2 research outputs found
Supplementary Material for: Characterization of Cutaneous Plasmacytosis at Different Disease Stages
<i>Background/Aims:</i> Cutaneous plasmacytosis is rare and still not well understood. A retrospective study was made of 9 Chinese patients with 1- to 15-year histories of biopsy-proven cutaneous plasmacytosis diagnosed between 2003 and 2015. <i>Methods:</i> Patient records and archival photographs helped establish the pattern and duration of skin lesions, and skin biopsy specimens provided additional data. <i>Results:</i> The mean age at diagnosis was 46.4 years. Two patients had lesions within 1 year of developing the disease, and 4 had lesions lasting longer than 5 years. One patient had lymphadenopathy of the neck that was later determined to be Castleman disease. Three patients had elevated IgG4 levels; only 2 had increased IgG4+ cells in skin tissues. Flexural accentuation was prominent. Four patients had elevated IgG levels, and 1, with an IgG level >5,000 mg/dL, developed systemic plasmacytosis (later confirmed as Castleman disease). The level of IgG4 subclass was related to disease duration, whereas IgG4+ plasma cells in tissues seemed irrelevant. <i>Conclusion:</i> Routine laboratory tests, especially measurement of IgG4 levels, may be useful for following patients with cutaneous plasmacytosis. Because of the retrospective nature of our study, we could only evaluate the results of a single IgG4 test for each patient, but the results pointed to cutaneous plasmacytosis in all 9 patients, who had different stages of the disease. Serial skin biopsies may also be helpful for gauging disease progress. Although IgG4-related disease was not established in any of these patients, long-term follow-up is warranted for all patients
Supplementary Material for: DAD-6: A 6-ltem Version of the Disability Assessment for Dementia Scale Which May Differentiate Alzheimer’s Disease and Mild Cognitive Impairment from Controls
<b><i>Background:</i></b> The need to detect early changes in instrumental activities of daily life led us to modify the Disability Assessment for Dementia Scale (DAD) by focusing on executive components of 6 instrumental items (DAD-6). <b><i>Aim:</i></b> To evaluate the relevance of the DAD-6 for detecting early impairment in a nondemented population. <b><i>Methods:</i></b> The DAD-6 was administered to informants of 84 patients: 31 with mild dementia (MD), 53 with mild cognitive impairment (MCI) and 55 healthy controls. <b><i>Results:</i></b> DAD-6 scores gradually decreased with increasing severity of the cognitive status [18 in healthy controls vs. 15.1 ± 3.2 in MCI versus 9.6 ± 3.5 in MD, p < 0.0001). Receiver-operating characteristic curve analyses yielded an optimal cut score of 14 to distinguish MCI from MD with a sensitivity of 0.83 (95% confidence interval 0.74–0.92) and a specificity of 0.84 (0.71–0.94), and a cut score of 15 to distinguish single-domain MCI from multi-domain MCI with a sensitivity of 0.96 (0.90–0.99) and a specificity of 0.54 (0.33–0.75). <b><i>Conclusion:</i></b> The DAD-6 reliably detects early loss of autonomy due to cognitive impairment