Children’s Health

Reviewed by Emily Henderson, B.Sc.Aug 31 2020 COVID-19 is disrupting just about every student’s 2020 education, but medical students have it particularly hard right now. “It’s a nightmare scenario for the class of 2021,” said Jake Berg, a fourth-year student at the Kentucky College of Osteopathic Medicine in Pikeville. In March, students were abruptly pulled

Aug 31 2020 It’s Tuesday morning, and teacher Tamya Daly has her online class playing an alphabet game. The students are writing quickly and intently, with occasional whoops of excitement, on the little whiteboards she dropped off at their homes the day before along with coloring books, markers, Silly Putty and other learning props —

The coronavirus disease (COVID-19) is known to be particularly severe and even fatal for the elderly, those with underlying medical conditions, and those with weakened immune systems. Children and adolescents, if infected by the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) are known to be mostly asymptomatic or only develop mild to moderate symptoms. Now,

A survey of nurses caring for children with heart problems has revealed that more than half are emotionally exhausted. The analysis, presented today at ESC Congress 2020, also found that good working environments were linked with less burnout. Nurses’ wellbeing is central to ensuring the best outcomes for patients. When wards have poor leadership and

Reviewed by Emily Henderson, B.Sc.Aug 28 2020 Over 1,000 children from Northern Ireland, Scotland, England and Wales, known as ‘COVID Warriors’ have had their antibodies measured in the UK-wide trial called ‘Seroprevalence of SARS-Cov-2 infection in healthy children’. The findings have been published today (Friday 28 August) as a pre-print on the server medRxiv. The

Reviewed by Emily Henderson, B.Sc.Aug 28 2020 Breast milk strengthens a child’s immune system, supporting the intestinal flora. These facts are common knowledge. But how does this work? What are the molecular mechanisms behind this phenomenon? And why is this not possible the same way with bottle feeding? The reasons were unknown until a team

Reviewed by Emily Henderson, B.Sc.Aug 28 2020 Infants from households reporting very low “food security,” a measure of access to adequate and healthy meals, tend to weigh more than those from households with relatively high food security, suggests a new study led by a researcher at Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. The study

Reviewed by Emily Henderson, B.Sc.Aug 28 2020 The data of 61,751 pregnant women, out of approximately 100,000 collected by the Japan Environment and Children’s Study analyzed the association between the maternal usage of insecticides and insect repellents during pregnancy and neonatal hyperbilirubinemia. The Koshin Unit Center at Shinshu University played a central role in this

Reviewed by Emily Henderson, B.Sc.Aug 27 2020 Preventing unplanned pregnancies in adolescents with effective and easy-to-use contraception is key to ensuring that adolescents do not become parents before they are ready. Adolescents view their health care providers as trusted sources of medical information. Thus, providers are tasked with providing adolescent patients with comprehensive, age-appropriate and

Reviewed by Emily Henderson, B.Sc.Aug 26 2020 A team led by researchers at Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH) has taken an important step forward in the goal of developing a potential treatment for non-alcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD), the most common form of chronic liver disease. There are currently no approved medications for NAFLD, but in

Body mass index (BMI) trajectories in the first years of life may be associated with lung function in later childhood. For example, children with accelerated BMI gain before age four years have higher lung function at age seven years, although they also exhibit airflow limitation. This is the conclusion of a new study by the

Artificial intelligence, or “supervised machine learning,” could help identify which well-appearing infants with fever, who are 60 days old or younger, are at low risk for a serious bacterial infection, according to a study published in Pediatrics. Accurate risk determination could reduce unnecessary lumbar puncture, antibiotics and hospitalizations for these infants, as well as decreasing

Reviewed by Emily Henderson, B.Sc.Aug 27 2020 A drug used to treat gout, probenecid, may improve heart function in individuals with a particular heart defect, according to results from a small pilot study run by a University of Cincinnati researcher. Jack Rubinstein, MD, associate professor in the UC College of Medicine and UC Health cardiologist,

An artificial pancreas originally developed at the University of Virginia Center for Diabetes Technology safely and effectively manages blood sugar levels in children ages 6 to 13 with type 1 diabetes, a national clinical trial has found. Data from this and other studies has prompted the U.S. Food and Drug Administration to approve the device

Aug 27 2020 New research from Edith Cowan University (ECU) has shown a link between young children’s early eating habits and higher levels of traits associated with autism as adults. The research published in the Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders found children who ate a less varied diet, and particularly less yoghurt and citrus

Reviewed by Emily Henderson, B.Sc.Aug 26 2020 In one out of 100,000 infants, a mutation in the GALC gene causes an incurable, always fatal disorder known as infantile Krabbe disease, or globoid cell leukodystrophy. Most children with the condition die before they turn 2. A parallel condition also naturally affects dogs, who typically show symptoms

Reviewed by Emily Henderson, B.Sc.Aug 26 2020 With a $1.2 million grant from Fondation Botnar, an international team of researchers will assess the feasibility of creating and launching a global-scale artificial intelligence (AI) app for mobile devices that diagnoses diet-related problems and offers nutritional advice to adolescent girls living in urban settings in Ghana and

Reviewed by Emily Henderson, B.Sc.Aug 25 2020 Contrary to earlier results, vitamin D supplements do not prevent severe asthma attacks in at-risk children, according to the first placebo-controlled clinical trial to test this relationship. These results were published today in JAMA. The reason that’s important is there are colleagues around this country and worldwide who

Reviewed by Emily Henderson, B.Sc.Aug 25 2020 In May 2019, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved a gene replacement therapy for the inherited, progressive neuromuscular disease 5q-linked spinal muscular atrophy (SMA). Approval included all children with SMA under the age of two years; however, the gene therapy had only been studied in children

A new study shows that caffeine consumption by pregnant mothers could harm the fetus and baby. The new study titled, “Maternal caffeine consumption and pregnancy outcomes: a narrative review with implications for advice to mothers and mothers-to-be,” was published in the latest issue of the journal British Medical Journal Evidence Based Medicine. What was the