Brenda Milner - Restored Retina - Double Uterus - B vitamin & Alzheimer's

[Marc Breedlove]

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/05/21/science/still-charting-memorys-depths.html?ref=science&_r=0

Still Charting Memory’s Depths

By CLAUDIA DREIFUS

MONTREAL ­ In many ways, the Obama
administration’s new plan to map the human brain
has its origins in the work of Brenda Milner, the
neuropsychologist whose detailed observations of
an amnesia patient in the 1950s showed how memory
is rooted in specific regions of the brain.

“Prior to Brenda Milner’s discoveries, many
behaviorists and some cognitive psychologists
followed the lead of Freud and Skinner in
abandoning biology as a useful guide to the study
of memory,” the Nobel laureate Dr. Eric Kandel
wrote in his memoir, “In Search of Memory.” “Milner’s work changed all that.”

The amnesia patient, Henry Molaison (known during
his lifetime only as H.M., to protect his
privacy), died at 82 in 2008; his brain is now
being dissected and digitally mapped in exquisite detail.

But Dr. Milner is still very much alive. Two
months short of her 95th birthday, she puts in
full days at the Montreal Neurological Institute
and Hospital, where she is studying left/right brain differences.

We spoke in her offices here at “the Neuro” and
at the annual meeting of the American Association
for the Advancement of Science in Boston. Here is
a condensed and edited version of the conversations.

How did you come to work with H.M., perhaps the
most famous patient in the history of neuroscience?

In 1950, while working on a doctorate at McGill,
I went to work here at the Montreal Neurological
Institute to study the patients of Dr. Wilder
Penfield. He’d created the Neuro as a place to
pioneer the neurosurgical treatment of epilepsy.
He’d developed a procedure for patients who were
having epileptic seizures because of brain
injuries where he’d excise the injured part of the brain.

© 2013 The New York Times Company
--------------------


http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn23568-stemcell-treatment-restores-sight-to-blind-man.html

Stem-cell treatment restores sight to blind man

by Andy Coghlan

An experimental stem-cell treatment has restored
the sight of a man blinded by the degeneration of
his retinal cells. The man, who is taking part in
a trial examining the safety of using human
embryonic stem cells (hESCs) to reverse two
common causes of blindness, can now see well enough to be allowed to drive.

People undergoing treatment had reported modest
improvements in vision earlier in the trial,
which began in 2011, but this individual has made
especially dramatic progress. The vision in his
affected eye went from 20/400 – essentially blind
– to 20/40, which is considered sighted.

"There's a guy walking around who was blind, but
now can see," says Gary Rabin, chief executive
officer of Advanced Cell Technology, the company
in Marlborough, Massachusetts that devised the
treatment. "With that sort of vision, you can have a driver's licence."

In all, the company has so far treated 22
patients who either have dry age-related macular
degeneration, a common condition that leaves
people with a black hole in the centre of their
vision, or Stargardt's macular dystrophy, an
inherited disease that leads to premature
blindness. The company wouldn't tell New
Scientist which of the two diseases the
participant with the dramatic improvement has.

In both diseases, people gradually lose retinal
pigment epithelial (RPE) cells. These are
essential for vision as they recycle protein and
lipid debris that accumulates on the retina, and
supply nutrients and energy to photoreceptors –
the cells that capture light and transmit signals to the brain.

© Copyright Reed Business Information Ltd.
--------------------


http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-22594587

Bed-sharing 'raises cot death risk fivefold'

By Michelle Roberts Health editor, BBC News online

Sharing a bed with a newborn increases the risk
of sudden infant death syndrome fivefold, research claims.

The risk applies even if parents avoid tobacco,
alcohol and drugs - other factors firmly linked to cot deaths.

The BMJ Open research compared nearly 1,500 cot
deaths with a control group of more than 4,500 parents.

Current guidance in the UK is that parents should
decide where their baby sleeps, but says the
safest option is in a crib or cot in the same room.
No consensus

Many other countries, such as the US and the
Netherlands, go further and say parents should
not share a bed with their baby for the first three months of his or her life.

Prof Bob Carpenter, from the London School of
Hygiene & Tropical Medicine, carried out the
analysis and says the UK should now follow suit
and "take a more definitive stance against
bed-sharing for babies under three months".

The government said it had asked the public
health watchdog NICE to urgently examine its
guidance on co-sleeping in light of this new study.

BBC © 2013
--------------------


http://www.washingtonpost.com/national/health-science/medical-mysteries-a-clue-to-a-girls-painful-ailment-goes-long-overlooked/2013/05/20/283de858-9fd5-11e2-82bc-511538ae90a4_story.html

Medical Mysteries: A clue to a girl’s painful ailment goes long overlooked

By Sandra G. Boodman,

‘Oh my God,” Leigh Partridge remembers thinking,
her mind reeling as she tried to contemplate the
unimaginable. “This cannot be happening again.”

Doctors in the emergency room of Children’s
Hospital of Philadelphia (CHOP) had just told
Partridge that a mass in the abdomen of her
16-year-old daughter might be cancer. Further testing would be required.

To Partridge, who had lost her husband two years
earlier when brain cancer killed him in a matter
of months, the possibility that their middle
daughter might have a malignancy was terrifying.

“I didn’t even know who to call to come sit with
me,” Partridge recalled. “The person who was
supposed to be with me wasn’t there” anymore.

