidemiology in Puglia is consistent with an endemic situation sustained by locally contaminated seafood consumed raw and by the recurrence of large epidemics, where size is influenced by the accumulation of susceptible subjects in the population. [source] | ||||||||||