MedicalResearch.com Interview with:
Shari Liu
Dept Psychology
Harvard University
Cambridge, MA 02138MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings?Response: Every day, we look out into the social world and see more than pixels changing across our retinas, or bodies moving in space. We see people brimming with desires, governed by their beliefs about the world and concerned about the costs of their actions and the potential rewards those actions may bring. Reasoning about these mental variables, while observing only people’s overt behaviors, is at the heart of commonsense psychology. (more…)
MedicalResearch.com Interview with:
Vicki McWilliam
Murdoch Children’s Research Institute (MCRI)
MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings?
Response: Food allergy affects up to 10% of children and 2-3% of adults, and appears to increasing in prevalence. The rise in food allergy prevalence has coincided with increased reports of anaphylaxis. Previous research has shown that adolescents are most at risk of experiencing adverse food reactions and appear to be at higher risk of anaphylaxis fatalities but are an understudied age group in food allergy research.
In a large population representative sample of 10,000 10-14 year olds in Melbourne, Australia we found that alarmingly over 40% had experienced an allergic reaction in the past year and almost 10% reported potentially life threatening reactions. Consistent with other research peanut and tree nuts were the most common trigger foods for reactions and those with nut allergy were most at risk of anaphylaxis. Having more than two food allergies doubled the risk of a food allergic reaction compared to those with a single food allergy. Surprisingly, reactions were found to occur most commonly at home rather than restaurants or school.
(more…)
MedicalResearch.com Interview with:
Julie M. Zito, PhD
Professor of Pharmacy and Psychiatry
University of Maryland, Baltimore
Pharmaceutical Health Services Department
Baltimore, MD 21201MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings?
Response: The growth of antipsychotic use in children, mainly for the treatment of behavior, has been of increasing concern in recent years. Clinical safety issues (Burcu et al. 2017) and government reports on overuse in the treatment of poor and foster care children (GAO, 2017; 2012) motivated our assessment of peer review programs. These programs are a relatively new approach to Medicaid oversight intended to monitor and assure clinical appropriateness of second generation antipsychotics in children. Critically important is the fact that most antipsychotic use is for child behavioral problems which are off-label conditions, i.e. without sufficient evidence of effectiveness or safety.(more…)
MedicalResearch.com Interview with:
Malcolm R. Sears, MB ChB
Firestone Institute for Respiratory Health
St Joseph's Healthcare and McMaster University
Ontario Canada.MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings?
Response: The Canadian Healthy Infant Longitudinal Development (CHILD) Study was initiated in 2008, funded by AllerGen NCA and CIHR, to determine root causes of allergy and asthma.
We recruited 3623 pregnant mothers in 4 centers across Canada and are following 3495 eligible children from pregnancy to age 5 years.
In this paper we describe some of the findings in early childhood, namely that children who develop skin conditions generally called eczema or atopic dermatitis, who are also sensitized to food allergens (milk, egg, peanut) at 1 year are at high risk of developing subsequent asthma, whereas those with these skin conditions but not sensitized are not at such risk.
(more…)
MedicalResearch.com Interview with:
Sarka Lisonkova, MD, PhD
Assistant Professor
Department of Obstetrics and Gynaecology
University of British Columbia.
Children’s and Women’s Health Centre
Vancouver, BC Canada
MedicalResearch.com:...
MedicalResearch.com Interview with:
Ulrika NörbyMScPharm, PhD
Department of E-health and strategic IT
Stockholm County Council
Sweden
MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings?
Response: The use of ADHD medication has increased rapidly during the last 10 years, especially among young women. Thereby, questions regarding treatment with these drugs during pregnancy are common. Until now, data concerning fetal safety of ADHD medication have been sparse, especially when it comes to neonatal disorders. For amphetamine preparations, most previous studies concerned illicit drug use during pregnancy, which made it difficult to draw conclusions. Our objective was to estimate birth and neonatal outcomes after maternal use of prescribed ADHD medication during pregnancy.