Allison Partridge, then a high school junior, had
found the fist-size tumor in her abdomen the
previous evening while lying in bed at home. For
months, Allie had suffered from severe and
worsening pain in her lower abdomen and tailbone,
which she usually tried to minimize or deny to
protect herself and her mother. But now the pain
and the giant lump were too obvious to downplay.

“My mom was definitely freaking out a lot more than I was,” Allie recalled.

Her hospitalization in April 2011 was both
traumatic and a turning point, revealing the
unusual cause of her problem as well as the
essential clue ­ unknown to her mother ­ that was overlooked by doctors.

© 1996-2013 The Washington Po
--------------------


http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn23573-b-vitamins-may-slow-the-advance-of-alzheimers.html

B vitamins may slow the advance of Alzheimer's

by Caroline Williams

Those at risk of developing Alzheimer's may be
able to slow its onset through daily B vitamins.

We already know that a high level of the amino
acid homocysteine in the blood is a risk factor
for Alzheimer's, and that B vitamin supplements
help reduce homocysteine levels. But it was
unclear whether or not these supplements would
slow the progression of mild cognitive impairment (MCI) to Alzheimer's.

David Smith and Gwenaëlle Douaud at the
University of Oxford led a research effort to
find out. They used MRI to track changes in the
brains of 200 elderly volunteers with MCI over
two years. During this time, half were given high
doses of vitamin B12, B6 and folic acid – 300, 20
and 4 times the UK guideline daily amounts,
respectively. The rest took a placebo.

In 2010, Smith and his colleagues showed that
high doses of B vitamins slowed whole-brain
shrinkage by up to 53 per cent in patients with
above average homocysteine levels. Now Smith and
Douaud's team have looked deeper to work out
which brain regions are best protected.

They found that it was the areas of the brain
most seriously affected by Alzheimer's, including
the hippocampus and cerebellum, that were
protected in volunteers given the vitamins. For
instance, in those with high homocysteine, the
atrophy rate in these brain regions was 5.2 per
cent in the placebo group but just 0.6 per cent in the vitamin group.

© Copyright Reed Business Information Ltd.
--------------------


http://vitals.nbcnews.com/_news/2013/05/20/18380822-nutty-finding-olive-oil-nuts-can-protect-your-brain?lite

Nutty finding: Olive oil, nuts can protect your brain

By Maggie Fox, Senior Writer, NBC News

It might seem against all logic, but adding a
little olive oil or a handful of nuts to your
diet each day may help keep your mind clear,
researchers reported on Monday. It’s the same
diet that’s also been shown to reduce deaths from heart attacks and strokes.

The researchers found that people who ate these
healthy fats were less likely to show the early
signs of dementia than those who stuck to a more
traditional diet. And this was done in Spain --
where people are already eating a so-called Mediterranean diet.

“Our ndings support increasing evidence on the
protective effects of the Mediterranean Diet on
cognitive function,” Miguel Martinez-Gonzalez of
the University of Navarra in Spain and colleagues
reported in the Journal of Neurology, Neurosurgery and Psychiatry.

The findings come from a large and
well-publicized trial that showed the
Mediterranean diet rich in fruits, vegetables,
olive oil and a little wine can cut the risk of
heart attacks and strokes by 30 percent. Martinez
and colleagues took a part data on 500 volunteers
from their own study center, who were followed
for more than six and a half years after starting the diet.

A Mediterranean diet includes lots of salad,
fruit, vegetables, nuts, a little fish, a little
lean meat, a small amount of cheese and olive
oil. Wine is also served at meals. In the main
study, 7,400 volunteers got extra counseling, and
either a weekly supply of extra-virgin olive oil
or mixed nuts -- walnuts, almonds and hazelnuts.

© 2013 NBCNews.com
--------------------


http://blogs.scientificamerican.com/mind-guest-blog/2013/05/20/dsm-5-caught-between-mental-illness-stigma-and-anti-psychiatry-prejudice/

DSM-5: Caught between Mental Illness Stigma and Anti-Psychiatry Prejudice

By Jeffrey A. Lieberman

Like many psychiatrists, I have been amazed by
the debates surrounding the DSM-5, the first
major revision of the American Psychiatric
Association’s Diagnostic and Statistical Manual
of Mental Disorders in nearly twenty years, which
was just released. Never before has a thick
medical text of diagnostic nomenclature been the subject of so much attention.

Although I was heartened to see more and more
people discussing the real-world issues and
challenges­for patients, families, clinicians and
caregivers–within mental health care, for which
the book offers an up-to-the-minute diagnostic
GPS, I was also alarmed at the harsh criticism of
the field of psychiatry and the APA.
Consequently, I believe that as you read and
watch this increased coverage, it’s important to
understand the difference between thoughtful,
legitimate debate, and the inevitable outcry from
a small group of critics –made louder by social
media and support from dubious sources ­who have
relentlessly sought to undermine the credibility
of psychiatric medicine and question the validity of mental illness..

DSM-5 has ignited a broad dialogue on mental
illness and opened up a conversation about the
state of psychiatry and mental healthcare in this
country. Critiques have ranged in focus from the
inclusion of specific disorders in DSM-5, to the
concern over a lack of biological measures which
define them. Some have even questioned the entire
diagnostic system, urging us to look with an eye
focused on the impact to patients. These are the
kinds of debate that I hope will continue long
after DSM-5’s shiny cover becomes warn and
wrinkled. Such meaningful discourse only fuels
our ability to produce a manual that best serves
those touched by mental illness.

But there’s another type of critique that does
not contribute to this goal. These are the groups
who are actually proud to identify themselves as “anti-psychiatry.”

© 2013 Scientific American
--------------------