ABSTRACT
Our knowledge about subjective tinnitus physiopathology has improved in the last decades, while information to understand the main mechanisms that transform a neutral phantom sound to tinnitus distress appear to be inadequate. The current review presents evidence from several studies using neuroimaging, electrophysiology and brain lesion techniques aiming at hypothesizing a new realistic multimodality tinnitus framework which can better explain the structural and functional brain connectivity in different stages of tinnitus development. Further to the present work, a full review of the entire literature should be prompted to discuss evidence to more comprehensively investigate the relationship between structural and functional connectivity of tinnitus. Progresses in such framework will shed lights to the tinnitus neurofunctional model and further evidence-based treatment modalities
ABSTRACT
The importance of education through interactive discussion-forums and seminars on family skills in coping with stress of having a child with Autistic Spectrum Disorder [ASD] seems to be under-attended. This prompted a local initiative entitled SMART [Shiraz Multidisciplinary Autism Research Team], to document the personal impact of autism on a preliminary group of parents and identify the correlates of stress and emotional well-being of having a child with ASD. Seventeen parents [11 mothers and 6 fathers] from 17 families who had a child with ASD volunteered to take part in the study. Each participant completed the general health questionnaire [GHQ-28]. They were invited to an interactive forum during the 'Brain Awareness Week-2016', where they engaged in discussions and small-group activities to share and rank their top-ten challenges with regard to emotional well-being and family functioning as well as rating their child's autistic symptoms, including stereotyped behaviors. The practice was done through audience-response analysis and post-it note technique for individual counseling with interdisciplinary experts' supervision. Mothers had significantly higher scores than fathers on measures of stress and emotional well-being. Results identified that the poorer health was associated with more behavioral problems of the child. This narrow sample of Iranian parents showed to experience broadly similar responses to parents in other countries, which suggests that the impact of ASD may outweigh cultural disparities. Family counseling and education is planned to be strategized and attempted by SMART, based on the priority challenges documented in this sample group