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Background and purpose: Post stroke spasticity has detrimental effects on quality of life and functions of patients. Moreover, it causes high economic and mental burden. Recognition of factors associated with spasticity can help in its treatment and prevention. The purpose of this study was to systematically review and meta-analysis of previously published studies concerning the prevalence of post stroke spasticity and its association with age, gender, type of stroke, and location of brain lesion. Materials and methods: A literature review was conducted in studies published between 2000-2014 in PubMed, Science Direct, Scopus, Google scholar, and Springer Link databases. The following terms were used as keywords: Spasticity, Ischemic stroke, hemorrhagic, location, prevalence, gender, and age. Results: We obtained 769 articles of which 42 were chosen based on their titles. After studying the abstracts and full texts, only 16 were considered that were congruent with the inclusion criteria of our study. The association between spasticity and time, age, gender, type of stroke and location was considered in 9, 9, 9, 5, and 6 articles, respectively. According to these studies the incidence rates of post stroke spasticity were 4-27% earlier than 3 months, 19-42.6% between 3 and 6 months, and 20-38% after 6 months. The intensity of the spasticity increased over time. Gender and type of stroke were not found to be significantly associated with spasticity in any study. Findings about age were contradictory in different articles. There was a significant relationship between sever upper limb spasticity and subcortical lesions. However, involved lobes or circulation sites were not significantly associated with spasticity. Conclusion: Time has an important role on incidence and intensity alternations of post stroke spasticity.

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Background and purpose: Statins are among the most widely used drugs in treatment of cardiovascular diseases. Reducing the side effects of these drugs is of great importance in preventing treatment failure. The aim of this study was to investigate the role of rs4149056 polymorphism in statin-induced myopathy in patients with cardiovascular diseases in West of Mazandaran province, Iran.
Materials and methods: A descriptive cross-sectional study was carried out in 161 patients taking atorvastatin who attended Cardiovascular Clinic in Ramsar Imam Sajjad Hospital and Tonekabon Shahid Rajaee Hospital, 2017-2018. All patients were given atorvastatin at 40 mg daily for 8 weeks and all lipid markers and CPK enzyme levels as a measure of myopathy were measured. Then, the patients received atorvastatin at 20 mg for 4 weeks and all lipid markers were measured again. PCR-ARMS method was used to determine the distribution of rs4149056 polymorphism.
Results: According to findings, reducing the dose of atorvastatin caused significant differences in total cholesterol and LDL levels (P<0.05), but the mean of these changes was not significant between different genotypes (P>0.05). Drug dose change caused significant differences in levels of triglycerides in patients with TC genotype and HDL in patients with CC genotype (P<0.05). Moreover, in patients with CC genotype, the percentage of those with high levels of CPK was two times higher than patients with normal CPK.
Conclusion: Current study could be of help in predicting the incidence of myopathy in patients receiving statins and preventing the side effects of these drugs.