The main findings were that infants exposed to ADHD medication in utero had a somewhat increased risk of neonatal morbidity, especially CNS-related disorders. The odds ratio (OR) for a CNS-disorder was 1.9 for exposed infants compared to non-exposed infants. Further, exposed infants more often needed treatment at a neonatal intensive care unit (NICU), OR 1.5, and were more frequently moderately preterm, OR 1.3. The risk for CNS-related disorders and admission to a NICU was increased also compared to infants whose mothers used ADHD before or after, but not during, pregnancy. This finding suggests a causal relationship between treatment with ADHD medication and the neonatal outcomes. Because of large differences in maternal background characteristics between treated and non-treated women, it is however uncertain to what extent the higher neonatal morbidity is caused by the ADHD medication.
(more…)
MedicalResearch.com Interview with:Teresa To, PhD
Biostatistics, Design and Analysis
Scientific Director
The Hospital for Sick Children
Dalla Lana School of Public Health, University of Toronto
Institute for Clinical Evaluative Sciences
Toronto, Ontario, Canada
MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings?
Response: We studied asthma prescription drug use in Ontario children aged 2 to 18 years with physician diagnosed asthma between 2003 and 2014.
We found that:
Currently in Ontario, nearly 50% of children with asthma did not fill a prescription for an inhaled corticosteroid during the study period, despite these medications being considered the gold-standard for asthma management.
Our findings did not show clinically important association between inhaled corticosteroids and fracture among children with asthma.
However, systemic corticosteroids (oral or injection) are associated with higher fracture risk in children with asthma (17% higher risk).
MedicalResearch.com Interview with:
Mimi Biswas M.D., MHSc
University of California Riverside School of Medicine and
Riverside Community HospitalMedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings?
Response: This started as My son's science project. He wanted to make a video game to teach CPR based on a science fair website. It grew to teaching the whole 6th grade using the AHA CPR training kit alone vs adding the video game or music, staying alive, to help with compression rate. We found that a 12 year can easily learn the basic concepts of calling for help and starting hands only CPR and they can physically perform effective CPR at this age.
(more…)
MedicalResearch.com Interview with:
Professor Sir Nicholas Wald FRCP FRS
Professor of Preventive Medicine
Wolfson Institute of Preventive Medicine
Barts and The London School of Medicine and Dentistry
Queen Mary University of London
London
MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: Prenatal screening for Down’s syndrome (trisomy 21), Edwards syndrome (trisomy 18) and Patau syndrome (trisomy 13) by maternal plasma DNA analysis has an improved screening performance compared with conventional screening but is too expensive to be performed routinely and has a technical failure rate.
The aim of the study was to take advantage of the improved screening performance of the DNA analysis in conjunction with the existing methods thereby providing a seamless testing interface between the “old” and the “new” methods that would detect a larger proportion of affected pregnancies with a much lower false-positive rate, at a much reduced cost compared with universal DNA testing and with no failed tests. The novel approach was to conduct a conventional screening test using a screening cut-off level that identifies about 10% of women with the highest risks of having an affected pregnancy (much higher than in conventional screening) and then to perform a DNA test using a portion of the original blood sample collected for the conventional test. Progressing to the DNA test was automatic for these high risk women without their having to be recalled for counseling and a fresh blood sample (ie as a reflex response hence the term “reflex DNA screening”).
(more…)
MedicalResearch.com Interview with:
Dr. Jianghong Li, Senior Research Fellow
WZB Berlin Social Science Center
Berlin, Germany
Telethon KIDS Institute, The University of Western Australia
West Perth, Western Australia
MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study?
Response: Over the last three to four decades, the prevalence of child overweight/obesity and maternal employment has both increased worldwide. This co-occurrence has drawn much attention to the connection between these two trends. Previous studies, predominantly based on US samples and cross-sectional data, has linked longer working hours to children’s higher body mass index (BMI), suggesting that any maternal employment was a risk for child health.
