News

Neurology News Network for the week ending June 22, 2019.

Findings from SANAD II have suggested that levetiracetam is inferior to valproate in time to 12-month and 24-month remission in patients with generalized or unclassified epilepsy.

This is the first neurotoxin treatment approved for pediatrics 2 to 17 years of age with upper limb spasticity.

The head of the Cleveland Clinic stroke program and medical director of the Comprehensive Stroke Center sat down with Neurology Live for an in-depth discussion on stroke certifications, advanced treatment technology, and the ever-evolving concept of "time is brain."

Four of the 7 patients exhibited significant improvement in all assessed study parameters, which included reduction in the Apnea-Hypopnea Index scale and an improvement in oxygen desaturation index, with 1 patient demonstrating mild improvement; overall THX-110 was generally well tolerated.

The director of behavioral medicine at the Mellen Center for MS Treatment and Research at Cleveland Clinic discussed the importance of screening patients with MS for other conditions for which they are prevalently comorbid, such as depression or sleep disorders.

The professor of neurology at both the University of California San Francisco and King’s College, London, spoke about the results from a phase 2b/3 study evaluating atogepant for prevention of migraine.

While the clinical benefit of the therapy in Alzheimer is still unclear, the dihydropyridine calcium channel blocker increased blood flow by 20% compared to placebo in the brain’s memory and learning center, indicative of preserved cerebral autoregulation.

The director of rehabilitation services at Cleveland Clinic Mellen Center for MS spoke about the impact that participation in the arts can have for individuals with multiple sclerosis in dealing with symptoms of their disease.

The director of the center for circadian and sleep medicine at Northwestern University spoke about the importance of recognizing insomnia as a clinical diagnosis since it affects patients 24-hours a day, not just during sleep.

Abeona Therapeutics is currently planning a phase 1/2 clinical trial to evaluate ABO-202 in Batten disease.

Despite the clinical benefit being limited, the slowing of pantothenate kinase-associated neurodegeneration disease progression—particularly in atypical cases—is a step toward developing a treatment for the orphan disease.

The director of MS neuropsychiatry at Brigham and Women’s Hospital spoke of the importance of not oversimplifying the approach to mental health disorders in individuals with MS, and how the collaborative care model can help.­­­

During the average follow-up period of 3 years, 70.7% of those in the pediatric-onset MS group met the clinical definition for cognitive impairment compared with 59.8% of those in the adult-onset group.

The systematic review and meta-analysis identified cNfL usefulness as a biomarker, with the potential to help differentiate between frontotemporal dementia and Alzheimer disease, as well as Parkinson disease from atypical parkinsonian syndromes.

Solriamfetol (Sunosi, Jazz Pharmaceuticals) is expected to be available in July 2019 in the United States.

Neurology News Network for the week ending June 15, 2019.

Patients with multiple sclerosis who were obese had higher EDSS scores and higher levels of inflammatory IL-6 and leptin in the CSF prior to treatment, as well as lower levels of anti-inflammatory IL-13.

Axovant reported positive safety data as well as improvements in a number of measurements of motor function and dyskinesias in patients with Parkinson disease who received treatment with their investigational gene therapy.

Pain related to more severe motor symptoms, phosphodiesterase 10A loss seen early, novel therapy shows promise, and other recent findings are summarized here.

Many patients with neurologic conditions such as multiple sclerosis are faced with gait and stability issues due to their disease, but Splichal and Naboso Technology seek to address these issues via mechanoreceptor stimulation.

Almost 25% more of the patients with focal drug-resistant epilepsy who successfully underwent cortical stimulation to induce electroclinical seizures experienced good outcomes versus poor, suggesting the method’s ability to identify the epileptic generator as reliably as spontaneous seizures.

What’s in your differential diagnosis for this cachectic, disheveled patient who can no longer carry on a coherent conversation?

All told, every patient with RLS in the study had SIBO present, in comparison to general population rates which range from roughly 6% to greater than 15%.

Use of prescription antidepressants and hypnotics was significantly reduced in patients who underwent digital cognitive behavioral therapy for insomnia.

The director of the Sleep-Wake Disorders Center at Montefiore Medical Center spoke about the challenges in diagnosing narcolepsy, which often adds to the delay of diagnosis.

Investigators noted that, when considered with efficacy findings in narcolepsy, pitolisant has a favorable risk-benefit profile representative of advancement in the treatment of excessive daytime sleepiness and cataplexy in adult patients.

The autonomic disorders and sleep medicine specialist at Stanford University spoke about the overlap of autonomic disorders in sleep medicine, an often underrepresented portion of the sleep medicine field.

The findings suggest that the benefits of CPAP adherence may translate beyond improving obstructive sleep apnea in older adults with mild cognitive impairment.

The investigational dual-orexin antagonist from Eisai was significantly better at reducing Insomnia Severity Index-measured symptom severity in more than 1000 adults with insomnia in 2 phase 3 studies.