Accidents & Violence, Author Interviews, JAMA, Pediatrics, University of Pittsburgh / 05.07.2018

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Alison J. Culyba, MD, PhD, MPH Assistant Professor of Pediatrics UPMC Children’s Hospital of Pittsburgh University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings? Response: Homicide is the third leading cause of death among adolescents, and disproportionately affects minority youth in under-resourced urban communities. Most research on youth violence focuses on risk factors, such as weapon carrying and substance abuse. We know much less about factors that protect youth from violence. Future orientation, defined as hopes and plans for the future, is linked to many important positive outcomes for youth, including doing well in school and avoiding illicit substances. However, there has been very little research to examine whether future orientation may also protect youth from violence. To study links between future orientation and violence perpetration, we surveyed over 850 male youth in lower resource neighborhoods in Pittsburgh as part of a community-based sexual violence prevention study. We found that youth with positive future orientation were significantly less likely to report threatening someone with a weapon or injuring someone with a weapon in the past nine months. (more…)
Author Interviews, Cancer Research, Endocrinology, JAMA, Pediatrics / 02.07.2018

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: “Cancer awareness” by Susan Roberts is licensed under CC BY 2.0Mette Vestergaard Jensen, MD Danish Cancer Society Research Center MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: Cancer survival rates have improved and it is necessary to explore the long-term consequences of cancer treatment. Adolescents and young adults with cancer are at risk for several therapy-related late effects; however, these have not been studied extensively. We investigatet the lifetime risks of endocrine late effects of cancer and cancer treatment in adolescent and young adult cancer s (more…)
Author Interviews, Education, Pediatrics, Smoking, Technology, Tobacco Research / 29.06.2018

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Jon-Patrick Allem, Ph.D., M.A. Research Scientist Keck School of Medicine of USC MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Would you briefly explain what is meant by JUUL?  Response: The JUUL vaporizer is the latest advancement in electronic cigarette technology, delivering nicotine to the user from a device about the size and shape of a thumb drive. JUUL has taken the electronic cigarette market by storm experiencing a year-over-year growth of about 700 percent. In our most recent study, we wanted to document and describe the public’s initial experiences with JUUL. We collected posts to Twitter containing the term “Juul” from April 1, 2017 to December 14, 2017. We analyzed over 80,000 posts representing tweets from 52,098 unique users during this period and used text classifiers (automated processes that find specified words and phrases) to identify topics in posts. (more…)
Accidents & Violence, Author Interviews, Emergency Care, Pediatrics / 27.06.2018

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: “Bikes” by Britta Frahm is licensed under CC BY 2.0Lara McKenzie, PhD Principal investigator in the Center for Injury Research and Polic Nationwide Children’s Hospital. MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings? Response: Bicycling is a great way for families to get outside and be active together, but certain precautions need to be taken to keep everyone safer. This study looked at bicycle-related injuries among children age 5-17 years treated in hospital emergency departments in the United States from 2006 through 2015 and found that, despite a decrease in the rate of injuries over the 10-year study period, there were still more than 2.2 million injuries. This averages 608 cases per day or 25 every hour. The majority of injuries involved children 10 to 14 years of age (46%) and boys (72%). The most commonly injured body region was the upper extremities (36%), followed by the lower extremities (25%), face (15%), and head and neck (15%). The most common types of injury were bruises and scrapes (29%) and cuts (23%). Overall, traumatic brain injuries (TBIs) represented 11% of total injuries and were most common among patients 10-14 years of age (44%). About 4% of patients were hospitalized. Injuries most frequently occurred in the street (48%) or at home (37%). Helmet use at the time of injury was associated with a lower likelihood of head and neck injuries and hospitalizations, but there was no significant change in the rate of injury among helmet users over the study period. Motor vehicle involvement increased the odds of bicycle-related TBIs and injury-related hospitalizations.  (more…)
Author Interviews, Opiods, Pediatrics, Pediatrics / 27.06.2018