(more…)
MedicalResearch.com Interview with:
Marcin JankiewiczUniversity of Cape Town
Cape Town, South AfricaMedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study?
Response: The Children with HIV Early Antiretroviral (CHER) trial, conducted in Cape Town and Soweto, was designed when there was uncertainty whether to start antiretroviral therapy (ART) as soon as HIV was diagnosed (below 12 weeks of age) or to wait until there was evidence of immuno-compromise and disease progression. Also, there were concerns about maintaining adherence, long-term toxicity and also resistance in the setting of few antiretroviral options. Early outcomes showed a decreased risk in childhood mortality in the early treatment arms compared to deferred treatment, becoming standard of care globally.
The CHER cohort is one of the largest and best documented of children receiving ART within the first year of life. Also, age- and community-matched HIV exposed uninfected (HEU) and HIV unexposed (HU) uninfected infants were enrolled in parallel for a linked vaccine study.
We therefore had an amazing opportunity to link with a neurodevelopmental sub-study in participants from Cape Town and apply sophisticated neuroimaging modalities that could link with clinical, virological and immunological characteristics.
(more…)
MedicalResearch.com Interview with:
Dawn M. Holman, MPH
Behavioral Scientist
Division of Cancer Prevention and Control
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention
MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study?
Response: Scientific evidence clearly shows that even one sunburn during adolescence can increase a person’s chances of developing skin cancer as an adult. Surprisingly, little research has been done to understand the factors associated with sunburn during this phase of life. The CDC wanted to examine beliefs, behaviors, and demographic characteristics that might be associated with adolescent sunburns in hopes that the findings could inform future intervention efforts. We used data from the 2015 YouthStyles survey (adolescents aged 12 to 17 years) to explore this research question
(more…)
MedicalResearch.com Interview with:Shane Shucheng Wong, MD
Massachusetts General Hospital
Boston, MassachusettsMedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: Medical cannabis is now legal in 29 states and the District of Columbia, and in those areas with active programs, children and adolescents can legally access medical cannabis with certification from their doctor and consent from a parent. This means that doctors and families need to understand what we know and what we don’t yet know about medical cannabis in order to make the best decision for the health of the individual child. Two synthetic cannabinoids – compounds that act on specific receptors in the brain – have been approved for medical use in the U.S., both of which mimic a form of THC (tetrahydrocannabinol), the compound responsible for the “high” of recreational cannabis use. Dronabinol (Marinol) is approved to treat chemotherapy-induced nausea and vomiting in both children and adults, while the pediatric use of nabilone (Cesamet) carries a caution. A third cannabinoid, cannabidiol, is currently in phase 3 trials for treatment of seizures.
(more…)
MedicalResearch.com Interview with:
Sally H. Adams, PhD, RN
Specialist, Division of Adolescent and Young Adult Medicine
Adolescent and Young Adult Health National Resource Center
University of California, San Francisco
Benioff Children’s Hospital
San Francisco, CA 94118
MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study?
Response: Major causes of adolescent illness and mortality are preventable. To address this, in the 1990s, professional medical organizations developed healthcare provider guidelines for the delivery of adolescent preventive healthcare. These include the receipt of anticipatory guidance and risk screening services in the effort to promote healthy behaviors and avoid risky behaviors that are intended to be covered within a preventive care visit, but could be addressed in other healthcare visits.
The adolescent developmental period is an important time for adolescents to be engaged with the healthcare system. Transitioning from childhood to adulthood, adolescents are becoming increasingly independent - having more responsibility and freedom for decision making in many areas, including healthy choices in behaviors and activities. While families and community settings (schools, churches) play strong roles in this process, the healthcare system also plays an important role.
