Ross Nortley

East Coast Community Healthcare CIC

Background Neurological COVID-19 disease has been reported widely, but published studies often lack information on neurological outcomes and prognostic risk factors. We aimed to describe the spectrum of neurological disease in hospitalised COVID-19 patients; characterise clinical outcomes; and investigate factors associated with a poor outcome. Me...

These authors contributed equally to this work. Preliminary clinical data indicate that severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) infection is associated with neurological and neuropsychiatric illness. Responding to this, a weekly virtual coronavirus disease 19 (COVID-19) neurology multidisciplinary meeting was established at the...

Reports of Guillain-Barré syndrome (GBS) have emerged during the Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic. This epidemiological and cohort study sought to investigate any causative association between COVID-19 infection and GBS. The epidemiology of GBS cases reported to the UK National Immunoglobulin Database was studied from 2016 to 2019 and c...

Therapies targeting late events in Alzheimer’s disease (AD), including aggregation of amyloid beta (Aβ) and hyperphosphorylated tau, have largely failed, probably because they are given after significant neuronal damage has occurred. Biomarkers suggest that the earliest event in AD is a decrease of cerebral blood flow (CBF). This is caused by const...

The association between COVID 19 and Guillain-Barre Syndrome

Background Reports of Guillain-Barre Syndrome (GBS) have emerged during the Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic. This epidemiological and cohort study sought to investigate any causative association between COVID-19 infection and GBS. Methods The epidemiology of GBS cases reported via the UK National Immunoglobulin Database were studied fr...

Covid-19 Neurological Illness

Pericytes put the squeeze on cognition Like a computer, the brain needs a reliable source of power, which is provided as oxygen and glucose in the blood. However, in many neurological disorders this energy supply is disrupted. Brain blood flow is controlled by adjustment of the diameters of the vessels supplying the blood. Nortley et al. found that...

Many central nervous system diseases currently lack effective treatment and are often associated with defects in microvascular function, including a failure to match the energy supplied by the blood to the energy used on neuronal computation, or a breakdown of the blood–brain barrier. Pericytes, an under-studied cell type located on capillaries, ar...

Vascular compromise occurs early in Alzheimer's disease (AD) and other dementias. Amyloid β (Aβ) reduces cerebral blood flow and, as most of the cerebral vasculature resistance is in capillaries, Aβ might mainly act on contractile pericytes on capillary walls. Employing human tissue to establish disease-relevance, and rodent experiments to define m...

Astrocytes form an anatomical bridge between the vasculature and neuronal synapses. Recent work suggests that they play a key role in regulating brain energy supply by increasing blood flow to regions where neurons are active, and setting the baseline level of blood flow. Controversy persists over whether lactate derived from astrocyte glycolysis i...

A 61 year old man presents with slowly progressive balance difficulties and numbness in the lower limbs. Neurological examination is consistent with a sensory ataxia. Investigations reveal positive anti-GD1b antibodies with modestly elevated CSF protein. EMG and nerve conduction studies demonstrate a mild large-fibre axonal motor-sensory neuropathy...

A 55-year-old man with a history of sickle cell disease (sickle cell hemoglobin C) but no history of sickle cell crises was seen with an episode of acute abdominal pain and fever. He had no significant medical history, including no antecedent neurologic problems. He became unresponsive during 24 hours, necessitating intubation and ventilation. On e...