News • Paediatrics
Vaccination helps protect unvaccinated from COVID-19
Higher levels of vaccination against COVID-19 were associated with lower rates of infection with SARS-CoV-2 among a group of unvaccinated people of 16 years of age and under.
Paediatrics
News • Cardiology
On the way to better analysis of paediatric ECGs
Physicians are increasingly using software to automatically evaluate Holter ECG signals in adult patients, but so far, no software has been developed for children. Cardiomatics and the Medical University of Warsaw are on the way to a breakthrough in paediatric cardiology. They are developing an international tool for automatic assessment, analysis, and interpretation of electrocardiographic…
News • Medication issues
Finding better ways to determine safe drug doses for children
Determining safe yet effective drug dosages for children is an ongoing challenge for pharmaceutical companies and medical doctors alike. To make drugs and their development safer for children, researchers at Aalto University and the pharmaceutical company Novartis have developed a method that makes better use of available data.
News • Photonics21
Infrared scanner spots brain damage in babies early
A new photonics device currently in development aims to reduce unnecessary disabilities by improving the instant, real-time monitoring of newborn babies with harmless light particles.
News • Reducing hospital-related stress and anxiety
Website helps children and parents to prepare for hospitalization
Every year, millions of children around the world are admitted to hospital for having anaesthesia and surgery. Many of them experience preoperative anxiety which negatively affects both their hospital experience and medical outcome, as well as their future relationships with healthcare services from both a short-term and long-term point of view. A new, internationally aimed website offers…
News • Léopold Griffuel Award
Childhood cancer research: Award for Stefan Pfister
Stefan Pfister, a director of the Hopp Children’s Cancer Center Heidelberg (KiTZ), a department head at the German Cancer Research Center (DKFZ) and a pediatric oncologist at University Hospital Heidelberg (UKHD), has received the Léopold Griffuel Award from Fondation ARC, the French cancer research foundation. The prize, worth EUR 150,000 in Basic Research category, is one of the highest…
Video • Perinatal imaging
Fetal MRI precisely defines and detects abnormalities in unborn babies
MRI scanning can more precisely define and detect head, neck, thoracic, abdominal and spinal malformations in unborn babies, finds a large multidisciplinary study led by King’s College London with Evelina London Children’s Hospital, Great Ormond Street Hospital and University College London (UCL). In the study, published in Lancet Child and Adolescent Health, the team of researchers and…
News • Alarm system 'ELISE'
A digital 'co-pilot' for paediatric intensive care
Working in intensive care units poses special challenges for healthcare workers. They have to safely and reliably detect whether the condition of their seriously ill patients is deteriorating in a life-threatening way, and they have to do so under great time pressure because every minute counts. The stress level increases even more when the patients are children and adolescents. In paediatric…
News • Malignant paediatric cancer
Neuroblastoma: sending tumour cells on a collision course
With two commercially available inhibitors, the cell cycle of the cancer cells in neuroblastomas can be disrupted at a key point causing tumour cell death. Neuroblastomas are malignant solid tumours that occur mainly in early childhood. Inhibiting the MYCN oncogene or its function could be a promising therapeutic opportunity.
News • Coronavirus risk assessment
Investigating the risk of severe Covid-19 in children
So far, little research has been done on the risk of children being seriously affected by Covid-19 when the schools were open. A study from Karolinska Institutet has now shown that one child in 130,000 was treated in an intensive care unit on account of Covid-19 during the period March-June. The study has been published in New England Journal of Medicine.
News • Scattering suppression for imaging
'Autocorrect' feature to make X-rays safer for children
Clinicians will be able to take a low radiation, digital X-ray image - without the need for an anti-scatter grid - thanks to new innovative ‘scattering suppression software’. Developed by photonics scientists at the Warsaw University of Technology (WUT), working in collaboration with innovation incubator ACTPHAST 4.0 and medical imaging company Italray SRL, the new algorithm ‘auto…
News • Childhood cancer
Molecular super-enhancers determine progression of neuroblastomas
Childhood neuroblastomas display extreme differences in the way they develop: they can shrink spontaneously or spread aggressively to healthy tissue. It is molecular super-enhancers that activate the regulatory circuits that steer the tumor down one path or the other. These are the findings of research conducted by scientists from the Hopp Children's Cancer Center Heidelberg (KiTZ), the German…
Article • Distinguishing arteriopathies
Deterring paediatric acute stroke
Acute stroke in children has the same incidence as brain tumours and can seriously affect a patient’s life. Two kinds of arteriopathies are common drivers of paediatric acute stroke and radiologists must learn to distinguish their signs as early as possible to improve prognosis, according to Béatrice Husson, a paediatric radiologist at Le Kremlin Bicêtre Hospital in Paris.
