Adult polyglucosan body disease: a postmortem correlation study

Autopsy of a 50-year-old woman with adult polyglucosan body disease and missense mutations (Arg515His, Arg524Gln) in the glycogen branching enzyme gene (GBE) revealed accumulation of polyglucosan bodies in the heart, brain, and nerve. GBE activity was decreased in the morphologically affected tissues but was normal in unaffected tissues. GBE mRNA transcripts were similar in all tissues and in controls, which confirms the lack of tissue-specific GBE isoforms.

[Plaque morphology of the carotid bifurcation and incidence of embolisms in relation clinical stage of cerebrovascular insufficiency]

Vascular morphology and determination of plaque surface structure are getting more and more matter of interest before revascularisation procedures are performed. One reason may be the increase of interventional treatment (PTA). For that we investigated the value of ultrasound duplex scanning to predict preoperatively the vascular surface and plaque structure. 368 patients operated on obstructing stenosis of the carotid artery could be enrolled in this investigation. In all patients duplex ultrasound scanning was performed preoperatively. In 127 patient an analysis of TC-Doppler curve was possible. During some operations (eversion endarteriectomie) we performed experimental stent implantation. The evaluation was performed with statistical methods.