AIMS To quantify the relationship between the timing of gastroesophageal reflux disease (GERD) symptoms and the burden of illness. PATIENTS & METHODS Data from the 2010 National Health and Wellness Survey were used. Regression analyses compared non-GERD controls with GERD patients with diurnal symptoms, nocturnal symptoms, and both diurnal and nocturnal symptoms, controlling for potential con...

Though relative dominance of photic/non-photic cues on rodent circadian running activity is known, the exclusive role of non-photic entrainers in rats deprived of photic entrainers is not demonstrated and hence present work using retino-hypothalamic pathway blocked male rats (n = 10) was initiated. Blocking is done by enucleation of eyeballs. Circadian running activity is studied before enuclea...

Activity period plays a central role in studies of primate origins and adaptations, yet fundamental questions remain concerning the evolutionary history of primate activity period. Lemurs are of particular interest because they display marked variation in activity period, with some species exhibiting completely nocturnal or diurnal lifestyles, and others distributing activity throughout the 24-...

The management of a young woman with congenital kyphoscoliosis, who developed symptomatic nocturnal hypoventilation during the third trimester of pregnancy, is described. Nasal intermittent positive pressure ventilation (NIPPV) was safely and effectively used to correct nocturnal hypoxaemia and hypercapnia from the 30th-36th week of gestation, when a healthy boy was delivered by Caesarean secti...

The activity patterns of mammals are generally categorized as nocturnal, diurnal, crepuscular (active at twilight), and cathemeral (active throughout the day). These patterns are highly variable across regions and seasons even within the same species. However, quantitative data is still lacking, particularly for sympatric species. We monitored the seasonal and diel activity patterns of terrestr...

This study compared the nocturnal autonomic nervous system (ANS) activity in seven sickle cell trait (SCT) carriers and six subjects with normal hemoglobin in response to exercise Sympathetic and parasympathetic indices of nocturnal ANS were measured in the two groups before and 24 and 48 h after a strenuous exercise consisting of the repetition of three maximal exercise bouts. Global ANS activ...

While color vision perception is thought to be adaptively correlated with foraging efficiency for diurnal mammals, those that forage exclusively at night may not need color vision nor have the capacity for it. Indeed, although the basic condition for mammals is dichromacy, diverse nocturnal mammals have only monochromatic vision, resulting from functional loss of the short-wavelength sensitive ...

Diurnal basking (“sunning”) is common in many ectotherms and generally thought to be a behavioural mechanism for thermoregulation. Recent studies have reported the occurrence of nocturnal few distantly-related species freshwater turtles, but true extent this behaviour unknown, it may underreported due sampling biases (e.g., not surveying turtles at night). Therefore, we initiated global, collab...

Previous results have indicated that valsartan administration at bedtime as opposed to on wakening improves the diurnal/nocturnal ratio of blood pressure without loss in efficacy and therapeutic coverage. We hypothesized that increasing this ratio could reduce microalbuminuria. We conducted a prospective, randomized, open-label, blinded endpoint trial on 200 previously untreated nonproteinuric ...

The vast majority of neurons in the suprachiasmatic nucleus (SCN), the primary circadian pacemaker in mammals, contain the inhibitory neurotransmitter GABA. Most studies investigating the role of GABA in the SCN have been performed using nocturnal rodents. Activation of GABA(A) receptors by microinjection of muscimol into the SCN phase advances the circadian activity rhythm of nocturnal rodents...