News • Re-starting economy
Tackling ‘last mile’ of vaccine journey
Re-starting the global economy for billions of people will depend on successfully overcoming logistical challenges in the ‘last mile’ of a COVID-19 vaccine’s journey to immunisation stations, according to a new report.
News • One mouse at a time
New approach to testing potential drugs for children’s cancers
A team of researchers in the US and Australia have developed a way of testing potential drugs for children’s cancers so as to take account of the wide genetic diversity of these diseases. In new research to be presented at the 32th EORTC-NCI-AACR Symposium on Molecular Targets and Cancer Therapeutics, Professor Peter Houghton, director of the Greehey Children’s Cancer Research Institute (San…
News • Mechanisms identified
Fanconi anaemia: Researchers find reason for bone marrow failure
Researchers at the University of Helsinki and the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute have identified the mechanism behind bone marrow failure developing in children that suffer from Fanconi anaemia. The findings will help to develop new therapies for the disorder.
News • European Respiratory Society International Congress
Childhood allergies and asthma are related to cadmium exposure in the womb
Babies born with higher levels of cadmium in their umbilical cord blood may be more likely to develop childhood asthma and allergies, according to research presented at the European Respiratory Society International Congress. (1)
News • Emotional exhaustion
Nurses burned out and want to quit
A survey of nurses caring for children with heart problems has revealed that more than half are emotionally exhausted. The analysis, presented at ESC Congress 2020, also found that good working environments were linked with less burnout.
News • Research shows
Children are silent spreaders of COVID-19 virus
In the most comprehensive study of COVID-19 pediatric patients to date, Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH) and Mass General Hospital for Children (MGHfC) researchers provide critical data showing that children play a larger role in the community spread of COVID-19 than previously thought. In a study of 192 children ages 0-22, 49 children tested positive for SARS-CoV-2, and an additional 18…
News • Right in the guts
IBD: The late repercussions of early antibiotics use
Disruption of gut bacteria by antibiotics soon after birth can affect the maturation of the immune system, say researchers at Rutgers University-New Brunswick. Even short, single antibiotic courses given to young animals can predispose them to inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) when they are older, according to their research. The study, published in Genome Medicine, provides further evidence…
Article • Paediatric health risks
Children in the COVID-19 pandemic: Between fear and care
The COVID-19 pandemic has affected children with direct impacts of the infection as well as on them leading normal lives. Schooling, play and vaccinations are among issues that can affect children’s health. Delay in taking paediatric patients to the emergency room (ER) has also had a negative impact, for example late treatment of acute appendicitis. Two experts from Spain tackled these topics…
News • What radiologists need to know
How lung disorders like COVID-19 affect children
Although the clinical symptoms of new pediatric lung disorders such as severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS), swine-origin influenza A (H1N1), Middle East respiratory syndrome (MERS), e-cigarette or vaping product use-associated lung injury (EVALI), and coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pneumonia may be nonspecific, some characteristic imaging findings "have emerged or are currently…
Video • Solution for pediatric assessment
Ultrasound: A gentler approach to imaging children
Royal Philips announced the ultimate ultrasound solution for pediatric assessment, the latest addition for its Philips Ultrasound System (EPIQ Elite). The new ultrasound solution provides clinicians with exceptionally detailed images and the performance they need to make a definitive diagnosis for pediatric patients, reducing the need for additional diagnostic imaging steps, such as X-ray imaging.
News • Pediatric cancer imaging
DW MRI measures tumor chemotherapy response with less radiation
Whole body diffusion-weighted magnetic resonance imaging (DW MRI) may aid in the assessment of cancer treatment response in children and youth at much lower levels of radiation than current approaches, suggests a small study funded by the National Institutes of Health. The results appear in Radiology. Researchers compared DW MRI, which measures the density of tumors by tracking the movement of…
News • Medulloblastoma
New insights into deadly brain tumours in children
The causes of 40 percent of all cases of certain medulloblastoma – dangerous brain tumors affecting children – are hereditary. A genetic defect that occurs in 15 percent of these children plays a key role by destabilizing the production and breakdown of proteins. The researchers suspect that protein metabolism defects could be a previously underestimated cause of other types of cancer.
