Assessment of exposure to drugs of abuse during pregnancy by hair analysis in a Mediterranean island.

Aims:   This study aims to estimate the prevalence of drug use by pregnant women living in Ibiza, using structured interviews and biomarkers in maternal hair. In addition, the potentially detrimental effects of maternal drug abuse on their newborns were investigated. Ibiza has a large international night-life resort associated with clubs, music and use of recreational drugs.

Cocaine use during pregnancy assessed by hair analysis in a Canary Islands cohort.

Background: Drug use during pregnancy is difficult to ascertain, and maternal reports are likely to be inaccurate. The aim of this study was to estimate the prevalence of illicit drug use among pregnant women by using maternal hair analysis.

Methods: A toxicological analysis of hair was used to detect chronic recreational drug use during pregnancy.

Acute heroin intoxication in a baby chronically exposed to cocaine and heroin: a case report.

Introduction: Acute intoxication with drugs of abuse in children is often only the tip of the iceberg, actually hiding chronic exposure. Analysis using non-conventional matrices such as hair can provide long-term information about exposure to recreational drugs.

Case Presentation: We report the case of a one-month-old Caucasian boy admitted to our pediatric emergency unit with respiratory distress and neurological abnormalities.

Simultaneous analysis of frequently used licit and illicit psychoactive drugs in breast milk by liquid chromatography tandem mass spectrometry.

A liquid chromatography tandem mass spectrometry (LC-MS-MS) method for the quantification of frequently used licit (caffeine, nicotine and cotinine) and illicit drugs (opiates, cocaine, cannabinoids and amphetamines) in breast milk was developed and fully validated. Chromatography was performed on a reverse-phase column using a gradient of 2mM ammonium acetate, pH 6.6, and methyl alcohol as mobile phase at a flow rate of 0.

[Relationship between lower respiratory tract infections in the first year of life and the development of asthma and wheezing in children].

Introduction: There is limited knowledge on the relationship between lower respiratory tract infections (LRTI) and asthma and wheezing during infancy, as there are few studies with prospective design, birth cohort and in non selected population. The objectives of the present study were to determine the prevalence of asthma and recurrent wheezing in childhood and to analyse the relationship between LTRI during the first year of life and the development of asthma and/or wheezing in childhood.

Patients And Methods: Prospective birth cohort study conducted in the Hospital del Mar (Barcelona).

A comprehensive review of assay methods to determine drugs in breast milk and the safety of breastfeeding when taking drugs.

Most of the licit and illicit drugs consumed by the breastfeeding woman pass into the milk and can modify the production, volume and composition of the milk, as well as hypothetically have short- and long-term harmful effects on the infant. There is much confusion in the scientific community regarding this issue: should a woman breastfeed her baby while continuing to use prescription drugs and/or drugs of abuse? There are many case reports of clinically significant toxicity in breast-fed infants from some substances used by mothers (such as irritability, vomiting, sedation, respiratory depression, shock), but there are too few data on studies conducted in breastfeeding women and their infants to make a realistic risk assessment. The objective measurement of a drug and/or metabolites in maternal milk is the first step when investigating the amount of drug excreted in milk and subsequently calculating the daily dose administered to the breast-fed infant.

[Perinatal exposure to tobacco and respiratory and allergy symptoms in first years of life].

Background And Objectives: To analyse the relationship between prenatal and postnatal tobacco exposure and the development of respiratory and allergy symptoms during the first 4 years of life.

Patients And Methods: Prospective and multicentred cohort study that included the subjects belonging to AMICS (Asthma Multicentred Infant Cohort Study) located in Ashford (England), Barcelona and Minorca (Spain). We recruited 1611 children, followed from the pregnancy to the 4th year of life, whose parents annually answered a questionnaire on their tobacco consumption and their children's respiratory and allergy health.

Transforming growth factor-alpha attenuates N-methyl-D-aspartic acid toxicity in cortical cultures by preventing protein synthesis inhibition through an Erk1/2-dependent mechanism.

Transforming growth factor-alpha (TGF-alpha), a ligand of the epidermal growth factor receptor, reduces the infarct size after focal cerebral ischemia in rat, but the molecular basis underlying the protection is unknown. Excitotoxicity and global inhibition of translation are acknowledged to contribute significantly to the ischemic damage. Here we studied whether TGF-alpha can rescue neurons from excitotoxicity in vitro and how it affects calcium homeostasis, protein synthesis, and the associated Akt and extracellular signal-regulated kinase 1/2 (Erk1/2) intracellular signaling pathways in mixed neuron-glia cortical cultures.

Activation of ERK and Akt signaling in focal cerebral ischemia: modulation by TGF-alpha and involvement of NMDA receptor.

Cerebral ischemia activates ERK and Akt pathways. We studied whether these activations were affected by treatment with the protective growth factor transforming growth factor-alpha (TGF-alpha), and whether they were mediated through N-methyl D-aspartate (NMDA) receptors. The middle cerebral artery was occluded in rats and signaling was studied 1 h later.

Certain forms of matrix metalloproteinase-9 accumulate in the extracellular space after microdialysis probe implantation and middle cerebral artery occlusion/reperfusion.

Matrix metalloproteinases (MMPs) are activated in focal cerebral ischemia. The activation of MMP-9 is involved in blood-brain barrier breakdown and tissue remodeling. The MMPs are released to the extracellular space, but the form and fate of secreted enzymes in brain are unknown.