Gene/Protein Disease Symptom Drug Enzyme Compound
Pivot Concepts:   Target Concepts:
Query: UMLS:C0004134 (ataxia)
 15,886 document(s) hit in 31,850,051 MEDLINE articles (0.00 seconds)

A pediatric neurologist analyzed the case histories of 30 4-16 year old children diagnosed with cerebellar ataxia in the pediatric neurology unit at the Royal Hospital for Sick Children in Edinburgh, Scotland to examine its clinical features, investigative findings, and etiology. Previous unfavorable events happened to 14 children (46.6%). Yet only 6 (42.8%) of these 14 children had unfavorable events of etiological significance. These previous unfavorable events occurred during the perinatal period (48%). These events in order of significance were asphyxia, prematurity, neonatal jaundice, and trauma. 66.6% of all children had an unsteady gait. The 2nd and 3rd most common signs of cerebellar ataxia were truncal ataxia (53.3%) and hypotonia (36.6%). The next most common symptom was considerable delay in reaching gross motor milestones (50%) such as not sitting until 2 years old. 23 (76.6%) of the children had dysfunctions in 1 of the cerebellar divisions. Clinical examination found dysfunctions most often in the paleocerebellum (86.6) followed by the neocerebellum (70%) and archicerebellum (56.6%). The paleocerebellum and the archicerebellum were the only divisions involved in 6 and 1 of the remaining children, respectively. The most common cause of ataxia was hydrocephalus (23.3%) followed by perinatal problems (20%). 70% of the patients also experienced other central nervous system conditions such as macrocephaly and mental retardation. 5 children had normal investigative findings, 3 of whom had cerebellar ataxia syndrome, 1 had congenital ataxic cerebral palsy, and 1 had familiar ataxia.
 ...
PMID:Cerebellar ataxia in childhood: a review of clinical features, investigative findings and aetiology in 30 cases. 150 89

Cowden disease (CD) is an autosomal dominant cancer predisposition syndrome associated with an elevated risk for tumours of the breast, thyroid and skin. Lhermitte-Duclos disease (LDD) cosegregates with a subset of CD families and is associated with macrocephaly, ataxia and dysplastic cerebellar gangliocytomatosis. The common feature of these diseases is a predisposition to hamartomas, benign tumours containing differentiated but disorganized cells indigenous to the tissue of origin. Linkage analysis has determined that a single locus within chromosome 10q23 is likely to be responsible for both of these diseases. A candidate tumour suppressor gene (PTEN) within this region is mutated in sporadic brain, breast and prostate cancer. Another group has independently isolated the same gene, termed MMAC1, and also found somatic mutations throughout the gene in advanced sporadic cancers. Mutational analysis of PTEN in CD kindreds has identified germline mutations in four of five families. We found nonsense and missense mutations that are predicted to disrupt the protein tyrosine/dual-specificity phosphatase domain of this gene. Thus, PTEN appears to behave as a tumour suppressor gene in the germline. Our data also imply that PTEN may play a role in organizing the relationship of different cell types within an organ during development.
 ...
PMID:Germline mutations of the PTEN gene in Cowden disease, an inherited breast and thyroid cancer syndrome. 914 Mar 96

Infants with macrocephaly, young children with acute disease resembling encephalitis, and children with truncal hypotonia, ataxia, or dystonia may be affected by glutaric aciduria type I (GA 1, glutaryl-CoA-dehydrogenase deficiency), a not-so-rare autosomal recessive neurometabolic disease. Well-known features of GA1 are fronto-temporal brain atrophy with macrocephaly and acute encephalopathic episodes with striatal necrosis followed by dystonia, but some patients develop motor disease without overt crises and other biochemically affected individuals remain asymptomatic. Biochemical and molecular characterization is available and allows post- and prenatal diagnosis. The pathogenesis of fronto-temporal atrophy, macrocephaly, and basal ganglia necrosis is still not understood, and there is no close correlation between biochemical parameters and clinical outcome. There is, however, evidence suggesting that carnitine supplementation and anticatabolic treatment of intercurrent illness may arrest or prevent neurological deterioration, while the role of limitation of dietary lysine and tryptophane is not yet clear. Although pathogenetic aspects are poorly understood, the natural course of glutaric aciduria type 1 can be changed by early diagnosis and treatment. Coordinated research is needed to understand the pathogenesis of brain toxicity, to define the role of dietary therapy, and to explore the possibility of neonatal screening.
 ...
PMID:Glutaric aciduria type 1 (glutaryl-CoA-dehydrogenase deficiency): advances and unanswered questions. Report from an international meeting. 939 91