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Gary A. Smith, MD, DrPH Director, Center for Injury Research and Policy Nationwide Children’s Hospital Columbus, OH MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: Buprenorphine is a prescription opioid medication commonly used to treat opioid use disorder. From 2005 to 2010, the annual number of individual patients who received a buprenorphine prescription increased from 100,000 to more than 800,000. Although buprenorphine is important for the treatment of opioid use disorder, pediatric exposure to this medication can result in serious adverse outcomes. (more…)
Author Interviews, OBGYNE, Pediatrics / 23.06.2018

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Melissa Lorenzo MD Pediatric medical resident Dr. Lorenzo is currently training at the University of Toronto, however the research was conducted while a medical student at Queens University MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: Preterm infants are born before 37 weeks gestation, with late preterm neonates defined as infants born between 34 weeks to 37 weeks gestation. Of all preterm births, over 70% of babies are born in the late preterm period. Late preterm births are common, affecting 12.5% of all births in the United States. Compared to infants born at term, late preterm neonates are at increased risk for many common complications following birth such as jaundice, low blood sugar, and respiratory distress, prolong hospital stay, admission to the neonatal intensive care unit, and increase readmission rate after hospital discharge. There are many causes for preterm delivery- two important ones are early onset of labour either spontaneous or after premature rupture of membranes, and medically indicated delivery prior to full term gestation due to chronic diseases in mother affecting her health in pregnancy, fetal medical reasons, or placental insufficiency. There is a debate that the risk of neonatal complications is affected by the causes of preterm delivery with immaturity acting as a contributing factor. The relative contribution of immaturity versus the reason for delivery and the resulting neonatal complications is unclear. (more…)
Author Interviews, Environmental Risks, Pediatrics, PLoS, Toxin Research / 19.06.2018

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Cheryl Rosenfeld PhD DVS Professor of biomedical sciences in the College of Veterinary Medicine investigator in the Bond Life Sciences Center, and research faculty member for the Thompson Center for Autism and Neurobehavioral Disorders University of Missouri MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings? Response: My laboratory has been examining the effects of developmental exposure to the endocrine disrupting chemical (EDC), bisphenol A (BPA) on later neurobehavioral responses in a variety of rodent models, including California mice. This species is unique in that both parents rear the pups and they have monogamous social structure, similar to most human societies. We had previously found that developmental exposure to BPA or another EDC, ethinyl estradiol (EE), disrupted later maternal and paternal care by F1 offspringto their F2 pups. Rodent pups use vocalizations both in the range of human hearing (20,000 hertz or below) and outside of the range of human hearing (20,000 hertz) to communicate with each other and their parents, and for the latter, such communications serve as a trigger to provide additional parental care in the form of nutrition or warmth to the pups. Thus, in the current studies we sought to determine if exposure of the grandparents to BPA or EE could lead to disruptions in their grandoffspring (F2 generation) pup communications that might then at least partially account for the parental neglect of their F1 parents. We found that early on female BPA pups took longer to call to their parents but later during the neonatal period they vocalized more than pups whose grandparents were not exposed to either chemical. Such vocalization changes could be due to multigenerational exposure to BPA and/or indicate that the pups are perceiving and responding to the reduced parental care and attempting but failing to signal to their F1 parents that they need more attention. (more…)
Author Interviews, Environmental Risks, Gastrointestinal Disease, Pediatrics / 18.06.2018

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Kris R. Jatana, MD, FAAP, FACS Associate Professor Director, Pediatric Otolaryngology Quality Improvement Department of Otolaryngology-Head & Neck Surgery Nationwide Children's Hospital & Wexner Medical Center at Ohio State University MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study?   Response: More than 2,500 pediatric button battery ingestions occur annually in the United States. When lodged in the esophagus, rapid injury can occur from the tissue and saliva connecting the circuit of the battery. Serious injury can occur in a matter of hours. This results in a highly alkaline caustic injury that dissolves tissue, a process called liquefactive necrosis. There was a need for novel mitigation strategies to slow the progression of esophageal injury caused by presence of a button battery. This study aimed at identifying a palatable liquid that can be given at home or hospital setting to reduce esophageal injury until the battery can be removed. (more…)
Author Interviews, Infections, OBGYNE, Pediatrics, Vaccine Studies / 17.06.2018

