No abstract

Background/Aims: To our knowledge, a suitable animal model to investigate how atypical antipsychotics may induce diabetes in patients has not received much attention. Methods: We investigated the effects of acute as well as subchronic administration of clozapine on food intake, body weight gain, glucose tolerance and insulin secretion in response to glucose in Sprague-Dawley rats. We then evaluated the effects of clozapine on corticosterone secretion and 11β-hydroxysteroid dehydrogenase type 1 (11β-HSD-1) and phosphoenolpyruvate carboxykinase (PEPCK) expression in the liver. We investigated the in vitro effects of clozapine on glucose uptake and development of differentiated myotubes in skeletal muscle cell (C2C12) cultures. Results: Clozapine administration caused hyperglycemia (p < 0.05) in female rats. In male rats, the increase of plasma glucose levels after clozapine injection was not statistically significant. The increase of plasma insulin concentrations and the intraperitoneal glucose tolerance test results proved that clozapine reduced insulin sensitivity in female rats. These endocrine and metabolic effects of clozapine were not related to changes in feeding behavior of fat accumulation. We observed a stimulatory effect of clozapine on corticosterone (p < 0.01) secretion in both female and male rats. Chronic clozapine administration upregulated PEPCK and 11β-HSD-1 expression in rat liver. Clozapine did not inhibit basal and insulin-induced glucose transport in murine myotubes but it was able to antagonize the stimulatory effect of α-methyl-5-hydroxytryptamine on glucose uptake. Conclusion: Clozapine induces sex-related alterations of glucose homeostasis and insulin sensitivity in rodents. We discussed the possible contribution of clozapine-induced activation of HPA and clozapine antagonistic activity at peripheral 5-HT_2A receptors to the observed metabolic alterations.

Clinical and laboratory findings suggest that cannabinoids and their receptors are implicated in schizophrenia. The role of cannabinoids in schizophrenia remains however poorly understood, as data are often contradictory. The primary aim of this study was to investigate whether the cannabinoid CB1 receptor antagonists rimonabant and AM251 are able to reverse deficits of sensorimotor gating induced by phencyclidine and to mimic the 'atypical' antipsychotic profile of clozapine. The prepulse inhibition (PPI) of the startle reflex was used to measure deficits of sensorimotor gating. PPI-disruptive effects of phencyclidine and their antagonism by rimonabant, AM251, and clozapine were studied in rats. The effects of rimonabant were carefully examined taking into account dose ranges, vehicle, and route of administration. We also examined the ability of rimonabant to reduce the PPI-disruptive effects of dizocilpine and apomorphine. Rimonabant as well as AM251 significantly counteracted the phencyclidine-disruptive model of PPI, comparable to the restoring effect of clozapine; no augmentation effect was observed with rimonabant and clozapine as cotreatment. Rimonabant also significantly attenuated the PPI disruptive effects of dizocilpine and apomorphine. Taken together, our results indicate that CB1 receptor antagonists do produce 'atypical' antipsychotic profile mimicking that of clozapine in the phencyclidine disruption of sensorimotor gating. Our findings further suggest that CB1 receptor antagonism may be involved in restoring disturbed interactions between the activity of the endocannabinoid system and glutamate neurotransmitter system implied in schizophrenia.

No abstract

Background: Corticobasal Syndrome (CBS) is a neurodegenerative disorder that overlaps both clinically and neuropathologically with Frontotemporal dementia (FTD) and is characterized by apraxia, alien limb phenomena, cortical sensory loss, cognitive impairment, behavioral changes and aphasia. It has been recently demonstrated that transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS) improves naming in healthy subjects and in subjects with language deficits.Objective: The aim of the present study was to explore the extent to which anodal tDCS over the parietal cortex (PARC) could facilitate naming performance in CBS subjects.Methods: Anodal tDCS was applied to the left and right PARC during object and action naming in seventeen patients with a diagnosis of possible CBS. Participants underwent two sessions of anodal tDCS (left and right) and one session of placebo tDCS. Vocal responses were recorded and analyzed for accuracy and vocal Reaction Times (vRTs).Results: A shortening of naming latency for actions was observed only after active anodal stimulation over the left PARC, as compared to placebo and right stimulations. No effects have been reported for accuracy.Conclusions: Our preliminary finding demonstrated that tDCS decreased vocal reaction time during action naming in a sample of patients with CBS. A possible explanation of our results is that anodal tDCS over the left PARC effects the brain network implicated in action observation and representation. Further studies, based on larger patient samples, should be conducted to investigate the usefulness of tDCS as an additional treatment of linguistic deficits in CBS patients.

Background Pathological reports suggest that dopaminergic and serotonergic pathways are early involved in Alzheimer’s disease (AD). 123I‐FP‐CIT SPECT imaging allows the evaluation of both dopamine transporter (DAT) and serotonin transporter (SERT) in several brain regions. Method Alzheimer’s disease patients were included in a multicenter study and underwent a standardized neurological examination, structural imaging and CSF, amyloid and metabolism imaging in order to reach a biomarker diagnosis of AD (i.e. A+T+N+ classification). Each patient underwent 123I‐FP‐CIT SPECT imaging and the bindings of extrastriatal regions of interests were calculated from spatially normalized images. The occipital‐adjusted specific to non‐displaceable binding (SBR) in the different regions was compared between AD and controls adjusting for the effect of age, sex, disease duration and serotonergic/dopaminergic treatment. Result 52 AD patients A+T+N+ and 75 controls entered in the study. AD patients showed lower 123I‐FP‐CIT SPECT SBR in cingulate (p=0.001) and temporal lobe (p=0.007) as well as in insula (p=0.01) and thalamus (p=0.025) compared to controls. When dividing AD according to severity, MCI due to AD (n=17) showed significantly lower parietal SBR compared to controls (p=0.002) and significantly higher SBR in insula (p=0.01), thalamus (p=<0.001) and temporal lobe (p=0.008) compared to AD dementia (n=35). Conclusion We demonstrated extrastriatal dopaminergic and serotonoergic impairment in Alzheimer’s disease. In the parietal cortex the alterations was present already at MCI stage, while in the temporal regions, thalamus and insula alterations appeared later in the AD dementia stage. Longitudinal studies will be necessary in order to evaluate the clinical value of extrastriatal 123I‐FP‐CIT SPECT assessment for possible different pattern of progression and response to treatment in AD patients.

No abstract