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Monthly Archives :

November 2014

Informing the Discussion on rhGH for Idiopathic Short Stature
 Informing the Discussion on rhGH for Idiopathic Short Stature 150 150 Juan F. Sotos, MD
By: Juan F. Sotos, MD

Growth hormone treatment for children with idiopathic short stature has remained controversial. Based on my experience and that of others, I recommend treatment. The use of growth hormone for idiopathic short stature has remained controversial in the field of endocrinology, mainly because of previous reports of its modest benefit and high cost. These reports led…

A New Take on Obesity Prevention: The Maternal-Child Relationship
 A New Take on Obesity Prevention: The Maternal-Child Relationship 150 150 Tiasha Letostak, PhD
By: Tiasha Letostak, PhD

In the past 30 years, obesity has quadrupled in adolescents and more than doubled in children, affecting even preschool-aged children. The majority of childhood obesity prevention strategies focus on energy balance, targeting behaviors and environmental changes to increase physical activity, decrease sedentary behavior or limit intake of energy-dense foods and beverages. However, the limited success…

Mystery Rising: Why is T1D Incidence Rising Globally?
 Mystery Rising: Why is T1D Incidence Rising Globally? 150 150 Katie Brind'Amour, PhD, MS, CHES
By: Katie Brind'Amour, PhD, MS, CHES

Type 1 diabetes used to be rare. Late 19th-century estimates put its incidence at about 0.004 percent of the world’s population. But by the end of the 20th century, most nations reported a number 350 times that rate. With many countries continuing to experience a steady rise in new cases of up to 4 percent…

Stressed Out: Toxic Stress and Child Brain Development
 Stressed Out: Toxic Stress and Child Brain Development 150 150 Dave Ghose
By: Dave Ghose

Stress, in small doses, can be good for children. When they argue with another child over a toy or attend a new school or daycare, the experience can teach them valuable coping skills. Even a more intense event, such as the death of a loved one or a frightening accident, can be beneficial developmentally with…

Getting to the Point: Are Safety Needles Really Safe?
 Getting to the Point: Are Safety Needles Really Safe? 150 150 Kelli Whitlock Burton
By: Kelli Whitlock Burton

Sharp hypodermic needles are, as the name implies, sharp. Just ask the nearly 400,000 U.S. health care workers who are accidentally pricked each year. Most needle sticks aren’t serious, but the potential for exposure to bloodborne diseases has led many hospitals to discontinue the use of sharp needles in certain areas, including the operating room.…

Building the Modern-Day Vaccine
 Building the Modern-Day Vaccine 150 150 Katie Brind'Amour, PhD, MS, CHES
By: Katie Brind'Amour, PhD, MS, CHES

Vaccine development used to be straightforward. Now, the challenges are many and the successes are few. What will it take to overcome the obstacles presented by both immunology and society? For 160 years, vaccine after vaccine succeeded at safely and effectively preventing its targeted illness using a set of standard strategies. Scientists knew they simply…

InSight: Working Up the Nerve
 InSight: Working Up the Nerve 150 150 Katie Brind'Amour, PhD, MS, CHES
By: Katie Brind'Amour, PhD, MS, CHES

Using regional anesthesia to numb nerves reduces pain and speeds recovery in pediatric orthopedic surgery. Ultrasound-guided regional anesthesia has been used in adult patients for more than a decade but is now being used more regularly in pediatric patients, especially for orthopedic procedures. Femoral nerve block, in which the femoral nerve is numbed, is among…

Body, Heal Thyself: Harnessing Our Innate Immunity
 Body, Heal Thyself: Harnessing Our Innate Immunity 150 150 Katie Brind'Amour, PhD, MS, CHES
By: Katie Brind'Amour, PhD, MS, CHES

What the urinary tract’s front-line defenses can teach us about our innate ability to self-heal …. and thwart antibiotic resistance. Antibiotic resistance is on the rise, health care-acquired infections are becoming harder to treat and even simple infectious illnesses account for billions of dollars per year in spending in the United States alone. As with…

Enteral Therapy on Trial
 Enteral Therapy on Trial 150 150 Katie Brind'Amour, PhD, MS, CHES
By: Katie Brind'Amour, PhD, MS, CHES

Micah Cohen sat down at the dining room table in his family’s Columbus, Ohio, home and took the first sip of a new therapy he hoped would relieve the symptoms of his Crohn’s disease. The thick, sweet chocolate shake, rich with nutrients, felt heavy in the 14-year-old’s stomach. Can I really drink six of these a…

Delays and Difficulties: Fecal Microbiota Transplants as Therapy
 Delays and Difficulties: Fecal Microbiota Transplants as Therapy 150 150 Katie Brind'Amour, PhD, MS, CHES
By: Katie Brind'Amour, PhD, MS, CHES

Use of fecal microbiota transplantation to treat a wide range of disorders is in limbo while the FDA decides how to regulate the therapy. Between 1997 and 2007, Clostridium difficile bacterial infections among U.S. children more than doubled and its mortality rate among all U.S. cases more than quadrupled. Clinicians are turning to a number of treatment…

An Unwelcome Blast from the Past: Vitamin K Deficiency Bleeding
 An Unwelcome Blast from the Past: Vitamin K Deficiency Bleeding 150 150 Kelli Whitlock Burton
By: Kelli Whitlock Burton

Most pediatric specialists who began practicing medicine in the mid-1960s have probably never seen a case of vitamin K deficiency bleeding. Robert Sidonio, MD, had seen just one, and that was during his fellowship. And then, in February 2013, an infant came in to the emergency room with bleeding in the brain, one of the most…

Thinking Outside the (Tool) Box: How Techniques From Alzheimer’s Research Illuminate the Pathophysiology of Preeclampsia
 Thinking Outside the (Tool) Box: How Techniques From Alzheimer’s Research Illuminate the Pathophysiology of Preeclampsia 150 150 Katie Brind'Amour, PhD, MS, CHES
By: Katie Brind'Amour, PhD, MS, CHES

Irina Buhimschi, MD, has a habit of getting lost. In July 2007, that poor sense of direction proved to be a fortunate flaw. Having wandered into the wrong presentation at the Protein Society’s national conference, she hovered in the back to get her bearings. Up front, a speaker discussed how misfolded proteins accumulate in the…

Adult Congenital Heart Disease: Let’s Finish What We Started
 Adult Congenital Heart Disease: Let’s Finish What We Started 150 150 Curt Daniels, MD
By: Curt Daniels, MD

Congenital heart disease is the most common birth defect, diagnosed in nearly 1 percent of all births in the United States. Traditionally, life expectancy in many infants with severe CHD was limited to months. However, advances in medical and surgical care have led to remarkable improvements in survival: the median age of those living with severe…

The End of “Under 12″
 The End of “Under 12″ 150 150 Kelli Whitlock Burton
By: Kelli Whitlock Burton

UNOS board eliminates age classification for child lung transplant candidates and alters rules for pediatric heart transplants. Many in the pediatric field were surprised last year when a federal judge ordered that a 10-year-old Pennsylvania girl with cystic fibrosis be added to the national adult waiting list for a double-lung transplant. She had spent 18 months…