Hania S. Zayed

Silent central nervous system involvement in Egyptian Behçet's disease patients: clinical, psychiatric, and neuroimaging evaluation

Behçets disease (BD) is an idiopathic multisystem disorder. Involvement of CNS occurs in 4–48% of cases. This study was designed to evaluate the prevalence of subclinical neuropsychiatric affection in asymptomatic Egyptian BD patients using psychometric tests and brain imaging with single photon emission computed tomography (SPECT) and magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), also to assess possibly associated clinical predictive variables. Twenty-five BD patients without overt CNS involvement and ten healthy controls matched for age, education, and sex completed a comprehensive neuropsychological battery including Hamilton scales for anxiety and depression and Wechsler memory scale–revised. Disease activity was assessed using Behçets Disease Current Activity Form (BDCAF). SPECT was done for all subjects, and 12 patients underwent brain MRI. Compared to controls, 23 (92%) and 24 (96%) patients had anxiety and depression scores respectively above normal range; also, BD patients had significantly lower memory quotient (MQ). SPECT revealed abnormalities in 16/25 (64%), while in 3/12 patients (25%), MRI was abnormal. Subjects with abnormal SPECT had significantly higher ages than those with normal SPECT (P = 0.02) and were more frequently males (P = 0.03). No statistically significant differences between cases with normal or abnormal SPECT were found regarding disease duration, frequency of headache, BDCAF, frequency of active eye disease, major vascular involvement, mean Hamilton anxiety and depression scores, and mean MQ. Early diagnosis of neurological involvement in BD is important in reducing or preventing complications. Neuropsychiatric evaluation and HMPAO brain SPECT were found to be useful for detecting subclinical neurological abnormalities in BD patients.

Cardiac findings in patients with Behçet’s disease: Facts and controversies

Behçet’s disease (BD) is a systemic vasculitis of unknown etiology. It is characterized by recurrent oral and genital ulcers, uveitis, and a number of systemic manifestations. Although the disease is recognized worldwide, its prevalence is highly variable. A detailed review and analysis of the worldwide published reports on BD showed that not only the prevalence of the disease but also its cardiac complications differ according to the geographic distribution of the studied population. With the exception of France, Greece, Spain, and Italy, very few reports and studies regarding BD have been published from the western countries. Cardiovascular complications are an important cause of poor outcome in patients with BD. Over the past few years, many case reports and studies have been published, providing more facts about these complications. For example, peculiar echocardiographic findings in patients with aortic valve regurgitation and intracardiac thrombi secondary to BD were recently described. The role of these findings in the initial diagnosis of the disease, however, remains to be evaluated. On the other hand, some reports present contradictory results, especially concerning the left ventricular diastolic function, pathogenesis of coronary artery disease, and proper management of the cardiac complications in BD. Importantly, management of these complications is based mainly on the discretion of the treating physician due to the absence of large controlled studies and clear guidelines. This approach sometimes creates inconsistent data and allows controversies to persist. The review presented here will discuss some of the facts and controversies related to cardiac complications in BD.

Clinical and immunological pattern and outcome of Egyptian systemic lupus erythematosus patients: a single center experience:

Objective The objective of this study was to describe the clinical and immunological pattern and disease outcome in Egyptian systemic lupus erythematosus patients. Patients and methods The medical records of 770 systemic lupus erythematosus patients who were followed from 2002–2015 at Kasr Alainy Hospital, Cairo University, were retrospectively reviewed. Results There were 707 (91.8%) females. The mean age at disease onset was 22.1 ± 8.6 and the disease duration was 6.1 ± 4.5 years. The main clinical manifestations were mucocutaneous (90.8% with oral ulcers affecting 52.5%), arthritis (80.3%), nephritis (67.8%), hematologic involvement (64.9%), serositis (55.2%) and neuropsychiatric manifestations (44.3%). The frequencies of antinuclear antibodies were 94.3%, anti-dsDNA 74.8%, anti-Smith 11%, anticardiolipin antibodies 29.5% and lupus anticoagulant 19.8%. Infections, predominantly bacterial, affected 337 (43.8%) patients. Thirty-three (4.3%) patients died. The main causes of death were sepsis and disease activity. The five- and 10-year survival rates for the total cohort were 97.4% and 96.3%, respectively, and were 96% and 92%, respectively for those with nephritis (p = 0.008). Autoimmune hemolytic anemia, thrombocytopenia, elevated serum creatinine, a higher damage index, infections, a higher glucocorticoid dose and cyclophosphamide use ≥ six months were associated with an increased risk of mortality with odds ratios of 3.69, p < 0.01; 4.12, p < 0.001; 1.54, p < 0.001; 1.43, p < 0.001; 5.08, p < 0.001; 5.04, p < 0.001 and 2.25, p = 0.03, respectively. Conclusion Compared to other cohorts, a relatively lower mean age at systemic lupus erythematosus onset and higher frequencies of oral ulcers, serositis and nephritis were found.

