Assessment of chilly sensation in Japanese women with Laser Doppler Fluxmetry and Acceleration Plethysmogram with Respect to Peripheral Circulation

To investigate the relationship between peripheral blood flow and chilly sensation in women. Peripheral blood flow was measured by laser Doppler fluxmetry and acceleration plethysmography in 1,624 women. Of these, 458 women who visited the outpatient menopausal and endocrine clinic and gave informed consent to blood flow measurement (284 women for whom chilly sensation was one of the chief complaints and 174 women free of chilly sensation) underwent laser Doppler fluxmetry (TBF-LN1, Unique Medical Co., Ltd., Osaka, Japan) to measure tissue blood flow in the middle finger and the third toe. The same women then received acceleration plethysmography (CP- 3166, Fukuda Denshi Co., Ltd., Tokyo, Japan) to measure blood flow in the index finger. Chilly sensation was complained by 52.0% of all patients (1,624/3,124). The blood flow as measured by laser Doppler fluxmetry and fingertip acceleration plethysmography reflected the chilly sensation well. The blood flow by laser Doppler fluxmetry and the fingertip acceleration plethysmogram index (APG-I) showed significantly lower and higher data, respectively, in the women with chilly sensation than in women free of the chilly sensation. The chilly sensation is partially attributable to reduced skin blood flow at the periphery of the extremities and the hardness of the vascular wall in these areas. Measurement of the peripheral tissue blood flow in patients complaining of chilly sensation seems to be clinically significant as a means of evaluating this sensatio

Postischemic Intraventricular Administration of FGF-2-Expressing Adenoviral Vectors Improves Neurological Outcome and Reduces Infarct Volume after Permanent Focal Cerebral Ischemia in Rats

Recently, we showed that the intraventricular administration of fibroblast growth factor (FGF) 2-expressing adenoviral vectors (AxCAMAssFGF-2) improves neurological recovery and reduces infarct volume after transient middle cerebral artery occlusion (MCAO) in rats. In the present study, we investigated whether the intraventricular administration of FGF-2-expressing adenoviral vectors has the same effect after permanent MCAO in rats. Infection of in vitro-cultured cells with AxCAMAssFGF-2, which contain an externally fused secretory signal of interleukin-2, results in an approximately 10-fold higher secretion of FGF-2 compared to infection with AxCAJSFGF-2, which contains no secretory signal. AxCAMAssFGF-2 was injected intraventricularly 2 hours after permanent MCAO. The treatment group showed significant recovery compared with the nontreatment group in terms of serial neurological severity scores (NSS) at 14, 21, 28 and 35 days after MCAO. Furthermore, 2,3,5-triphenyltetrazolium chloride staining showed that infarct volume was significantly reduced by the intraventricular administration of AxCAMAssFGF-2 in comparison with that of untreated MCAO. These results suggest that FGF-2 gene transfer using adenoviral vectors is useful in the treatment of occlusive cerebrovascular disease, regardless of reperfusion