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Sylvia Becker-Dreps, MD MPH Associate Professor, Department of Family Medicine Associate Director, Office of International Activities (Latin America Focus) Director, UNC Program in Nicaragua University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill Chapel Hill, NC 27599-7595 MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings?  Response: Pertussis (or whooping cough) is a respiratory infection caused by bacteria. It has been becoming more common in the US over the past two decades. Infants are more likely to be hospitalized and die of the disease. They are especially vulnerable in the first months of life because they have not yet had time to complete the DTaP vaccine series themselves. (Currently, infants receive 3 doses of DTaP at 2,4, and 6 months of age.) Immunizing mothers allows the mothers to pass antibodies against pertussis through the placenta and provide passive immunity to infants early in life. In early 2013, the CDC recommended that pregnant women receive a Tdap vaccine in every pregnancy. That recommendation was based on studies of the immune response to the vaccine, not real cases of pertussis. Our study examined clinical cases of pertussis in over 675,000 infants throughout the US. We found that in the first six months of life, infants of vaccinated mothers (those that received Tdap during pregnancy) had 75% less pertussis hospitalizations and 50% less pertussis cases overall.  (more…)
Author Interviews, Hand Washing, Infections, MRSA, Pediatrics / 15.06.2018

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: “Bart Infant” by Bart Everson is licensed under CC BY 2.0Gwen M. Westerling, BSN, RN, CIC Infection Preventionist Helen DeVos Children's Hospital MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: The setting of this study is a Level III Neonatal Intensive Care Unit (NICU) with 106 beds. In 2016, an increase in Hospital Acquired Infections (HAI) was noted in the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit (NICU) caused by Staphylococcus aureus (SA) through diligent Infection Prevention Surveillance. When we reviewed the literature we found the SA is a common skin colonizer and can be a problem for neonates with immature skin and immune systems. Staphylococcus aureus is easily transmitted through direct contact with skin, the contaminated hands of health care workers, the environment and equipment. We also found one study that listed skin to skin care as a risk factor for acquisition of SA. Before we saw the increase in infections some process changes occurred in our NICU that included increased skin to skin care, meaningful touch between neonates and parents, and two person staff care. We hypothesized that the process changes were exposing neonates to increased amounts of Staphylococcus aureus and contributing to the increase in infections. (more…)
Author Interviews, Ophthalmology, Pediatrics / 14.06.2018

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: multiple choice test takingKrista Kelly, PhD Postdoctoral Fellow Crystal Charity Ball Pediatric Vision Evaluation Center Retina Foundation of the Southwest Dallas, TX 75231 MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings? Response: We were interested in seeing whether the fine motor deficits typically seen in amblyopia (lazy eye) and strabismus (crossed eyes) translate to an academic setting. Namely, transferring answers to a multiple choice answer form widely used in standardized testing in schools. Children with amblyopia and strabismus took about 28% longer than their peers transferring answers to a multiple choice answer form, even though they have good vision in one or both eyes.  (more…)
Accidents & Violence, Author Interviews, Autism, Pediatrics / 14.06.2018

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: “Driving” by Martin Alvarez Espinar is licensed under CC BY 2.0Kristina Elise Patrick, Ph.D Nationwide Children’s Hospital Columbus, OH 43205 MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings?  Response: Many families of young adults with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) are concerned that they may have difficulty acquiring driver’s licenses and driving safely because of symptoms of ASD. However, the ability to drive opens the door to a variety of social, occupational, and educational experiences. We aimed to assess differences in simulated driving behaviors of young adults with ASD and those with typical development and to evaluate whether differences depended on level of driving experience and complexity of the driving task. On average, young adults with ASD had more difficulty regulating their speed and position within their lane compared with typically developing individuals even on a very basic rural route. After completing the basic route, drivers were required to engage in more complex tasks such as changing the radio or engaging in conversation while driving, driving through a construction zone, and following behind a truck. On complex driving tasks, drivers with ASD who had acquired licensure drove similarly to typically developing drivers who had acquired licensure. However, novice drivers with ASD had more difficulty than typically developing drivers regulating their speed and position within the lane. (more…)
Allergies, Author Interviews, Autism, JAMA, Pediatrics / 10.06.2018