Psychiatric and functional neuroimaging abnormalities in chronic hepatitis C virus patients: Is vasculitis a contributing factor?

BACKGROUND AND STUDY AIMS Central nervous system (CNS) involvement in hepatitis C virus (HCV) infection has different facets such as anxiety, depression, cognitive impairment and vasculitis. We were interested in detecting subclinical CNS involvement in chronic HCV infected subjects with and without systemic vasculitis. PATIENTS AND METHODS Nineteen patients (15 females and 4 males) with chronic HCV infection (mean age 46.5 ± 7 and mean duration since diagnosis of HCV infection 4.7 ± 4 years, including 6 (32%) Child-Pugh class A cirrhotic patients) and 30 age, sex and education matched healthy control subjects were studied. Thirteen patients had associated vasculitis. Patients and control subjects were assessed using the block design and comprehension subtests of Wechsler Bellevue Adult Intelligence Scale, Wechsler Memory scale (WMS), Beck Anxiety Inventory (BAI) and Beck Depression Inventory (BDI). Brain HMPAO Single Photon Emission Computed Tomography (SPECT) was performed for HCV patients. RESULTS Patients with HCV had lower scores on the block design test compared to control subjects (8.37 ± 1.89 versus 10.37 ± 1.47, p < 0.001), lower total WMS scores (43.15 ± 10.49 versus 60.27 ± 8.08, p < 0.001) and higher anxiety and depression scores (16.94 ± 10.46 and 37.17 ± 10.38 versus 10.3 ± 4.67 and 28.9 ± 5.99, p = 0.004 and 0.001, respectively). Total WMS were lower in HCV patients with vasculitis compared to those without vasculitis (39.14 ± 9.3 versus 51.17 ± 8.3, p = 0.019) while the block design and comprehension tests, BAI and BDI were not significantly different between both groups. The block design and comprehension tests, WMS, BAI and BDI were not significantly different between cirrhotic and non-cirrhotic patients. Seven patients had different patterns of cerebral hypoperfusion on SPECT, and all of them had associated vasculitis. Abnormal SPECT was associated with lower total WMS scores (35.87 ± 10.8 versus 46.79 ± 8.6 in those with normal SPECT, p = 0.049). CONCLUSIONS Vasculitis may contribute to the development of neuropsychiatric involvement in HCV patients.

Assessment of Left Ventricular Diastolic Function in Egyptian Patients With Behçet's Disease

Objectives This study aims to evaluate left ventricular diastolic function in Egyptian patients with Behçets disease using variable echocardiographic parameters by combining both transmitral and tissue Doppler velocities to overcome the occasional false interpretation of preload dependent transmitral parameters and to detect the correlation between various left ventricular diastolic parameters and different disease manifestations. Patients and methods Forty patients (35 males, 5 females; mean age 31±8 years; range 19 to 52 years) with Behçets disease and 32 age- and sex- matched healthy controls (26 males, 6 females; mean age 28±6 years; range 19 to 60 years) were enrolled. Left ventricular diastolic function was assessed using an algorithm that combined transmitral and tissue Doppler derived parameters. Results Mean disease duration of the patients was 7.4±6 years. Left and right ventricular systolic function was normal in both groups. The transmitral E/A was<1 in six patients (15%). There was no difference between patients and controls regarding the other left ventricular diastolic parameters. Compared to patients with an E/A ratio >1, patients with E/A<1 were significantly older and had a longer disease duration (p=0.001 and p<0.001, respectively). All the other echocardiographic parameters in both groups were comparable. Conclusion Egyptian patients with Behçets disease have normal left ventricular diastolic function regardless of disease duration and activity.