Neurological Disorders

Besides key symptoms of narcolepsy such as excessive daytime sleepiness, cataplexy, and disturbed nighttime sleep, patients affected by the disease also suffer from cognitive deficits, particularly impairments in attention, concentration, and various memory skills. However, it is still not fully understood to what extent cognitive impairments are independent of daytime sleepiness. In this study we aimed at identifying the taxonomy of neuropsychological dysfunctions in patients with narcolepsy without any stimulant or specific narcolepsy medication and the degree of independency of specific cognitive impairments of subjective daytime sleepiness. We expected that memory impairments, prefrontal dysfunctions, and disturbed emotion processing are independent of subjective daytime sleepiness and age. 22 patients with narcolepsy and 89 healthy controls were assessed by a comprehensive neuropsychological testing battery, psychological questionnaires on depression, alexithymia, as well a questionnaire on general daytime sleepiness. We found that narcolepsy patients exhibited independent of daytime sleepiness and age, significant deficits in tonic attention, set-shifting and in the conscious experience of arousal associated with emotions. Our results show for the first time that narcolepsy itself may lead to neuropsychological deficits that cannot be explained by subjective daytime sleepiness or aging-related cognitive decline. We propose that these novel insights are of considerable scientific and clinical relevance.

Human addiction, as a learned behaviour, has and is constantly being treated psychologically, with specific and timely interventions from Neuroscience. We endorse that human addiction can receive further boost as regards treatment, when we firmly understand how it works from a quantum scale. This is majorly because the dopaminergic pathway (DP) that is well elaborated in the brain of every addict is connected to the memory pathway. This further implies that the recall process in the brain of the addict, as regards his/her addiction is fully functional in line with the pleasure that arises from the element of his/her addiction. This dopamine-led pathway shows itself as prominent in what pertains to addiction; this is because of the role it plays in reward. As a neurotransmitter, dopamine flickers when reward is in the offing. It should be noted that a full understanding of the dimensions of addiction in the human person has not be attained to, therefore, we seek to add to this ongoing research, by considering excerpts arising from Quantum Field Theory. We are introducing excerpts from QFT, because DP, is an attendant element in the process of reward and motivation. In clear terms, we are alluding that it all begins with the memory.

Background: Dentists face numerous daily pressure that can lead to stress, as are most people who work in the health care field.

Objectives: The aim of this study was to investigate the prevalence of stress among a sample of Lebanese dentists to understand their probable causes and propose solutions to reduce their occurrence.

Material and methods: A total of 314 Lebanese dentists, who practiced different specialties of dentistry, after giving verbal consent, completed an anonymous questionnaire that focused on occupational health problem. This study was approved by the ethics committee of Saint-Joseph University (USJ) of Beirut, Lebanon. The statistical analyses were performed using SPSS software for Windows. The alpha error was set to 0.05.

Results: The mean age of the participants was 39.2 (± 11.66) years (58.6% male). The results showed that 90.8% (n=285) were satisfied with their work, 23.2% (n=73) had sleep disorders, 21.3% (n=67) of Lebanese dentists have relationship problems with dental technician, 14% (n=44) Lebanese dentists have misunderstanding with the assistant, 42.7% (n=134) had concerns related to work accident, 5.7% (n=18) are dealing with aggressive patient, 51.9% (n=163) had payment issue, 3.8% (n=12) have unsatisfied patients, 24.8% (n=78) have anxious patients while 14% (n=44) had financial concerns.

Conclusions: Our findings indicate a potential stress of Lebanese dentists, for that we must encourage them to practice sport, cultural and outdoor activities, improve their quality of sleep. In addition, preventive programs should be initiated to help professionals to cope with their professional duties without hazardous effects on their mental health.

Metastatic carcinomas are more prevalent in the vertebrae and epidural spaces than in the intradural and intramedullary spinal cord. Although thyroid carcinomas seldom induce intramedullary spinal cord metastases, no evidence has been presented to prove that pure follicular thyroid carcinomas can generate these metastases. In this case, a man in his late 30s who had undergone lymphadenectomy, thyroidectomy, and radioactive iodine therapy developed spastic paraparesis and urine retention. Owing to the patient's aggressive clinical presentation with intramedullary metastasis, an initial tumor biopsy was performed to determine the histology of the tumor. Following an unexpectedly negative first biopsy, the patient underwent thorough tumor excision, the histopathology of which revealed a metastatic pure thyroid follicular carcinoma. Hence, it is imperative that all patients with pure follicular thyroid cancer who have developed acute neurological symptoms, regardless of how long they have been in remission, be immediately evaluated for intramedullary spinal cord metastas