(more…)
MedicalResearch.com Interview with:
Jorge E. Chavarro, MD, ScD
Associate Professor
Departments of Nutrition and Epidemiology
Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health
Channing Division of Network Medicine
Department of Medicine
Brigham and Women’s Hospital and Harvard Medical School
Boston, MA 02115
MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings?
Response: It is well known that sugared sweetened beverages (SSBs) promote excessive weight gain and obesity in children. The excess sugars in chocolate milk and other flavored milks puts them in a category that may be closer to sugared sweetened beverages than to plain milk. However, data on whether flavored milks promote weight gain is scarce.
We followed a cohort of 5,321 children and adolescents over a four year period to evaluate whether intake of chocolate milks was related to weight gain. We found that children who increased their intake of flavored milk gained more weight than children whose intake of flavored milk remained stable over this period. Moreover, among those children who did not drink any chocolate milk at baseline, those who started drinking chocolate milk over the course of the study gained substantially more weight than children who remained non-consumers of chocolate milk.
(more…)
MedicalResearch.com Interview with:
Angeline Lillard PhD
Professor of Psychology
University of Virginia
Charlottesville, VA
MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study?
Response: Montessori education was developed in the first half of the last century, but has been subject to little formal research. Prior research on its outcomes was problematic in using poor control groups, very small samples, demographically limited samples, a single school or classroom, or poor quality Montessori, or data from just a single time point and limited measurements.
This study addressed all these issues: it collected data 4 times over 3 years from 141 children, experimental children were in 11 classrooms at 2 high quality Montessori schools at which the control children were waitlisted and admission was done by a randomized lottery, family income ranged from $0-200K, groups were demographically equivalent at the start of the study, and many measures were taken.
(more…)
MedicalResearch.com Interview with:
Erik Stratman, MD
Chairman, Department of Dermatology
Marshfield Clinic, WI
MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings?
Response: The United States Food and Drug Administration has classified tanning beds as cancer-causing. Tanning bed exposure has been linked with increased risk of melanoma, a deadly form of skin cancer that preferentially affects young people. While no current federal ban exists on indoor tanning of minors, there have been over 40 states (43) and the District of Columbia that passed laws limiting the use of tanning beds for minors. Despite these laws, nearly 1.9 million high school students in the United States are tanning in tanning salons.
In this study, researchers posed as minors called 427 tanning salons in 42 states and the District of Columbia. Following a script that included questions like ‘would my mom have to come with me? I was hoping to come after school.’ Salons were randomly selected by zip code, with 10 salons selected for each state. Overall, 37.2% of tanning salons were out of compliance with state legislation. Illinois, New Hampshire, and Oregon were the only states scoring 100% compliant with the state law for those tanning salons contacted. Alabama scored the lowest with 0% compliant for those tanning salons contacted. Statistically significant decreases in compliance were found for rural, independently owned, and Southern US tanning salons.
(more…)
MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Dr. Manjari Tripathi Professor, Epileptology, NeurologyDr. P Sarat Chandra, Chief epilepsy Neurosurgeon
AIIMS, New Delhi
MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study?:
Surgery for drug resistant epilepsy (DRE) is an accepted procedure for children and there have been multiple surgical series and surgical techniques published in literature. However, till date there are no randomized controlled trials (RCT) available to objectively demonstrate the safety and efficacy of surgical therapy in children with DRE. There are till date only 2 randomized trials for adult patients with drug resistant epilepsy (both for mesial temporal sclerosis only, Wiebe S et al, New Eng J Med, 2001 & Engel J et al, JAMA, 2012).
Children constitute a significant proportion of patients undergoing surgical therapy for DRE (close to 50% in tertiary centers). They have unique problems associated due to uncontrolled epilepsy and some of these include epileptic encephalopathy and status epilepticus. In addition, surgery is also associated with problems like hypothermia, issues related to blood loss etc. Thus the senior author (Manjari Tripathi) and her team felt that a RCT would be very important to objectively assess the role of surgery and hence designed this study.