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Wei Bao, MD, PhD Assistant Professor, Epidemiology College of Public Health University of Iowa MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings? Response: Previous studies indicated a possible link between immunologic dysfunction and autism. The current study, based on nationally representative large-scale surveys, showed that food allergy, respiratory allergy, and skin allergy, all relevant to immunological dysfunction, were associated with autism spectrum disorder among US children. (more…)
Author Interviews, Autism, Blood Pressure - Hypertension, JAMA, OBGYNE, Pediatrics / 08.06.2018

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: “Blood Pressure” by Bernard Goldbach is licensed under CC BY 2.0Ali Khashan, PhD Senior Lecturer in Epidemiology School of Public Health & INFANT Centre University College Cork Cork, Ireland MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings? Response: There is some evidence to suggest an increased likelihood of neurodevelopmental disorders in relation to hypertensive disorders in pregnancy, however consensus is lacking. Considering hypertensive disorders in pregnancy are among the most common prenatal complication, we decided to synthesise the published literature on this topic by conducting a comprehensive systematic review and meta-analysis. Our main findings suggest that hypertensive disorders in pregnancy are associated with about 30% increase in the likelihood of autism spectrum disorders (ASD) and ADHD in the offspring, compared to offspring not exposed to hypertensive disorders in pregnancy. (more…)
Author Interviews, Mental Health Research, Pediatrics / 06.06.2018

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Alfio Maggiolini, MD Minotauro, Milan MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings? Response: Antisocial behaviour is common during adolescence and it incurs significant costs both for society and for the young people themselves. Persistent antisocial behaviour places a heavy burden on the community, the justice system and the public health system. Responses to juvenile crime have always seen a tension between a focus on the understanding and the rehabilitation of the youth and the need to enforce discipline and public safety through punishment and threat. The treatment of young offenders was traditionally deemed particularly difficult, and often ineffective. In recent years, therapeutic nihilism has given way to cautious optimism. While punitive-based approaches, at all levels, are hardly ever effective in the long term, the most popular and effective programs tend to focus on behaviour control. Common core elements of such programs include positive reinforcement, problem solving skills training and role playing, as behavioral problems are often assumed somewhat inherently wrong, or a “lack of something”, the programs aims at improving or changing. The study presents a developmental approach that understands behavioral problems as the result of intentions, values and goals that need to be taken in full consideration and that are usually legitimate, even though carried out in ways that prove dysfunctional for both the young person and society. In other words, we consider antisocial behaviors as maladaptive responses to legitimate developmental tasks, a deviant way of meeting positive goals and taking control of one’s life. In the program we describe, a developmental understanding is combined with a psychoanalytically informed perspective on treatment and delivered in multi-modal terms. It has been carried out in Italy for the past 20 years, with positive outcomes, both in private practice and within the juvenile justice services.  (more…)
Author Interviews, Autism, Dental Research, Mineral Metabolism, Pediatrics / 31.05.2018

