Reviewed by Emily Henderson, B.Sc.Jun 22 2020 A team of researchers from Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia (CHOP) has demonstrated how to easily and effectively monitor for seizures in newborn infants, catching more instances than typical methods and improving the quality of care for infants in hospitals that lack the on-site resources to detect these seizures.
Children
Reviewed by Emily Henderson, B.Sc.Jun 21 2020 A report from Ann & Robert H. Lurie Children’s Hospital of Chicago shows that infants under 90 days of age who tested positive for COVID-19 tend to be well, with little or no respiratory involvement. Fever was often found to be the primary or only symptom. Findings were
Neuroblastoma is one of the most common cancers in children and has limited treatment options. In a new study, researchers from Kanazawa University retrospectively analyzed children with refractory or relapsed high-risk neuroblastoma who were treated with 131I-metaiodobenzylguanidine (131I-MIBG) and discovered a favorable prognosis in these patients. Neuroblastoma forms in organs that embryologically originate from nerve
Reviewed by Emily Henderson, B.Sc.Jun 18 2020 Social distancing and limited access to contraceptive and abortion care during the COVID-19 pandemic is affecting the sexual and reproductive health of adolescents and young adults according to a new study by researchers at Columbia University Mailman School of Public Health and Rutgers University. The researchers address how
Pioneering research led by the University of Stirling could play a vital role in reducing the prevalence of “snail fever” – a debilitating infection that affects more than 200 million people worldwide. The infection – also known as schistosomiasis or bilharzia – is caused by a parasite that lives in fresh water in subtropical and
A neuroscientist’s neon pink arm cast led him and fellow researchers at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis to discover previously undetected neuronal pulses in the human brain that activate after an immobilizing illness or injury. The pulses appeared on MRI scans used to measure brain activity of the neuroscientist and, later, two
Reviewed by Emily Henderson, B.Sc.Jun 16 2020 An Australian program that avoids hospital admission for some young cancer patients with a fever is helping to ease pressure on the UK health system during the COVID-19 crisis. The AUS-rule system, now published in E Clinical Med, guides doctors when deciding whether patients can be treated and
A national study measuring parental attitudes toward vaccinations found 6.1% were hesitant about routine childhood immunizations while nearly 26% were hesitant about the influenza vaccine. Our study provides the first national estimates of hesitancy about routine childhood and influenza vaccination among representative samples of U.S. parents of children, using a scale specifically developed and validated
Scientists at the University of Southampton’s Zepler Institute for Photonics and Nanoelectronics are developing a rapid bedside test for diagnosing neonatal Respiratory Distress Syndrome (nRDS) in premature babies. The photonic platform combines the complementary capabilities of fingerprint Mid-IR and Raman spectroscopies to create a compact, versatile and easily operable device that could underpin a range
Reviewed by Emily Henderson, B.Sc.Jun 11 2020 Omar Rahman, M.D., director of the Munroe-Meyer Institute Department of Genetics at the University of Nebraska Medical Center, is part of a group that has created a training manual in both English and Spanish designed to help health care providers recognize and diagnose fetal alcohol spectrum disorders (FASD).