MedicalResearch.com Interview with:
Jingzhen (Ginger) Yang, PhD, MPH
Principal Investigator
Associate Professor, Center for Injury Research and Policy
The Research Institute at Nationwide Children’s Hospital
Dept. of Pediatrics, College of Medicine, The Ohio State University
Columbus, Ohio 43205MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study?
Response: From 2009-2014, all 50 states and the District of Columbia passed their state TBI laws, more commonly known as concussion laws, to mitigate severe consequences of concussions.
These laws often include 3 core components:
(1) mandatory removal from play following actual or suspected concussions,
(2) requirements to receive clearance to return to play from a licensed health professional, and
(3) education of coaches, parents, and athletes regarding concussion symptoms and signs.
Our study aimed to evaluate whether the laws achieve the intended impact.
MedicalResearch.com: What are the main findings?
Response:The main findings showed that:
The rates of new and recurrent concussions initially increase significantly after a law goes into effect. This is likely due to more people – athletes, athletic trainers, coaches, and parents – becoming aware of the signs and symptoms of concussion and actually reporting a potential or actual concussion. Lack of knowledge about concussion signs and symptoms may have resulted in underreporting of concussions during the prelaw period. This trend is consistent across sports in our study and other studies looking at youth sports-related concussions.
The rate of recurrent concussions shows a significant decline approximately 2 ½ years after the law is in place. This demonstrates that the laws are having an impact. One of the core function of these laws is to reduce the immediate risk of health consequences caused by continued play with concussion or returning to play too soon without full recovery. The decline in recurrent concussion rates in our study is likely the results of the laws requirements of mandatory removal from play or permission requirements to return to play.
Football had the highest average annual concussion rate, followed by girls’ soccer and boys’ wrestling.Males had a higher average annual concussion rate than females. However,when comparing the rates in gender comparable sports (basketball, soccer, baseball/softball), females had almost double the annual rate of concussions as males. These results are consistent with findings from other studies. It is possible that girls have higher risk of concussions than boys or are more likely to report injuries. Future studies are needed to look specifically at these disparities.
MedicalResearch.com Interview with:
Prof. Dr. med. Reinhard Holl
Division of Endocrinology and Diabetes, Medical Faculty
Aachen University, Aachen,
Institute of Epidemiology and Medical Biometry
University of Ulm, Ulm
GermanyMedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings?
Response: Today there are two accepted strategies to treat type-1 diabetes: pump or multiple daily injections. In a large group of patients we compared both strategies, and our results indicate advantages for pump therapy with fewer severe hypos, fewer events of diabetic ketoacidosis, and better metabolic control.
(more…)
MedicalResearch.com Interview with:Dr. Sunghee Han
ProfessorSeoul National Unversity College of Medicine
Seoul National University Hospital
Department of Anesthesia and Pain Medicin
What is the background for this new technology and study? What are the main findings?Response:The time from patient arrival in the operating theatre to induction of general anesthesia is one of the most stressful moments for children undergoing surgery. Various strategies such as 'pre-operative guided operating room tour' or 'therapeutic play intervention' have been developed in order to reduce children's pre-operative anxiety. Although these existing simulation-based approaches may be effective, they have not been widely used in real clinical settings with limited budget and resources such as manpower and space.Virtual Reality(VR), a relatively new technology in the field of healthcare, can allow the user to experience an immersive environment. In this study, using VR technology, we provided the children with a realistic trip to the operating theatre accompanied by ‘My best friend’ Pororo. “Pororo, The Little Penguin” is a very famous cartoon character in Korea and Asia. Most children in Korea watch Pororo in TV, play with Pororo toys since early yeas and perceive Pororo as a ‘close friend’. In the VR content used in this study, Pororo acts as a patient and is subjected to anesthesia and surgery himself. Pororo kindly brings his friend(the viewer; paediatric patient) to the theatre and shows all that is going on in there.Intervention with the VR content was able to reduce the level of anxiety in paediatric patients and promote collaborative behavior and acceptance of the invasive procedures, especially general anesthesia. Parental satisfaction level was also relatively higher in the VR group.(more…)
MedicalResearch.com Interview with:
Maureen Durkin, PhD, DrPH
Professor and Interim Chair
Department of Population Health Sciences
University of Wisconsin School of Medicine and Public Health
Madison, WIMedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings?
