Search

The article presents the information about several papers discussed at the 28th Annual Carrell-Krusen symposium at Texas Scottish Rite Hospital for Children in Dallas, Texas hold in February 16-17, 2006. The presented papers includes: patient with spinal cord tumor and charcot-marie-tooth type 1; early-onset autosomal dominant ataxia; exercion-related pain and stiffness; middle-aged male progressive weakness; freidreich ataxia with spastic paraparesis; an infant with abnormal electrophysiology and hypotonia; and bulbar palsy, head drop, and proximal weakness.

Because handwriting is viewed as such an important component of academic success, an evaluation has always been included in the diagnostic battery at Texas Scottish Rite Hospital given to children with suspected learning disabilities. For a long time a good evaluative instrument for writing was sought and could not be found. In response to a pressing need, the Children's Handwriting Evaluation Scale (CHES) was developed in 1984. See the Journal of Educational Research, 1985 for a description of the research. The test is a brief paragraph with 197 letters which children are asked to copy. Writing samples were gathered from 1397 students in grades 3 through 8, representative of the sociological data reported in the 1980 census. Standard scores for rate and descriptive and objective criteria for judging quality were evolved. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Texas Scottish Rite Hospital for Crippled Children is recognized as one of the finest pediatric orthopedic hospitals in the nation. The facility is capable of providing extensive treatment and therapy for children afflicted with cerebral palsy, spina bifida, scoliosis, and arthritis, as well as aftereffects of meningitis or encephalitis and accidental injury. Support clinics include those for dental, eye and hearing treatment, which have evolved to treat the needs of the "total child." Specific learning disabilities such as dyslexia also are evaluated and treated in the Hospital's Child Development Division and, through this division's outreach program, dyslexic children in school districts throughout Texas have available a course of instruction videotaped at the Hospital. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article presents abstracts on topics that will be discussed at the Annual Scientific Conference of the Canadian Spine Society that is to be held at the Halifax Marriott Harbourfront Hotel in Halifax, Nova Scotia which includes spine care, spine surgery and low back pain in Canada.

Background. This paper reports three children with short stature: developmental coxa vara unilateral in the first case and bilateral in the other two; somewhat squared and “ovoid” vertebral bodies in the first patient, and normal to slightly tall vertebral bodies in the third; metaphyseal changes in some long tubular bones including bone fragments similar to the corner fractures seen in child abuse in all three patients.¶Materials and methods. The first and second patients were sisters; their mother, also quite short, had surgical procedures in early life for bilateral “coxa vara”; their brother, also of short stature, had bilateral coxa valga with otherwise normal femoral heads and necks, and mild metaphyseal changes associated with two minute “corner fractures” in the proximal metaphysis of the left tibia.¶Results. A review of reported cases of developmental coxa vara associated with spondylometaphyseal dysplasia revealed that simulated corner fractures were present in most instances. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Presents a calendar of meetings and congresses that are related to neurology, from August 2000 to February 2001.

Accreditation This event is an accredited group learning activity (Section 1) as defined by the Maintenance of Certification Program of the Royal College of Physicians and Surgeons of Canada, approved [...]

Objective: This comparative cohort study examined language differences in young children (preschool to first grade) with myelomeningocele and shunted hydrocephalus (MM/SH). Method: A well-validated, standardized language test was administered to 17 children with MM/SH (age range 4–6 years) and 16 age-matched, nonaffected children. Results: Standard scores were obtained within lexical/semantic, syntactic, and pragmatic domains. An analysis of performance on individual subtests within the lexical/semantic domain was striking. Children with MM/SH performed significantly worse (p < 0.01) on a test measuring the comprehension of words representing important early learning concepts and on pragmatic tasks that measured their ability to use language functionally in social situations. Conclusions: Words representing basic precepts and concepts are commonly used in instructions to children in early childhood. Difficulty with functional pragmatic language results in suboptimal communication skills. Academic and community implications are discussed.Copyright © 2003 S. Karger AG, Basel [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose: To prospectively determine anomalies of limbic tracts and to describe the relationship between these anomalies, seen on diffusion-tensor magnetic resonance (MR) and fiber tract (FT) reconstruction images, and learning and memory in children with myelomeningocele (MM) and Chiari II malformation., Materials and Methods: The investigation was HIPAA compliant and approved by institutional review boards; informed consent was obtained. In seven male and six female patients (aged 6 months to 16 years) with MM and Chiari II malformation, diffusion-tensor imaging and FT reconstruction were performed. FT reconstruction was generated with fractional anisotropy continuous tracking algorithm and manually drawn regions of interest. Limbic tract abnormalities were assessed on FT reconstruction images by an experienced pediatric neuroradiologist blinded to results of cognitive testing. Nine patients met criteria for memory and learning testing by a trained cognitive neuroscientist blinded to MR results. Exact Wilcoxon rank sum test was used to compare performance with learning and memory tasks in two groups., Results: Eleven of 13 patients had defects within fornices and/or cingulum; three patients had aberrant fibers of cingulum. In nine patients, six had deficits in general memory; four, in learning; and four, in both. Atresia or hypoplasia of crura and body of fornices was noted in six patients with memory deficits and four patients with learning deficits. Five of six patients with memory deficits and three of four with learning deficits had hypoplasia or atresia of cingulum. Exact Wilcoxon rank sum test demonstrated significantly poorer performance for nonverbal immediate recall tasks in patients with anomalies of the fornix compared with those without (P = .04, exact two-tailed test)., Conclusion: Diffusion-tensor and FT reconstruction images revealed that limbic fiber abnormalities were common in patients with MM and Chiari II malformation. Nonverbal immediate recall task performance appeared to be related to abnormalities of the fornix., (RSNA, 2006)