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The unexpected return of mental clarity and memory shortly before death in patients suffering from severe psychiatric and neurologic disorders, which we have called "terminal lucidity", has been reported in the medical literature over the past 250 years, but has received little attention. We review a range of terminal lucidity cases in order to encourage investigation of the mechanisms involved and possible insights into both the neuroscience of memory and cognition at the end of life and treatment of terminal illness. These examples include case reports of patients suffering from brain abscesses, tumors, strokes, meningitis, dementia or Alzheimer's disease, schizophrenia, and affective disorders. Several of these accounts suggest that during terminal lucidity, memory and cognitive abilities may function by neurologic processes different from those of the normal brain. We expect that significant contributions to better understanding the processes involved in memory and cognition processing might be gained through in-depth studies of terminal lucidity. Studying terminal lucidity might also facilitate the development of novel therapies. In addition, increased awareness of unusual end-of-life experiences could help physicians, caregivers, and bereaved family members be prepared for encountering such experiences, and help those individuals cope with them.
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Neurofunctional mechanisms underlying cognitive behavior therapy (CBT) are still not clearly understood. This functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) study focused on changes in brain activation as a result of one-session CBT in patients suffering from spider phobia. Twenty-six female spider phobics and 25 non-phobic subjects were presented with spider pictures, generally disgust-inducing, generally fear-inducing and affectively neutral scenes in an initial fMRI session. Afterwards, the patients were randomly assigned to either a therapy group (TG) or a waiting list group (WG). The scans were repeated one week after the treatment or after a one-week waiting period. Relative to the non-phobic participants, the patients displayed increased activation in the amygdala and the fusiform gyrus as well as decreased activation in the medial orbitofrontal cortex (OFC) during the first exposure. The therapy effect consisted of increased medial OFC activity in the TG relative to the WG. Further, therapy-related reductions in experienced somatic anxiety symptoms were positively correlated with activation decreases in the amygdala and the insula. We conclude that successful treatment of spider phobia is primarily accompanied by functional changes of the medial OFC. This brain region is crucial for the self-regulation of emotions and the relearning of stimulus-reinforcement associations.
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Abnormal auditory temporal processing might be an underlying deficit in language disabilities. The auditory temporal-order threshold, one measure for temporal processing abilities, is defined as the shortest time interval between two acoustic events necessary for a person to be able to identify the correct temporal order. In our study, we examined the reliability of the auditory temporal-order threshold during a one-week period and over a time interval of four months in normally developing children aged 5 to 11 years. The results of our method show that children younger than 7 years have difficulties performing the task successfully. The reliability of the assessment of the temporal-order threshold during a period of one week is only moderate, and its stability over a time interval of four months is low. The results show that auditory-order thresholds in children have to be treated with caution. A high temporal-order threshold does not necessarily predict disabilities in temporal processing.
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- Child, Preschool
- Adolescent (1)
- Adult (2)
- Aged (1)
- Aged, 80 and over (1)
- Aging/psychology (1)
- Amygdala/pathology (1)
- Animals (1)
- Auditory Perception/*physiology (1)
- Brain Diseases (1)
- Child (1)
- Cognition (1)
- *Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (1)
- *Desensitization, Psychologic (1)
- Emotions/physiology (1)
- Fear/psychology (1)
- Female (3)
- Humans (3)
- Image Processing, Computer-Assisted (1)
- Magnetic Resonance Imaging (1)
- Male (2)
- Middle Aged (1)
- Mood Disorders (1)
- Phobic Disorders/pathology/*psychology/*therapy (1)
- Photic Stimulation (1)
- Prefrontal Cortex/pathology (1)
- Psychiatric Status Rating Scales (1)
- Reproducibility of Results (1)
- Schizophrenic Psychology (1)
- Sensory Thresholds/physiology (1)
- Spiders (1)
- Terminally Ill (1)
- Time Factors (1)
- Time Perception/*physiology (1)
- Young Adult (1)