Response: Previous studies of the prevalence of autism spectrum disorder (ASD) among children in the U.S. have found two consistent patterns. One is a higher prevalence among white non-Hispanic children than among black non-Hispanic or Hispanic children. The other is a positive socioeconomic gradient, meaning that ASD prevalence in the U.S. is found to increase with increasing income and other indicators of socioeconomic status.
One of the findings of this new study is that the racial and ethnic differences in autism spectrum disorder prevalence are not explained by socioeconomic factors, because even after adjusting for socioeconomic factors, ASD prevalence was found to be significantly lower in black and Hispanic children than in white non-Hispanic children. Another finding is that the gap in ASD prevalence between children of high and low socioeconomic status did not change over time between 2002 and 2010, though the overall prevalence of ASD more than doubled during this period.
(more…)
MedicalResearch.com Interview with:
Mehmet Burcu, PhD, MS
Department of Pharmaceutical Health Services Research
University of Maryland, BaltimoreMedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings?
Response: Antidepressants are one of the most commonly used psychotropic medication classes in U.S. youth, with serotonin reuptake inhibitors representing a large majority of total antidepressant use in youth.
The most interesting finding was that the current use of serotonin reuptake inhibitors in youth was associated with an increased risk of type 2 diabetes mellitus, and this increased risk intensifiedfurther with the increasing duration of use and with the increasing dose. A secondary analysis also revealed that the risk of incident type 2 diabetes was most apparent in youth who used serotonin reuptake inhibitors for longer durations AND in greater daily doses.
(more…)
MedicalResearch.com Interview with:
Jack Peltz, Ph.D.
Clinical assistant professor in Psychiatry
Rochester Medical Center
MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings?Response: Approximately 90% of high-school aged adolescents get either
insufficient sleep during school nights or barely meet the required
amount of sleep (ie, 8–10 hours) expected for healthy functioning.(1)
In fact, sleep problems and insufficient sleep are so pervasive for
adolescents that they could be considered an epidemic due to their
adverse impact on adolescent mental and physical health.(2–5)
As a result,addressing insufficient adolescent sleep represents a critical
point of study and intervention. The growing body of evidence suggests
that later school start times (SST), 8:30 AM or later as recommended
by the American Academy of Pediatricians,6 convey
multiple benefits on adolescents, including improved sleep, better
mental and physical health, and improved academic outcomes.(7–10)
This research, however, has focused on the direct effects of delaying
school start times, or specifically how moving SST back directly predicts changes
in an outcome (eg, mental health, academic achievement). This
type of analysis precludes examining the important role that SST
might play as a condition or context under which other sleeprelated
processes take place. For instance, earlier school start times might exacerbate
the impact of sleep-related processes on adolescent behavioral
health outcomes. Thus, incorporating school start times as a larger contextual variable
that might moderate models of sleep and adolescent functioning
represents a gap in the literature and a unique opportunity to advance
conceptual models. Accordingly, the current study examines
the moderating role of school start times on the associations between sleep hygiene,
sleep quality, and mental health.
(more…)
MedicalResearch.com Interview with:
Scott D. Grosse, PhD
National Center on Birth Defects and Developmental Disabilities
CDCMedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings?
Response: The U.S. Institute of Medicine (IOM) in 2007 published estimates of the economic costs associated with preterm birth. That report is publicly available: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/20669423. The total societal cost over a lifetime of a single year’s cohort of infants born preterm was estimated as $26 billion in 2005 US dollars. The study in Pediatrics sought to provide more current estimates of one component of those costs: medical care between birth and 12 months and to answer two additional questions:
What costs are specifically incurred by employer-sponsored private health plans?