Twelve patients with early infancy onset megalencephaly and leukodystrophy with a mild clinical course are reported. The neuroradiological, clinical, and genetic aspects of this recently recognized familial leukodystrophy syndrome were reviewed. Five were affected siblings, and all patients had consanguineous parents. Macrocephaly, a slowly progressive delay in motor development and mild mental deterioration constitute the clinical triad of the disease, showing characteristic age-related onset. The clinical findings outlined remarkably slight functional deterioration despite severe lesions on magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), especially in the initial period. Characteristically, mental function is preserved for years after onset of the motor deficit. The MRI lesions do not reflect the progress of disease. The disease probably has an autosomal recessive mode of inheritance even though no metabolic defect has been detected to date. In a more severe variant of the mentioned disease, there is more progressive and severe neurological dysfunction, including ataxia and spastic quadriparesis, leading to an inability to walk independently after 10 years of age. In mild variants, however, disease severity varies from macrocephaly with near-normal pyschomotor development to mild motor and/or mental dysfunction. Seizures were observed in both types but response to drugs was good. The 12 patients reported here confirm the specific and distinguishing clinical and radiological features of the previously reported 51 cases with this new syndrome, while adding some information regarding identification of the disease.
 ...
PMID:Megalencephaly and leukodystrophy with mild clinical course: a report on 12 new cases. 962 90

Leukoencephalopathy with swelling and a discrepantly mild clinical course is a recently identified syndrome described by van der Knaap et al. It is characterised by macrocephaly occurring during the first year of life, initially normal or nearly normal development, slowly progressive ataxia and spasticity with initial preservation of intellectual functions. MRI shows diffuse abnormality of signal intensity in the hemisphere white matter with subcortical cyst-like spaces in the fronto-parietal and anterior temporal areas. The case of a 5-year-old boy whose clinical and neuroimaging findings are consistent with this syndrome is reported. The clinical and neuroimaging findings of this case may provide further information about this new syndrome which could possibly be useful also for genetic counselling.
 ...
PMID:[Leukoencephalopathy with swelling, megalencephalopathy and surprisingly mild course. A case report]. 1076 5

Alexander disease is a rare disorder of the central nervous system of unknown etiology. Infants with Alexander disease develop a leukoencephalopathy with macrocephaly, seizures and psychomotor retardation, leading to death usually within the first decade; patients with juvenile or adult forms typically experience ataxia, bulbar signs and spasticity, and a more slowly progressive course. The pathological hallmark of all forms of Alexander disease is the presence of Rosenthal fibers, cytoplasmic inclusions in astrocytes that contain the intermediate filament protein GFAP in association with small heat-shock proteins. We previously found that overexpression of human GFAP in astrocytes of transgenic mice is fatal and accompanied by the presence of inclusion bodies indistinguishable from human Rosenthal fibers. These results suggested that a primary alteration in GFAP may be responsible for Alexander disease. Sequence analysis of DNA samples from patients representing different Alexander disease phenotypes revealed that most cases are associated with non-conservative mutations in the coding region of GFAP. Alexander disease therefore represents the first example of a primary genetic disorder of astrocytes, one of the major cell types in the vertebrate CNS.
 ...
PMID:Mutations in GFAP, encoding glial fibrillary acidic protein, are associated with Alexander disease. 1113 88