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: “baby teeth” by Thomas Ricker is licensed under CC BY 2.0Christine Austin PhD Department of Environmental Medicine and Public Health Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai New York, NY 10029 MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings? Response: Previous studies have shown that some metals (nutrients and toxicants) are absorbed and metabolized differently in children with autism spectrum disorder compared to neuro-typical children. However, it is not known when this dysregulation occurs and it is incredibly difficult to study prenatal metal metabolism. Teeth, which begin forming prenatally, grow by adding a new layer every day, much like the yearly growth rings in trees. Each layer formed captures many of the chemicals circulating in the body at the time. We have developed a method to measure metals in these layers to build a timeline of metal exposure during the prenatal and early childhood period. We found that the cycles of copper and zinc metabolism were disrupted in children with ASD and used this feature to develop a method to predict the emergence of autism spectrum disorder with 90% accuracy. (more…)
Abuse and Neglect, Allergies, Education, Pediatrics, Sleep Disorders / 30.05.2018

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Michael S. Blaiss, MD, FACAAI Executive Medical Director American College of Allergy, Asthma & Immunology Arlington Heights, IL 60005 MedicalResearch.com: Is this research important? Why or why not? Response: There has not been a comprehensive review of how allergic rhinitis impacts the adolescent population. Most studies put adolescents in with children and yet we know that how disease affects adolescents may be dramatically different than children. Adolescents is a difficult enough time with a chronic condition MedicalResearch.com: What is the key take-home message? Response: The symptoms associated with nasal and eye allergies can be different in adolescents compared with adults and children and lead to poor quality of life and impair learning in school. Adolescents with AR/ARC may experience difficulties falling asleep, night waking, and snoring, and generally have poorer sleep. Therefore health care providers need to aggressively control the adolescent’s allergic rhinitis.  (more…)
Author Interviews, Genetic Research, Pediatrics, Weight Research / 22.05.2018

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: “Great Grandmother” by David Amsler is licensed under CC BY 2.0Rebecca Somerville MB BCh BAO, BMedSci, MRCPI, MPH, PhD School of Public Health, Physiotherapy and Sports Science University College Dublin Dublin, Ireland  MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings?  Response: Rates of obesity in the Western world have increased dramatically over recent decades. The negative health consequences of obesity are well known and significant amounts of research have been conducted into the causes and possible solutions. While it is clear that there have been massive changes in diet and physical activity at a societal level that are primarily responsible for this 'obesity epidemic', it is less clear the extent to which obesity, once established, or risk factors for same, can be perpetuated down generations. Family studies lend opportunity to explore these questions, however there are few world wide which incorporate 3 generations. We therefore sought to examine patterns of central adiposity, as measured by waist circumference, between grandparents and their grandchildren, separately in maternal and paternal lines. We were able to utilize prospectively collected data from the Lifeways Cross-Generation Cohort Study. This is a longitudinal birth cohort, established in Ireland in 2001, involving up to 7 members of the same family (mother, father, child and 4 grandparents). In the 589 families where a child had a waist circumference measurement we found that, at the age of both 5 and 9, there was a direct relationship between the waist circumference of the maternal grandmother and her grandchild (both male and female). This remained after adjustment for a wide range of confounding variables including mother's waist circumference. There was no relationship seen with any of the other grandparents. (more…)
Author Interviews, Cannabis, Pediatrics / 21.05.2018

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Natalie Castellanos Ryan, PhD École de Psychoéducation Université de Montréal Outremont Canada  MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: Our study followed a group of boys living in low socioeconomic neighbourhoods in Montreal (N=1030) from early childhood to 28 years of age to investigate: 1) whether the age at which one starts to use cannabis across adolescence is associated with the risk of developing drug abuse by early adulthood, when one controls for  arrange of known risk factors for cannabis use and problems assessed across development (risk factors in childhood, adolescence and early adulthood); and 2) the developmental pathways from early risk factors to drug abuse problems. To examine these associations, the study collected  self-reported cannabis use information from these boys annually from ages 13 to 17 years and drug abuse symptoms at 28 years, as well as teacher, parent and child reported information on a number of environmental (family and friend) and child characteristics (e.g., impulsivity, delinquency, school performance) across childhood and adolescence. Alcohol and other drug use was also assessed across adolescence and early adulthood. (more…)
Author Interviews, Nutrition, Pediatrics / 18.05.2018

