Gene/Protein Disease Symptom Drug Enzyme Compound
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Query: UMLS:C0241981 (loss of balance)
 452 document(s) hit in 31,850,051 MEDLINE articles (0.00 seconds)

Drop attacks are sudden, unexpected, nonsyncopal falls, which are not preceded or accompanied by loss of consciousness, dizziness, lightheadedness, or loss of balance. They can be a manifestation of epilepsy, brain stem tumors, and a variety of other conditions. In the elderly, they have been associated with vertebrobasilar insufficiency, cervical spondylosis, or both. However, the specificity and etiology of drop attacks have come under some scrutiny in recent years. The patient described in this case report experienced frequent drop attacks that were effectively prevented with nifedipine. Possible pathophysiologic mechanisms are discussed and the relevant literature is reviewed.
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PMID:Treatment of drop attacks with nifedipine: a case report. 779 70

Intracranial astrocytomas are rarely diagnosed in cats. Clinical and pathological aspects of these tumors are more often described in humans and dogs. The classification scheme used in human medicine is of important prognostic value. We have analyzed clinical neurological and pathological findings from 8 cats with intracranial astrocytomas. The animals were 10.1 years old in average and presented with a history of tetraparesis (n = 3), epilepsy (n = 2), loss of balance (n = 3) and dyspnoe (n = 1). The latter cat died immediately after the first presentation while the other animals were euthanized because of a progressive course of the symptoms despite therapy. Even though feline astrocytomas, that we could classify into 4 different types in this study, are clinically and pathologically well correlated with those of other species, a prognostically useful classification has never been established before.
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PMID:[Intracranial astrocytomas in eight cats: clinical and pathological findings]. 1188 14

It is well recognized that a juvenile brain is more plastic than an adult brain and often undergoes better functional recovery following cortical injury. Infants treated with hemispherectomy to cure intractable epilepsy often exhibit restored normal motor function in the extremities contralateral to the lesion. Neuronal mechanisms of functional recovery after such a large cortical damage at a young age have been studied using animals with a similar lesion, hemidecortication. In such animals, descending pathways from the undamaged sensorimotor cortex to the ipsilateral forelimb motoneurons are reorganized as restoring normal motor function of the forelimb contralateral to the injury. Similar aberrant pathways from the motor cortex to the ipsilateral motoneurons are also generated following suppression of cortical activity in the other hemisphere, suggesting the development of contralateral connections in an activity-dependent manner in normal animals. Thus, formation of ipsilateral descending pathways following neonatal hemidecortication might be due to a loss of balance in cortical activity between the two hemispheres. Studies using animal models of neonatal cortical injury can reveal mechanisms of neural development and may help to establish therapeutic strategies to facilitate recovery from human juvenile cortical injury.
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PMID:Reorganization of motor circuits after neonatal hemidecortication. 2401 96

As an endogenous inhibitor of glutamate-mediated synaptic transmission in mammalian central nervous system, neuropeptide Y (NPY) plays a crucial role in regulating homeostasis of neuron excitability. Loss of balance between excitatory and inhibitory neurotransmission is thought to be a chief mechanism of epileptogenesis. The abnormal expression of NPY and its receptors observed following seizures have been demonstrated to be related to the production of epilepsy. The tremor rat (TRM) is a hereditary epileptic animal model. So far, there is no report concerning whether NPY and its receptors may be involved in TRM pathogenesis. In this study, we focused on the expression of NPY and its three receptor subtypes: Y1R, Y2R and Y5R in the TRM brain. We first found the expression of NPY in TRM hippocampus and temporal lobe cortex was increased compared with control (Wistar) rats. The mRNA and protein expression of Y1R was down-regulated in hippocampus but up-regulated in temporal lobe cortex, whereas Y2R expression was significantly increased in both areas. There was no significant change of Y5R expression in either area. The immunohistochemistry data showed that Y1R, Y2R, Y5R were present throughout CA1, CA3, dentate gyrus (DG) and the entorhinal cortex which is included in the temporal lobe cortex of TRM. In conclusion, our results showed the altered expression of NPY, Y1R and Y2R but not Y5R in hippocampus and temporal lobe cortex of TRM brain. This abnormal expression may be associated with the generation of epileptiform activity and provide a candidate target for treatment of genetic epilepsy.
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PMID:Altered expression of neuropeptide Y, Y1 and Y2 receptors, but not Y5 receptor, within hippocampus and temporal lobe cortex of tremor rats. 2444 22