The Anti-Saccade Eye Movement Task to Screen for Cognitive Dysfunction in Patients with Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis

Up to 50% of patients with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) have frontotemporal cognitive deficits. These deficits are diagnosed by a lengthy neuropsychological assessment. However, these assessment tools have limited reliability in patients with declining motor control. As the ocular motor neurons are spared, the interleaved pro- and anti-saccade task (IPAST), which probes executive and working memory functions of the frontal lobes, can be used to assess cognitive function in ALS. This study compared the IPAST performance of patients with ALS with varying cognitive function, healthy controls, and patients with behavioural-variant frontotemporal dementia, and determined the neuropsychological and clinical variables linked to the performance. The results showed that patients with ALS and differing cognitive levels have different IPAST performances. The IPAST performances were mainly attributed to the level of executive dysfunction and attention-working memory. The results supported IPAST as a promising cognitive screening tool in ALS.M.Sc

Animal models of necrotizing enterocolitis: review of the literature and state of the art

Necrotizing enterocolitis (NEC) remains the leading cause of gastrointestinal surgical emergency in preterm neonates. Over the last five decades, a variety of experimental models have been developed to study the pathophysiology of this disease and to test the effectiveness of novel therapeutic strategies. Experimental NEC is mainly modeled in neonatal rats, mice and piglets. In this review, we focus on these experimental models and discuss the major advantages and disadvantages of each. We also briefly discuss other models that are not as widely used but have contributed to our current knowledge of NEC