Rejected

To investigate whether a family history of LBP influences patient outcomes and treatment effects following home-exercises in older people with chronic LBP.

To identify significant bleeding complications following spinal interventions in patients taking medications with antiplatelet or anticoagulation effect.

To determine how demographic, socioeconomic, health and psychosocial factors predict preferences to accept life prolonging treatments (LPT) at the end of life.

Opioid abuse and related overdose deaths continue to rise in the United States contributing to the current national opioid crisis. Although several opioid-based pharmacotherapies are available (e.g., methadone, buprenorphine, naloxone), they show limited effectiveness in long-term relapse prevention. In response to the opioid crisis, the National Institute on Drug Abuse proposed a list of pharmacological targets of highest priority for medication development for the treatment of opioid use disorders (OUD). Among these are antagonists of dopamine D3 receptors (D3R). In this review, an update of recent progress in research of the dopamine hypothesis of opioid reward and abuse will be followed by the rationale and recent development of D3R ligands for the treatment of OUD. Herein, an emphasis is placed on the effectiveness of newly developed D3R antagonists in the animal models of OUD. These new drug candidates may also potentiate the analgesic effects of clinically used opioids, making them attractive as adjunctive medications for pain management and treatment of OUD.

Squamous cell carcinoma of the ear canal is an entity that arises from the stratum spinosum; it is a rare neoplasm, with a low incidence presenting 1 to 6 cases per million inhabitants, so there is little literature on this pathology. The clinical presentation of temporal bone cancer is usually nonspecific, meaning that its diagnosis is always a late-stage discovery. The definitive diagnosis requires biopsy of the lesion for histopathological and immunohistochemical study to establish the behaviour and the degree of differentiation. We present the case of an adult female patient with a clinical history of osteoporosis, diagnosed with chronic otitis media of the left ear of years of evolution, accompanied by purulent secretion of the same ear that did not respond to multiple treatment regimens. The patient also presented with a headache of left temporal predominance refractory to conventional analgesia. Cranial CT scans showed an osteolytic lesion of the left temporal bone with dural invasion. After resection and biopsy of the lesion, moderately differentiated squamous cell carcinoma was confirmed.

To evaluate the safety and efficacy of cryoneurolysis (CNL) in patients with refractory thoracic neuropathic pain related to tumor invasion.

Superior hypogastric nerve block (SHNB) decreases pain and use of narcotic pain medication following uterine artery embolization (UAE). The purpose of this retrospective study was to evaluate the effect of the addition of a corticosteroid (triamcinolone) to SHNB on analgesia following UAE. Records of 16 patients were reviewed for when pain occurred or acutely worsened after the procedure. No major complications were identified. Patients reported that pain began or worsened an average of 33.8 hours after the procedure, when their average pain increased from 0.6/10 to 5.9/10 (P < .001). This suggests that addition of triamcinolone to SHNB could result in prolonged analgesia following UAE.

Although previous evidence suggest that paracetamol decreases psychological reactivity in healthy subjects, there is still no confirmed correlation between the empathy scores and brain activity in healthy and headache patients after paracetamol treatment.

Inflammatory Bowel Disease (IBD) is categorized as Crohn's disease (CD) and Ulcerative colitis (UC) and it is characterized by chronic inflammation in the gastrointestinal (GI) tract. Relapsing symptoms, including abdominal pain, increased stool frequency, loss of appetite as well as anemia contribute to significant deterioration of quality of life. IBD treatment encompasses chemotherapy (e.g. corticosteroids, thiopurines) and biological agents (e.g. antibodies targeting tumour necrosis factor α, interleukin 12/23) and surgery. However, efficacy of these therapies is not satisfactory. Thus, scientists are looking for new options in IBD treatment that could induce and maintain remission.

We describe a 75-year-old woman with rapid onset orbital inflammatory syndrome as her initial manifestation of relapsing polychondritis. Patient presented after the development of right eyelid swelling, erythema, and proptosis over a 48-hour period. Visual acuity was 20/30 in both eyes. Intraocular pressure was elevated in her right eye along with severe restriction of extraocular motility. Magnetic resonance imaging of the orbits revealed thickened right medial and inferior recti muscles. Serologic laboratory data was unrevealing. Patient demonstrated marked improvement within 12 hours of administration of intravenous corticosteroids. She was symptom-free after 1 week. A diagnosis of relapsing polychondritis was confirmed 3 weeks later after new onset complaints of right ear pain and a rash.