Jeffrey L. Cummings

Behavior and mood disorders in focal brain lesions

Acknowledgements Preface 1. Emotional consequences of focal brain lesions: an overview Jeffrey Cummings and Julien Bogousslavsky 2. The evaluation of mood and behavior in patients with focal brain lesions David Desmond 3. Methodological issues in studying secondary mood disorders Jordan Grafman and Deborah Warden 4. Disorders of behavior and mood in focal brain lesion Florence Ghika-Schmid and Julien Bogousslavsky 5. Depression and lesion location in stroke Robert Robinson 6. Mood and behavior in disorders of basal ganglia Joseph Ghika 7. Mania and manic-like disorders Sergio Starkstein and Facundo Manes 8. Behavioral and emotional changes after focal frontal lobe damage Paul Eslinger and Laszlo Geder 9. Abulia, apathy, athymhormia: toward a neurology of human motivation Michel Habib 10. Thalmic behavioral syndrome Atsushi Yamadori 11. Obsessive compulsive disorders in association with focal brain lesions F. Etcharry-Boux and F. Dubas 12. Emotional dysprosody and similar dysfunctions Diana Van Lancker and Caterina Breitenstein 13. Temporal lobe behavioral syndromes Serge Bakchine 14. Neural correlates of violent behavior Daniel Tranel 15. Focal lesions and psychosis Terri Edwards-Lee and Jeffrey Cummings 16. Alterations in sexual behavior following focal brain injury John Ringman and Jeffrey Cummings 17. Anosognosia Patrik Vuilleumier 18. Acute confusional states and delirium Louis Caplan Index.

The A431E mutation in PSEN1 causing Familial Alzheimer's Disease originating in Jalisco State, Mexico: An additional fifteen families

Nine families with autosomal dominant Alzheimer’s disease (AD), all of whom had the Ala431Glu substitution in the PSEN1 gene and came from Jalisco State in Mexico, have been previously reported. As they shared highly polymorphic flanking dinucleotide marker alleles, this strongly suggests that this mutation arose from a common founder. In the current letter, we expand this observation by describing an additional 15 independent families with the Ala431Glu substitution in the PSEN1 gene and conclude that this mutation is not an uncommon cause of early-onset autosomal dominant AD in persons of Mexican origin.

Evidence for Psychotropic Effects of Acetylcholinesterase Inhibitors

Alzheimer’s disease is a dementing illness, the risk of which increases markedly with age. It is estimated that it consumes

Measuring Outcomes in Alzheimer's Disease Research: Assessment of the Effectiveness of Interventions

US90 billion annually. Alzheimer’s disease is marked by an expanding cholinergic deficit, with a direct relationship between the degree of cholinergic dysfunction and the cognitive impairment. Substantial research continues to be focused on the development of newer and better medications, in particular acetylcholinesterase inhibitors (AChEIs), to compensate for the cholinergic deficit.Trial observations over the past several years suggest that in addition to positive effects on cognitive function, AChEIs may be able to decrease and ameliorate the neuropsychiatric symptoms frequently associated with Alzheimer’s disease. These observations have also shown that the instrumentation used can significantly influence the interpretation and outcome of a study. Typically the individual subscores of the noncognitive component of the Alzheimer’s Disease Assessment Scale (ADAS-noncog) and the Neuropsychiatric Inventory (NPI) scale have most consistently reflected the ability of AChEIs to improve the noncognitive behavioural problems and neuropsychiatric symptoms.Apathy and visual hallucinations are the symptoms that respond most positively to AChEIs. These agents may have the potential to decrease polypharmacy in this elderly population by achieving symptom reduction without additional use of antipsychotic medication.

Behavioral and emotional changes after focal frontal lobe damage

Alzheimer’s disease is a common disorder in the elderly, and a cure is not currently available. This article summarises the intervention studies that have been done in Alzheimer’s disease research and discusses assessment tools and outcome measures used in these studies. Current approaches are broadening their definition of positive outcome beyond improvement or maintenance of cognitive functioning. These new areas include slowing of disease progression, assessment of behavioural disturbances, quality of life and caregiver burden. Many new therapies are emerging for Alzheimer’s disease, and appropriate use of assessment tools that evaluate the cognitive, behavioural and social aspects of this disease is required.