Jun 12 2020 QUT, in partnership with Children’s Health Queensland, will lead a nation-wide study to help health services support the long-term neurodevelopment and quality of life of children with congenital heart disease. The four-year study has received $2.99 million in funding through the Federal Government’s Medical Research Future Fund, announced by Federal Minister for
A new set of expert consensus-based recommendations lays out how best to study possible neurodevelopmental impacts of pubertal suppression treatment in transgender youth. Developed by a consensus panel of 24 international scientists, the recommendations were published in the journal Transgender Health. While early evidence suggests suppressing puberty has positive effects on the mental health of
Reviewed by Emily Henderson, B.Sc.Jun 9 2020 Living in close proximity to oil and gas operations may increase the risk of preterm birth, according to new research on births in California’s primary oil-producing region. The work could inform discussions about the state’s implementation of setbacks from oil and gas extraction facilities. Researchers examined 225,000 births
Reviewed by Emily Henderson, B.Sc.Jun 8 2020 A study on children suffering from severe inflammatory symptoms shows the condition is new and distinct from Kawasaki disease. In April, researchers in the UK and several European countries with high numbers of COVID-19 cases recognised a new inflammatory syndrome in children that was similar to Kawasaki disease,
Cystic fibrosis is the most frequent severe inherited disorder worldwide. Every year, hundreds of families are confronted with this diagnosis – and to date, there is no cure for this disease that mainly affects the respiratory system. Besides supportive treatments, a lung transplant is often the only option to save a patient’s live. Researchers of
Gastrointestinal infection with Campylobacter plays a major role in the stunting of children in urban Bangladesh, say the authors of a new study. The bacteria Campylobacter, which people get from contaminated food and drinks, can lead to severe diarrhoea. Infections of Campylobacter in children under the age of two years are especially frequent in developing
Reviewed by Emily Henderson, B.Sc.Jun 4 2020 Next-generation sequencing of the COVID-19 virus is providing powerful metagenomic data, which, combined with clinical data, will inform the search for effective treatments, as reported in the peer-reviewed journal Pediatric Allergy, Immunology, and Pulmonology. Continued genomic and epigenomic analysis of SARS-CoV-2 is critical, as it can be used
Reviewed by Emily Henderson, B.Sc.Jun 4 2020 Universally screening pediatric patients for COVID-19 before they undergo surgical procedures has allowed hospitals to improve safety by identifying all patients who test positive for the virus, half of whom have no symptoms, according to new research led by Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia (CHOP). The study, which analyzed
Reviewed by Emily Henderson, B.Sc.Jun 3 2020 Following positive preliminary data, Octapharma USA is extending funding for an investigator-initiated study (IIS) focused on treating the most critical patients at the heart of the coronavirus pandemic, those experiencing hypoxia and who are at the highest risk of requiring mechanical ventilation. The research is led by infectious
Reviewed by Emily Henderson, B.Sc.Jun 2 2020 Seattle Children’s Research Institute, one of the top pediatric research institutions in the world, and global biotechnology leader CSL Behring announced a strategic alliance to develop stem cell gene therapies for primary immunodeficiency diseases. Initially, the alliance will focus on the development of treatment options for patients with
Reviewed by Emily Henderson, B.Sc.Jun 1 2020 JUUL and similar pod-based e-cigarettes have been popular with teenagers and young adults since they came on the market in 2015, but little has been known about their health effects. A new systematic review led by researchers from Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health found that while
Children and adolescents are likely to experience high rates of depression and anxiety long after current lockdown and social isolation ends and clinical services need to be prepared for a future spike in demand, according to the authors of a new rapid review into the long-term mental health effects of lockdown. The research, which draws
Reviewed by Emily Henderson, B.Sc.May 30 2020 Two University of Cincinnati students have developed an interactive dashboard that shows COVID-19 cases and deaths in Greater Cincinnati and other major U.S. cities. Known asthe COVID-19 Watcher, it joins a list of options available to the public to track the novel coronavirus. Benjamin Wissel, a student at
Reviewed by Emily Henderson, B.Sc.May 29 2020 Scientific studies suggest that children with birth defects are at increased risk of cancer. However, it has not been assessed whether the type of cancer, the age at which they are diagnosed or the extent of cancer spread at the time of diagnosis, is different for children with
Reviewed by Emily Henderson, B.Sc.May 27 2020 Black non-Hispanic and Hispanic women with opioid use disorder (OUD) are significantly less likely to receive or to consistently use any medication to treat their opioid use disorder during pregnancy than their white non-Hispanic counterparts, according to a new study from Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH). Based on a
Reviewed by Emily Henderson, B.Sc.May 27 2020 A joint program of UT Southwestern Medical Center and Children’s Health has been approved as a Certified Duchenne Care Center (CDCC) by Parent Project Muscular Dystrophy (PPMD), the nation’s most comprehensive nonprofit organization focused on finding a cure for Duchenne muscular dystrophy. The UTSW/Children’s Health collaboration, which involves
Reviewed by Emily Henderson, B.Sc.May 26 2020 The COVID-19 pandemic has magnified the social, educational and health care disparities already plaguing the nearly 40 million Americans the U.S. Census Bureau estimates are living in poverty. Perhaps the hardest hit members of that population, say three pediatricians at Johns Hopkins Children’s Center and Children’s National Hospital,
The current COVID-19 outbreak was declared a pandemic in March 2020 by the World Health Organization (WHO). This led to the enforcement of a lockdown on an almost global scale with wide-ranging consequences. Now, a new Danish study by researchers at the Statens Serum Institut and Rigshospitalet and published on the preprint server medRxiv* in