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Katherine Ottolini MD, lead study author Children’s National Health System and Catherine Limperopoulos, Ph.D., senior study author and Director of Developing Brain Research Laboratory Children’s National Health System MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings? Response: Nutrition is an important modifiable factor for brain development in premature infants, however few studies have evaluated the impact of nutritional interventions in the neonatal intensive care unit (NICU) on structural brain development in very premature infants using advanced, quantitative MRI techniques. The goal of this study was to utilize quantitative MRI to evaluate the impact of macronutrient (carbohydrate, protein, fat) and energy intake throughout the duration of the NICU stay on brain volumes and white matter development in very premature infants at term-equivalent age (TEA). We prospectively enrolled 68 very low birthweight infants (< 1500g) admitted to Children’s NICU within the first 7 days of life. We found significant negative associations between cumulative macronutrient and energy intake on both the brain’s white matter microstructural development (in the superior cerebellar peduncle, corpus callosum) and regional brain volumetric growth (cortical gray matter and cerebellum). In contrast, when evaluating average nutritional intake, we found significant associations between lipid and energy intake and regional brain volumes in the cortical gray matter, brainstem and cerebellum.  (more…)
Author Interviews, Education, Exercise - Fitness, Pediatrics, Social Issues / 17.05.2018

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Dr Sharon Wheeler PhD Lecturer in Sport, Physical Activity and Health Department of Sport and Physical Activity Faculty of Arts and Sciences Edge Hill University Lancashire MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings? Response: It is well-known that family background and parents’ investment in their children has a big impact on a number of outcomes, including how well people do at school, the jobs they get, and how they spend their leisure time. It is also known that it is middle-class parents who tend to work particularly hard to make sure their children get on in life. This research starts to question whether parents’ investment in their children’s organised activities is having the desired impact. Parents initiate and facilitate their children’s participation in organised activities as it shows that they are a ‘good’ parent and they hope such activities will benefit their children in both short-term (keeping fit and healthy, developing friendship groups) and long-term ways (getting jobs, having lots of opportunities in the future). The reality, which has been highlighted in this research, is that while children might experience some of these benefits, a busy organised activity schedule can put considerable strain on parents’ resources and families’ relationships, as well as potentially harm children’s development and well-being. (more…)
Author Interviews, CDC, JAMA, Pediatrics / 15.05.2018

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Craig M. Hales, MD, MPH, MS CDR, U.S. Public Health Service Division of Health and Nutrition Examination Surveys National Center for Health Statistics Centers for Disease Control and Prevention MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: Monitoring trends in prescription medication use among children and adolescents is an important part of understanding the health of youth in the U.S. and the healthcare they receive. For this study we used data from the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey or NHANES, which is a nationally representative survey of the US population and as part of this face-to-face survey in the home, we ask participants about their prescription medication use in the last 30 days and collect information about the prescription directly from the medication package. (more…)
Accidents & Violence, Author Interviews, Pediatrics, Pediatrics / 14.05.2018

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: “Crime Scene _MG_4847” by thierry ehrmann is licensed under CC BY 2.0Daniel Romer, PhD Research Director Annenberg Public Policy Center and Director of its Adolescent Communication Institute (ACI) University of Pennsylvania MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings? Response: We have been studying the steady increase in gun violence that has been occurring in popular PG-13 movies since the new rating was adopted in 1984.  It has recently even surpassed the amount of gun violence in R-rated movies.  Since these movies are open to the public at any age, we are concerned that they promote the use of guns and potentially socialize youth to believe that using guns to defend oneself is an appropriate way to handle threats and other conflicts. We knew that the rating requires the omission of graphic consequences, such as blood and suffering, that can make the violence more acceptable.  But we also wondered whether the motivation for the violence might make a difference as well.  Many of the characters in PG-13 movies are seen as heroic (e.g., Bruce Willis and Liam Neeson).  Could that also be a factor that makes such films more acceptable to parents despite their concerns about their children seeing so much violence in the movies.  So, we conducted this experiment to see if parents are less upset by justified violence in PG-13 style movies.  (more…)
Author Interviews, Critical Care - Intensive Care - ICUs, Depression, Pediatrics / 11.05.2018

