BACKGROUND AND PURPOSE:Cerebral microbleeds are thought to represent cerebral amyloid angiopathy when in lobar regions of the brain and hypertensive arteriopathy when in deep and infratentorial locations. By studying cerebral microbleeds, their topography, and risk factors, we aimed to gain an insight into the vascular and amyloid pathology of dementia diagnoses and increase the understanding of cerebral microbleeds in dementia.

With increasing availability of magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), there is also an increase in incidental abnormal findings. MRI findings suggestive of multiple sclerosis in persons without typical multiple sclerosis symptoms and with normal neurological findings are defined as radiologically isolated syndrome (RIS). Half of the persons with RIS have their initial MRI because of headache, and some have a subclinical cognitive impairment similar to that seen in multiple sclerosis. Radiological measurements also show a similarity between RIS and multiple sclerosis. Approximately two-thirds of persons with RIS show radiological progression and one-third develop neurological symptoms during mean follow-up times of up to five years. Cervical cord lesions are important predictors of clinical conversion. Management has to be individualised, but initiation of disease modifying therapy is controversial and not recommended outside of clinical trials since its effects have not been studied in RIS. Future studies should try to establish the prevalence and long-term prognosis of RIS, its impact on quality of life, and define the role of disease modifying therapy in RIS.

Summary:We have evaluated whether allogeneic hematopoietic stem cell transplantation (HSCT) could induce an antitumor effect in patients with metastatic solid tumors. A total of 12 HLA-identical siblings and 6 HLA-A-, -B-and -DRb1-compatible unrelated grafts were used. Diagnoses were adenocarcinoma of kidney (n ¼ 10), colon (n ¼ 6), breast (n ¼ 1) and cholangiocarcinoma (n ¼ 1). Conditioning was fludarabine 30 mg/m 2 /day for 3 days and 2 Gy of total body irradiation. Recipients of unrelated HSCT were also given thymoglobuline and two additional days of fludarabine. The median CD34+ cell dose was 7.5 Â 10 6 / kg. Immunosuppression was mycophenolate mofetil and cyclosporin. Among all, 12 patients became complete donor chimeras within a median of 28, 29 and 65 days for B, myeloid and T cells, respectively. Two patients rejected the grafts, one developed marrow aplasia and three were mixed chimeras. The probability of grades II-IV acute graft-versus-host-disease (GVHD) was 57%. Regression of all tumor metastases was seen in one patient with colon carcinoma. Another patient with colon and two with renal carcinoma had regression of lung metastases, but progression of metastases in the liver and/or bone. Necrosis of lung metastasis was found in one further patient with renal carcinoma who died of graft-versushost-disease (GVHD). In all, 10 patients died; four of transplant-related complications, one of trauma and five of progressive disease. Thus, progression was common after allogeneic HSCT in unselected patients with advanced solid tumors. However, the regression of some metastases associated with GVHD provides suggestive evidence that the GVHD effect may occur in renal and colon adenocarcinoma using reduced intensity conditioning. The immune system is known to induce tumor regression. 1 Following allogeneic hematopoietic stem cell transplantation (HSCT), graft-versus-host disease (GVHD) has been found to contribute to an antileukemic effect. 2,3 An alloresponse of donor T lymphocytes is most probably the cause of GVHD and the graft-versus-leukemia (GVL) effect. 4 An allogeneic graft-versus-tumor (GVT) effect has also been reported in breast and renal metastatic carcinoma. [5][6][7][8][9] When performing HSCT, lethal myeloablative conditioning to eradicate leukemia and induce marked immunosuppression to pave the way for the donor immunohematopoietic system has been the routine for several decades 10À13 . However, this approach has been challenged by using lower doses and less toxic conditioning to induce immunosuppression and take advantage of the GVT effect later rather than the antitumor effect of chemoradiotherapy. [14][15][16][17][18][19]

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BACKGROUND AND PURPOSE:Cerebral microbleeds are thought to have potentially important clinical implications in dementia and stroke. However, the use of both T2* and SWI MR imaging sequences for microbleed detection has complicated the crosscomparison of study results. We aimed to determine the impact of microbleed sequences on microbleed detection and associated clinical parameters.