OBJECTIVES To determine the reliability and aspects of validity of the Evaluation Tool of Children's Handwriting-Cursive (ETCH-C; Amundson, 1995), using the general scoring criteria, when assessing children who use alternative writing scripts. METHOD Children in Years 5 and 6 with handwriting problems and a group of matched control participants from their respective classrooms were assessed w...

PURPOSE Human photosensitive epilepsy models have been used as proof of principle (POP) trials for epilepsy. Photosensitive patients are exposed to intermittent photic stimulation and the reduction in sensitivity to the number of standard visual stimulation frequencies is used as an endpoint. The aim of this research was to quantify the predictive capabilities of photosensitive POP trials, thro...

System epilepsy is an emerging concept interpreting major nonlesional epilepsies as epileptic dysfunctions of physiological systems. I extend here the concept of reflex epilepsy to epilepsies linked to input dependent physiological systems. Experimental and clinical reseach data were collected to create a coherent explanation of underlying pathomechanism in AE and NFLE. We propose that AE shoul...

Chronic heart failure (CHF) is well known to be associated with both an enhanced chemoreceptor reflex and an augmented cardiac "sympathetic afferent reflex" (CSAR). The augmentation of the CSAR may play an important role in the enhanced chemoreceptor reflex in the CHF state because the same central areas are involved in the sympathetic outputs of both reflexes. We determined whether chemical an...

Background and Objective: Temporal lobe epilepsy is hallmarked with neuronal degeneration in some areas of hippocampus and mossy fiber sprouting in dentate area. Considering some evidences on neuroprotective and antioxidant activity of silymarin (SM), this study was undertaken to evaluate the preventive effect of this agent on structural changes in hippocampus of kainate-epileptic rats. Materia...

A cross sectional hospital based study was undertaken to find out the various clinical aspects and management of Hot Water Epilepsy (HWE) in children. Of the 71 cases analysed, 67.6% had onset of seizures in the first decade of life. Seizures occurred frequently towards the end of head bath (71.8%). In 14.1% cases, seizures were precipitated with cold-water head bath also. Complex partial seizu...

The vestibular responses evoked by transmastoid galvanic stimulation (GS) in the rectified soleus electromyogram (EMG) in freely standing human subjects disappear when seated. However, a GS-induced facilitation of the soleus monosynaptic (H and tendon jerk) reflex has been described in few experiments in subjects lying prone or seated. This study addresses the issue of whether this reflex facil...

BACKGROUND Exhaled nitric oxide (ENO) is elevated in bronchial asthma patients, and inhaled corticosteroid therapy lowers the elevated ENO levels in such patients. ENO appears to be an inflammatory marker, but its role in the pathophysiology of cough remains unclear. This study aimed to elucidate the relationship between NO and increased cough reflex sensitivity induced by allergic airway react...

Chronic amphetamine intake leads to neurogenic bladder and chronic urinary retention. The mechanism underlying persistent urinary retention is unclear. The pelvic-urethral reflex (PUR) is essential for the urethra to develop sufficient resistance to maintain urine continence, an important function of the urinary system. Recent studies on PUR activities have indicated that repetitive/tetanic sti...

Background. Epilepsy is a common disease in children and adults, requiring long-term or lifelong use of antiepileptic drugs (AEDs) 60% cases. Enzyme-inducing enzyme-inhibiting AEDs may have negative effect on vitamin D metabolism. However, at present, standard treatment protocols for patients with epilepsy include no nutrients vitamin-mineral containing complexes. Objective: to analyze studies ...