AANEM News Express

AANEM Attends AMA House of Delegates Meeting

    6/28/2021
The AMA’s House of Delegates (HOD) convened virtually in mid-June for its Annual Meeting. The meeting ran for five and a half days, in addition to caucus meetings throughout the 2-3 weeks leading up to it. The meeting covered a wide range of important, timely topics currently affecting health care in the U.S. Not surprisingly, similar to the HOD Interim meeting last November, many of the resolutions brought before the HOD directly related to managing the COVID-19 pandemic.
 

Science News: Value of Systematic Genetic Screening of Patients with Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis

    6/24/2021
Submitted by: Francisco Gomez, MD
Edited by: Hristelina Ilieva, MD, PhD

Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) is a progressive neurodegenerative disease comprising injury and cell death of upper and lower motor neurons in the brainstem, spinal cord and cortex.  Overt respiratory failure and death occur on average at 2–5 years of onset.

Science News: Relation of Exercise and Pain in Patients With Idiopathic Distal Axonal Polyneuropathies

    6/24/2021
Submitted by: Pritikanta Paul, MD
Edited by: Hristelina Ilevia, MD, PhD

Benefits of exercise in peripheral neuropathy related to diabetes mellitus or metabolic syndrome were studied. Exercise improves glycemic control and control of other metabolic measures resulting into improved small fiber function and reducing risk of developing neuropathy.

Science News: Amyloid Typing by Mass Spectrometry in Clinical Practice: a Comprehensive Review of 16,175 Samples

    6/15/2021
Submitted by: Hristelina Ilieva, MD, PhD
Edited by: Niranjan Singh, MD

This is a very extensive summary of the experience of the Mayo clinic over ten years – from 2008 to 2018 with analyzing the congo red positive biopsy samples from throughout the country from a variety of tissues (heart, fat pad, GI, kidney, liver, muscle, nerve, tendons, breast, lymph nodes, bone marrow, etc) in a way that is able to report even rare amyloid types usually not detected by the standard amyloid IHC (immunohistochemistry) panels.

Science News: Sensory Neuronopathies: A Case Series and Literature Review

    6/15/2021
Submitted by: Bryan X. DeSouza, MD & Niranjan N. Singh, MD
Edited by: Hristelina Ilieva, MD, PhD   

Sensory neuronopathies also called sensory ganglionopathies are important disorders to understand especially in the setting of COVID-19 infections, which are characterized by clinical features of acute and subacute loss of smell and taste sensation.

Science News: Long-Term Safety and Efficacy of Patisiran for Hereditary Transthyretin-Mediated Amyloidosis With Polyneuropathy: 12-Month Results of an Open-Label Extension Study

    6/1/2021
Submitted by Hristelina Ilieva, MD, PhD                                                           
Edited by Niranjan Singh, MD

This article summarizes the world wide experience of treating patients with HTTR with Patisiran in terms of safety and efficacy. This is a multicenter, open-label extension (OLE) trial that enrolled patients at 43 hospitals or clinical centers in 19 countries.

Science News: An Appraisal of Electrodiagnostic Studies in Stiff Person Syndrome

    5/17/2021

Submitted by Betul Gundogdu, MD
Edited by Niranjan Singh, MD

This is a review of electrodiagnostic (EDX) findings for diagnosis of stiff person syndrome (SPS). The authors performed a literature review of EDX findings in SPS as well as an online survey on the use of EDX testing for the evaluation of SPS among EDX laboratory test results accredited by the EDX Laboratory Accreditation Committee of the American Association of Neuromuscular & Electrodiagnostic Medicine (AANEM).

Science News: Peripheral Nerve Compression Syndromes in Children

    4/22/2021
Non-traumatic neuropathies of the upper limb are rare in children. Diagnostic and treatment parameters are lacking high quality evidence and guidelines.
Carpal tunnel syndrome (CTS) was noted in children with lysosomal storage diseases, and ultrasound (US) was found to be more sensitive than nerve conduction studies (NCSs) for diagnosis; however, NCS was preferred for follow up post operatively.

Science News: Monitoring Clinical Course and Treatment Response in Chronic Inflammatory Demyelinating Polyneuropathy During Routine Care

    4/13/2021
Chronic inflammatory demyelinating polyneuropathy (CIDP) is without a disease activity biomarker and has broad clinical heterogeneity.  There are several different metrics used in research trials, but we do not have a standard parameter to use in clinical practice to monitor the response to treatment.

Patient Safety: EMG/NCS and Risk of Bleeding

    3/31/2021
Electrodiagnostic testing (needle electromyography) in patients with bleeding diathesis is associated with greater risk of bleeding when compared to general population. It is recommended that caution should be used when deciding on electrodiagnostic testing in patients with platelet counts less than 50,000 and INR greater than 1.5-2.0.