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Karen Fratantoni, M.D., M.P.H. Pediatrician and lead study author Children’s National Health System MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: We looked at the prevalence of depressive symptoms at NICU discharge and at six months after discharge among 125 parents randomized to the control group of a larger PCORI-funded trial of peer-to-peer support after NICU discharge. Determining factors associated with parental depressive symptoms at NICU discharge may help to identify at-risk parents who could benefit from mental health support. (more…)
Author Interviews, BMJ, Genetic Research, Pediatrics / 10.05.2018

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: “Newborn” by Brad Carroll is licensed under CC BY 2.0Dr Sian Taylor-Phillips MPhys, PhD Associate Professor Screening and Test Evaluation / NIHR Career Development Fellow Division of Health Sciences Warwick Medical School University of Warwick Coventry MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings? Response: In newborn blood spot screening a small amount of blood is taken from newborn babies heels, and this is tested for a range of rare diseases. The idea is to detect each disease earlier when it is more treatable. However, it would be better not to test for some diseases, for example if the test is inaccurate so worries parents that their baby may have a serious illness when they do not. Some countries test for as few as 5 diseases and others as many as 50. In this study we investigated how different countries choose which diseases to test for. We found that many national recommendations on whether to screen newborn babies for rare diseases do not assess the evidence on the key benefits and harms of screening. Evidence about the accuracy of the test was not considered in 42% of recommendations, evidence about whether early detection at screening has health benefits was not consulted in 30% of recommendations, and evidence around the potential harm of overdiagnosis where babies have variants of the disease that would never have caused any symptoms or ill effects was not considered in 76% of recommendations. We also found through meta-analysis that when a systematic review was used to bring together the evidence then countries were less likely to recommend screening for the disease. (more…)
Accidents & Violence, Author Interviews, Pediatrics / 07.05.2018

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Dr. Julie Leonard MD MPH Nationwide Children’s Hospital Columbus, OH MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings? Response: We looked at children with unintentional injuries who were hospitalized to see if there was an increase in their mental health needs. We saw an average 63% increase in mental health diagnoses and a 155% increase in medications prescribed to treat a mental illness. (more…)
Author Interviews, CDC, Depression, Pediatrics / 04.05.2018

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Rebecca H. Bitsko, PhD National Center on Birth Defects and Developmental Disabilities Centers for Disease Control and Prevention  MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings? Response: CDC’s National Center on Birth Defects and Developmental Disabilities(https://www.cdc.gov/ncbddd/index.html) (NCBDDD) is committed to helping children who have mental, emotional, and behavioral disorders. Anxiety and depression are both internalizing mental disorders that often start during childhood, and that frequently occur together. In this study, we show that more than 1 in 20, or 2.6 million, US children aged 6-17 had a current diagnosis of anxiety or depression, by parent report, in 2011-12. We also found an increase of diagnosed anxiety in these children from 1 in 28 in 2007 to 1 in 24 in 2011-12. Further, in 2011-12, approximately 1 in 5 children with current anxiety or depression did not receive mental health treatment in the past year. Children with current anxiety or depression were more likely than those without to have:
  • Another mental, behavioral, or developmental disorder such as ADHD, learning disability, or speech or language problems
  • School problems
  • Parents who report high levels of stress and frustration with parenting
  • Unmet medical and mental health service needs
(more…)
Author Interviews, BMJ, Global Health, Pediatrics, Vitamin D, Weight Research / 04.05.2018