Megalencephalic leukoencephalopathy with subcortical cysts (MLC) is an autosomal recessive disorder characterized by macrocephaly, deterioration of motor functions with ataxia, and spasticity, eventuating in mental decline. The brain appears swollen on magnetic resonance imaging, with diffuse white-matter abnormalities and the invariable presence of subcortical cysts. MLC was recently localized on chromosome 22q(tel). We have narrowed down the critical region by linkage analysis of 11 informative families with MLC to a region of approximately 250 kb, containing four known genes. One family with two patients who were siblings did not display linkage between the MLC phenotype and any of the analyzed microsatellite markers on chromosome 22q(tel), suggesting genetic heterogeneity and the existence of at least a second MLC locus. The maximum two-point LOD score for the 11 families was 6.6 at recombination fraction .02. Twelve different mutations in seven informative and six uninformative families were found in one of the candidate genes, KIAA0027, which we renamed "MLC1." The gene encodes a putative membrane protein with eight predicted transmembrane domains. The patients of one family were compound heterozygotes for mutations that both introduced stop codons. The mutations further included frameshifts, splice-acceptor mutations, a putative splice-donor mutation, and amino acid substitutions of residues in predicted transmembrane domains. These data provide strong evidence that mutations of MLC1 cause the disease.
 ...
PMID:Mutations of MLC1 (KIAA0027), encoding a putative membrane protein, cause megalencephalic leukoencephalopathy with subcortical cysts. 1125 42

Leukodystrophy with macrocephaly as the main features of infantile neurodegenerative disease are characteristics of Canavan's disease, L-2-hydroxyglutaric aciduria, type I glutaric aciduria, and Alexander's disease. Also occasionally described are occidental congenital muscular dystrophy, G(M)2-gangliosidosis, metachromatic leukodystrophy, Krabbe's disease, and mucopolysaccharidosis. Since 1995, over 60 patients with a new syndrome, vacuolating megalencephalic leukoencephalopathy, have been described. The syndrome is characterized by macrocephaly, a slowly progressive clinical course of ataxia, spastic paraparesis, and seizure disorder with relatively spared cognition. Unlike other leukodystrophies with macrocephaly (except Alexander's disease), no metabolic marker has been found. We describe a similar group of 12 patients from two different Jewish ethnic origins in whom consanguinity is prominent. These patients have neuroimaging features and magnetic resonance spectroscopy findings indicating that there is an initial increase in white-matter edema with subsequent cystic formation. Consistent with loss of tissue in these areas, brain metabolites are reduced. The familial incidence in this group of patients is suggestive of autosomal-recessive inheritance.
 ...
PMID:Vacuolating megalencephalic leukoencephalopathy in 12 Israeli patients. 1129 32

Leukoencephalopathy with swelling and a discrepantly mild clinical course ("van der Knaap disease") is a recently identified syndrome. It is characterised by macrocephaly occurring during the first year of life, initially normal or nearly normal development, and slowly progressive ataxia and spasticity with initial preservation of intellectual functions. MRI shows diffuse abnormality in signal intensity, as well as swelling of the hemispheral white matter with subcortical cyst-like spaces in the fronto-parietal and anterior temporal areas. It is thought to have an autosomal recessive mode of inheritance, since many patients have consanguineous parents and more than one affected patient is often present within the same family. We report on two sibs: a 5-year old boy affected with "van der Knaap disease" and his macrocephalic sister whose first MRI (2 years 6 months) showed delayed myelination, which led us to suspect the same disease as her brother, however with subsequent normalisation at the second MRI (3 years 6 months).
 ...
PMID:Presence of delayed myelination and macrocephaly in the sister of a patient with vacuolating leukoencephalopathy with subcortical cysts. 1150 54

Somatic inactivation of PTEN occurs in different human tumors including glioblastoma, endometrial carcinoma and prostate carcinoma. Germline mutations in PTEN result in a range of phenotypic abnormalities that occur with variable penetrance, including neurological features such as macrocephaly, seizures, ataxia and Lhermitte-Duclos disease (also described as dysplastic gangliocytoma of the cerebellum). Homozygous deletion of Pten causes embryonic lethality in mice. To investigate function in the brain, we used Cre-loxP technology to selectively inactivate Pten in specific mouse neuronal populations. Loss of Pten resulted in progressive macrocephaly and seizures. Neurons lacking Pten expressed high levels of phosphorylated Akt and showed a progressive increase in soma size without evidence of abnormal proliferation. Cerebellar abnormalities closely resembled the histopathology of human Lhermitte-Duclos disease. These results indicate that Pten regulates neuronal size in vivo in a cell-autonomous manner and provide new insights into the etiology of Lhermitte-Duclos disease.
 ...
PMID:Pten regulates neuronal soma size: a mouse model of Lhermitte-Duclos disease. 1172 27


1 2 3 4 5 Next >>