How much of the overall cost burden of prematurity is attributable to infants born preterm with major birth defects (congenital malformations and chromosome abnormalities)?
MedicalResearch.com Interview with:Giovanni Piedimonte, MD
Steven and Nancy Calabrese Endowed Chair for Excellence in Pediatric Care, Research, and Education
Professor & Chair of Pediatrics
Cleveland Clinic Lerner College of Medicine
Case Western Reserve University
MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings?
Response: This study proves that asthmatic children already have a hyperactive calcium channel that’s extremely sensitive to environmental triggers.
If these children contract a virus, such as RSV, the hyperactive channel causes more severe symptoms that may require care in a hospital setting.
When a child developed asthma or bronchitis in the past, doctors thought these conditions could only be triggered by environmental allergens. There was no explanation why two out of three children ages five and under who wheeze and cough – and still test negative for allergies.
We needed to explore the mechanisms of the calcium molecule and the epithelial cells, which seem to trigger these symptoms without an allergic reaction. If the molecule’s behavior is producing the cough, we just need to figure out how to control the molecule to properly deactivate the cough mechanism in the asthmatic child
(more…)
MedicalResearch.com Interview with:
Staffan Berglund MD PhD
Umeå University
SwedenMedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings?
Response: Iron deficiency has been associated with impaired neurodevelopment and iron supplementation is recommended to those at risk. While it is well known that very low birth weight infants are at risk of iron deficiency, less has been known regarding the large subgroup of children born with only marginally low birth weight (2000-2500g). In the present study, we previously showed that this relatively common group of otherwise healthy children is at risk of iron deficiency during infancy (Berglund Pediatrics 2010;126).
In the study published this week, we now also found that supplementation during the first six months of life had long term positive effects on their behavioral profile, with significant reduction of externalizing behavioral problems.
(more…)
MedicalResearch.com Interview with:
Tami H Skoff
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention
Atlanta, Georgia
MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings?
Response: Infants are at greatest risk for severe pertussis (whooping cough) morbidity and mortality, especially during the first months of life before infant immunizations begin. CDC and the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP) currently recommend that women receive a dose of Tdap during the third trimester of each pregnancy. This recommendation has been in place since 2012. By getting Tdap, pregnant women pass critical short-term protection to their unborn babies. This helps protect babies until they are old enough to start getting their own whooping cough vaccines at 2 months of age.
The purpose of our study was to evaluate the effectiveness of maternal Tdap during pregnancy at preventing whooping cough in infants <2 months of age.
In our evaluation, Tdap administration during the third trimester of pregnancy prevented more than 3 in 4 (78%) infant cases. Additionally, Tdap vaccination during pregnancy was even more effective (90%) at preventing whooping cough serious enough that the baby had to get treatment in a hospital.
(more…)
MedicalResearch.com Interview with:
[caption id="attachment_37248" align="alignleft" width="133"] Dr. Kercsmar[/caption]
Dr. Carolyn M. Kercsmar, MD
Co-Director, Division of Pulmonary Medicine
Director, Asthma Center
Cincinnati Children’s Hospital...
MedicalResearch.com Interview with:
Duo Li, PhD
Chief professor of Nutrition
Institute of Nutrition and Health
Qingdao University, China.MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings?
Response: Childhood obesity is becoming an emerging public health issue worldwide, owing to its association with a variety of health problems at younger ages in adulthood, including obesity, type 2 diabetes and cardiovascular diseases. Identification of prenatal and early life risk factors is key for curbing the epidemic of the childhood obesity.
Main finding of the present study is that among pregnant women, elevated blood pressure is associated with a greater risk of overweight and obesity for their children.
(more…)
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