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Dr Javeria Saleem PhD Department of Public Health, Institute of Social and Cultural Studies, University of the Punjab, Lahore, Pakistan Centre for Primary Care and Public Health, Blizard Institute, Barts and The London School of Medicine and Dentistry Queen Mary University of London London, United Kingdom MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings? Response: Severe acute malnutrition is the most extreme and visible form of undernutrition. Affected children have very low weight for their height and severe muscle wasting; they may also have swollen feet, face and limbs. Around 20 million children suffer from severe acute malnutrition worldwide of whom an estimated 1.4 million live in Pakistan. The condition is a major cause of death in children under 5 in Asia and Africa. The standard treatment is to give a high-energy, micronutrient enhanced paste called ready-to-use therapeutic food (RUTF). Vitamin D deficiency has been reported to be a risk factor for severe wasting in children with severe acute malnutrition Ready-to-use therapeutic food contains relatively modest amounts of vitamin D. However, the effects of adding high-dose vitamin D to this standard treatment have not previously been evaluated. We therefore did a clinical trial to assess whether high-dose vitamin D hastened recovery in 185 children aged 6-58 months who were receiving standard treatment for severe acute malnutrition in Southern Punjab, Pakistan. The 93 children in the active arm of the study received two doses of 5 mg vitamin D by mouth, while the 92 children in the control arm received placebo (a dummy medicine containing no vitamin D). Our findings were very striking: after 2 months of treatment, the children who received high-dose vitamin D in addition to standard therapy had significantly better weight gain, and significantly better motor and language development, than those who received standard treatment alone. (more…)
Author Interviews, Mental Health Research, Pediatrics / 02.05.2018

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: “dog” by Neil Mullins is licensed under CC BY 2.0Prof. Dr. rer. nat. Stefan O. Reber Laboratory for Molecular Psychosomatics Clinic for Psychosomatic Medicine and Psychotherapy University Clinic Ulm Ulm, Germany  MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings? Response: Our hypothesis was that people who grew up in cities with more than 100.000 inhabitants  and without pets will show a more pronounced immune activation towards psychosocial stressors compared with people raised in rural areas in the presence of farm animals. This hypothesis is based on the fact that stress-associated psychiatric disorders, which are linked to or even promoted by an over(re)active immune system and chronic low grade inflammation,  are more prevalent in urban compared with rural areas. One possible explanation for a hyper(re)active immune system in people raised in urban relative to rural environments might be a reduced contact to immunoregulatory microorganisms (the so called “old friends”), which is significantly increased in rural people with regular contact with farm animals compared with urban people in the absence of pets. Our results show that a standardized laboratory psychosocial stressor causes a greater inflammatory response in young healthy participants with an urban upbringing in the absence of pets, relative to young healthy participants with a rural upbringing in the presence of farm animals. (more…)
Author Interviews, Exercise - Fitness, Orthopedics, Pediatrics / 02.05.2018

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: “Pitching Crop” by slgckgc is licensed under CC BY 2.0Jason L. Zaremski, MD, CAQSM, FACSM, FAAPMR Assistant Professor│Divisions of PM&R, Sports Medicine, & Research Department of Orthopaedics and Rehabilitation Co-Medical Director Adolescent & High School Outreach Program University of Florida College of Medicine MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings? Response: Throwing injuries are common in baseball and can be caused by excessive pitch counts, year-round pitching, and pitching with arm pain and fatigue. Despite the evidence, pitching injuries among high school players have not decreased. With a multitude of research in overhead throwers, yet the volume of overuse throwing injuries not decreasing, our team suspected there was a missing workload factor in baseball pitchers. Therefore, our team conducted research to determine whether an important factor was being overlooked: volume of pitches thrown during warm-up between innings and bullpen activity in high school varsity baseball pitchers. In the study, our team counted all pitches thrown off a mound during varsity high school baseball games played by 34 different high schools in North Central Florida during the 2017 season. After counting nearly 14,000 pitches in 115 pitch outings, our team found that 42% of the pitches thrown off a mound were not accounted for in the pitch counts, and that there is a large variability of bullpen pitches being thrown from pitcher to pitcher. Even with a greater focus on pitch counts as a way to prevent injuries, a substantial number of pitches are going unaccounted for in high school players as part of warm-up and bullpen activity. (more…)