Luc J P Defebvre

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..This study, based on an objective method, revealed that chronic bilateral GPi stimulation may improve gait and preparatory postural adjustments in severe PD patients with a more limited effect than L-dopa...

..Clinical evaluation of motor complications must be performed precisely to establish the best therapeutic strategy...

..However, a subcortical origin cannot always be ruled out...

..The primary objective was to describe the clinical outcome in terms of efficacy and tolerance in STN-DBS patients. A secondary objective was to discuss presurgery clinical characteristics a posteriori as a function of outcome...

..Delayed ERD onset, which shows that programming of movement is affected in Parkinson's disease, may be partially corrected by L-DOPA therapy...

..Parkinsonian symptoms must still be levodopa responsive and cause severe clinical disability severely limiting daily living activities. Cognitive impairment and other severe pathologies are contraindications...

..However, a subcortical origin cannot always be ruled out...

..RBD, idiopathic or secondary to PD, is associated with perceptual closure dysfunction. Our results suggest that this perceptual dysfunction is specifically associated with RBD and may be related to a non-dopaminergic impairment...

..HD patients have difficulty in synchronizing their footsteps with a metronome, mainly due to attentional deficits...

..The reliability of joint angle curves and comparisons with control data are of major interest in PD, since variability in gait cycle timing is a feature of this pathology...

..A predominantly noradrenergic tricyclic antidepressant induced a more intense short-term effect on parkinsonian depression than did an SSRI. However, desipramine's lower tolerability may outweigh its slight short-term clinical advantage...

..The LARS-i was seen to have excellent psychometric properties and appears to be valid for use in PD with respect to the patient-based LARS and the informant- and clinician-rated versions of the AES...

..Patients with HD had greater difficulty walking while performing a concurrent cognitive task; the drain on attentional resources deteriorated walking performance...

..These findings suggest that in nondemented, nondepressed PD patients, apathy may be a predictive factor for dementia and cognitive decline over time...

..We conclude that time-frequency analysis is an appropriate approach to detect brief and subtle FOG episodes. Future work will need to decide whether this approach can support or even replace expert clinical opinion...

..However, the CCI does not enable more accurate screening for PD-associated dementia...

..Our results demonstrate the high sensitivity of the PASAT to cognitive impairment. However, correlation analyses showed that the main factor explaining the PD patients' PASAT impairment was cognitive slowing...

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..Stimulation of the subthalamic nucleus is proposed for the treatment of patients presenting with severe Parkinson disease. The effect on gait is not clearly established...

..This study suggests that despite the evidence of some differences in executive function in MSA and PD, the contribution of standard neuropsychological examination to the differential diagnosis of both syndromes remains still limited...

..Associated signs, sometimes of slight expression, remain of high interest for the clinical and genetic diagnosis of benign hereditary chorea...

..Although the neurochemical substrate of apathy remains poorly characterized, the strong link between apathy and cognitive impairment observed in several studies suggests the participation of nondopaminergic circuits...

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..The authors suggest that this may be due to anomalous activity in inhibitory motor cortical systems and impaired sensorimotor integration of afferent inputs from muscle and joint receptors...

..Our findings suggest that MSA-P is characterized by both macro- and microstructural changes in the sensorimotor circuit...

..We believe that this semiautomatic classification may be a precious tool for reinforcing the current clinical differential diagnosis of CBD and PD...

..Stroke outcomes are worse in patients admitted at nonworking hours (NWH), but whether this is also true in patients treated with intravenous (i.v.) thrombolysis has not been definitely proven...

..Patients harbouring T/T genotype have an earlier AAO of 3.8 years as compared to C/C genotype (p=0.02). Our data thus strengthens the pathophysiological role of A(2A) receptors in Huntington's disease...

..The course of the disease in patients taking a fibrate did not differ from the controls. These data suggest that lipid-lowering drugs may have a disease modifier effect, with a stronger action for statins than for fibrates...

..Hence, local muscle strategies were used to counteract the overall delay in postural preparation revealed by biomechanical parameters...

..The aim of this study was to use vertical torque to characterise anticipatory postural adjustments in slow movement and to determine the significance of this biomechanical parameter...

..To find a biomechanical parameter able to characterize postural adjustments in different movement conditions...

..Neurodegeneration with brain iron accumulation (NBIA), formerly known as Hallervorden-Spatz syndrome, is a heterogeneous group of disorders with different treatment options...