Glioblastoma, epilepsy, scoliosis, stroke, and more: 10 highlights of the past year that you may have missed from Duke Neurosurgery and Duke Neurology
Management of glioblastoma: State of the art and future directions
There is a clear need for better therapeutic options for glioblastoma, and there have been substantial efforts exploring immunotherapy and precision oncology approaches. Biological factors represent significant challenges in the development of novel therapies. Innovative clinical trial designs with biomarker‐enrichment strategies are needed to ultimately improve the outcome of patients with glioblastoma.
Pinpointing the timeline for safe administration of IV tPA
Research indicates intravenous tissue-type plasminogen activator (IV tPA) only increases the risk for brain hemorrhage in patients with previous stroke if the prior occurred within the past two weeks.
The role of wait time in patient satisfaction
Neurosurgeon researchers found that every 10-minute increase in wait time was associated with a 3-percent decrease in patient scores for the doctor on the patient’s rating of overall visit experience as well as the doctor’s communication score.
Treating neurological emergencies in a pandemic
As COVID-19 is making neurological emergencies harder to treat--and potentially more dangerous for the patient--neurology providers have devised a protocol with robots, iPads, and collaboration.
Surgical decision making in the setting of severe TBI
In a survey-based randomized experiment, a total of 139 neurosurgeons were presented with two hypothetical patient with severe TBI and subdural hematoma.
Surgery for adult scoliosis may be more cost effective than nonoperative treatment
Although surgery for adult symptomatic lumbar scoliosis is more costly for patients than nonoperative modalities, a study found that it may be more cost-effective over time, representing a major shift in thinking around long-term treatment options for complex adult spinal deformity.
PD-1 inhibitors and glioblastoma
A contemporary outline of immunobiological barriers to progress in glioblastoma and new approaches to increase the efficacy of PD-1/PD-L1 inhibitors
Translating the brain
A new study shows that mapping neural signals directly to word sequences produces lower error rates in speech decoding than previous methods that use motor or auditory based features. This suggests that using higher-level language goals can aid decoding algorithms for neural speech prostheses.
Interneuron transplantation
Interneuron transplantation may represent a novel neurobiological approach to the surgical treatment of epilepsy.
A new approach to pain management
Researchers are examining the effects of light-induced analgesia for acute, chronic pain.