Volume 16 Issue 10, October 2020

The Nigerian Parkinson Disease registry is the first published national Parkinson disease registry in sub-Saharan Africa. Though the clinical data and number of participants are currently limited in comparison with European, North American and Asian equivalents, this registry represents a valuable resource for the field.

A new meta-analysis indicates that multiple sclerosis disease-modifying therapies (DMTs) have positive effects on cognition. High-efficacy and medium-efficacy DMTs apparently had comparable cognitive benefits; however, limitations of the original studies, including brief duration, restricted assessment and failure to account for baseline cognitive impairment, might limit the interpretation of the findings.

A recent study describes the yield and clinical utility of epilepsy gene panel testing in a cohort of adults with epilepsy and intellectual disability. These findings are similar to those in children with developmental epileptic encephalopathies and support the utility of testing in this subgroup of adults with epilepsy.

In this Review, Tabrizi et al. discuss new insights into the molecular pathogenesis of Huntington disease and outline potential therapeutic strategies, which could include the modulation of DNA repair processes.

This Review discusses the advantages and pitfalls of metagenomic next-generation sequencing (mNGS) in patients with encephalitis, meningitis and myelitis. The authors outline data on mNGS test performance, cost and turnaround time and highlight future directions for mNGS technology.

This Review outlines the advances of molecular treatment of brain metastases from non-small-cell lung cancer, breast cancer and melanoma. Substantial improvements in survival have been achieved in patients with molecular subgroups whose alterations can be targeted with specific molecular compounds.

Imaging-based assessment is becoming increasingly important in the management of acute stroke, but processing and interpretation of images in clinical practice is challenging. In this Review, Parsons and colleagues explore the potential of artificial intelligence to provide treatment decision support.