Publications by authors named "Dagmar L'Allemand"

Unlabelled: Nerve conduction velocity (NCV) abnormalities are the forerunners of diabetic peripheral neuropathy (DPN). Therefore, this study aimed to analyze the effect of glucose profile quality on NCV in children and young adults with type 1 diabetes. Fifty-three children age 5 to 23 years with type 1 diabetes were recruited to participate in the study, which was conducted prospectively at the Children's Hospital of Eastern Switzerland from 2016 to 2022.

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Article Synopsis
  • Graves' disease (GD) is a rare condition affecting children and adolescents, often treated with antithyroid drugs like carbimazole combined with levothyroxine, but many patients still face hormone fluctuations, particularly during puberty.
  • This study analyzed clinical data from 44 pediatric patients with GD across four Swiss hospitals to create a computer model that predicts individual disease activity and improves treatment outcomes.
  • The pharmacometrics model utilized FT4 measurements and treatment histories, revealing no significant differences in patient characteristics or treatment responses among varying severity groups of the disease.
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One-sixth of Swiss children are affected by overweight, and despite the implementation of an evidence-based multiprofessional approach, there has only been moderate therapeutic success. An unfavourable home environment and psychosocial stresses on the family may impede lifestyle changes. This longitudinal observational study included children with obesity (body mass index [BMI] ≥97th percentile [P.

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The nitric oxide (NO) signaling pathway in hypothalamic neurons plays a key role in the regulation of the secretion of gonadotropin-releasing hormone (GnRH), which is crucial for reproduction. We hypothesized that a disruption of neuronal NO synthase (NOS1) activity underlies some forms of hypogonadotropic hypogonadism. Whole-exome sequencing was performed on a cohort of 341 probands with congenital hypogonadotropic hypogonadism to identify ultrarare variants in .

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Modeling of retrospectively collected multi-center data of a rare disease in pediatrics is challenging because laboratory data can stem from several decades measured with different assays. Here we present a retrospective pharmacometrics (PMX) based data analysis of the rare disease congenital hypothyroidism (CH) in newborns and infants. Our overall aim is to develop a model that can be applied to optimize dosing in this pediatric patient population since suboptimal treatment of CH during the first 2 years of life is associated with a reduced intelligence quotient between 10 and 14 years.

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Primary care providers can use behavioral lifestyle interventions to effectively treat children with overweight and obesity, but implementing these interventions is challenging. Most childhood obesity intervention evaluation studies focus on effectiveness. Few studies describe implementation.

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Objective: Congenital hypogonadotropic hypogonadism (CHH) and constitutional delay of growth and puberty (CDGP) represent rare and common forms of GnRH deficiency, respectively. Both CDGP and CHH present with delayed puberty, and the distinction between these two entities during early adolescence is challenging. More than 30 genes have been implicated in CHH, while the genetic basis of CDGP is poorly understood.

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Purpose: Currently, there are two laparoscopic stapling techniques to perform the gastrojejunostomy in gastric bypass surgery: the linear stapling and circular stapling techniques. The aim of the study was to compare the two techniques regarding postoperative morbidity and weight loss at an accredited bariatric reference center in Switzerland.

Methods: We compared two consecutive cohorts at a single institution between November 2012 and June 2014 undergoing laparoscopic gastric bypass surgery.

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Classic 3β-hydroxysteroid dehydrogenase type 2 (3β-HSD II) deficiency causes congenital adrenal hyperplasia with glucocorticoid, mineralocorticoid, and sex steroid deficiency. We present a female patient with congenital adrenal hyperplasia detected in newborn screening due to elevated 17OH-progesterone. Female external genitalia and non-measurable androgen levels elicited the suspicion of a defect early in the steroid cascade.

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Background: Since recombinant human growth hormone (rhGH) became available in 1985, the spectrum of indications has broadened and the number of treated patients increased. However, long-term health-related quality of life (HRQoL) after childhood rhGH treatment has rarely been documented. We assessed HRQoL and its determinants in young adults treated with rhGH during childhood.

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Article Synopsis
  • Primary hypoaldosteronism is a rare genetic disorder that can cause severe health issues in newborns and infants due to a defect in aldosterone synthesis, complicating timely diagnosis.
  • The study analyzed data from 9 patients over 12 years, revealing that low PAC/PRC and PAC/PRA ratios (<1 and <28, respectively) consistently indicated the disorder.
  • These findings suggest that using PAC/PRC and PAC/PRA ratios can effectively identify primary hypoaldosteronism, facilitating quicker diagnosis and potential life-saving treatment for affected infants.
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The general practitioner or pediatrician mostly is the first point of contact for overweight children and may recognize adiposity early enough in order to start therapy of obesity or comorbidity or to initiate measures of prevention. Interventions against overweight are most efficient before age 7 in terms of short-and long-term results and should not be delayed. As obesity requires care of the entire family, close or recurring contact with the overweight child and its family is important as well as the treatment nearby their residence.

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Insulinomas first presenting as refractory seizure disorders are well documented in adulthood but rarely found in children. Only a few cases of childhood insulinoma have been reported so far. We report on two adolescents with hyperinsulinaemic hypoglycaemia, initially misdiagnosed as epilepsy and migraine accompagnée, and compare those to other cases published.

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Overweight and obese youth represent a challenge for the affected individual, the healthcare system as well as society as a whole. Increased long-term cardiovascular risk is one of the major consequences of early-onset obesity, affecting both life expectancy and quality of life. The aim of this report is to study the effects of age, gender and obesity category on the presence of individual components of dyslipidemia using normal-weight subjects from the population-based German KIGGS study including 17,641 randomly selected children and adolescents, aged 0-18 years (11,110 normal-weight subjects with lipid measurements) and the German-Austrian-Swiss APV registry, including 57,239 overweight or obese children, adolescents and young adults from 162 specialized obesity care centers (lipid measurements available in 29,711 subjects).

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Objective: To study whether metformin reduces obesity, homeostasis model assessment for insulin resistance index (HOMA-IR), and the metabolic syndrome (MtS) in obese European adolescents in addition to previous unsuccessful lifestyle intervention.

Design And Methods: After 6 months of multiprofessional lifestyle intervention, 70 out of 86 adolescents without improvement in body mass index (BMI) and HOMA-IR were randomized into either the placebo (n=34) or the metformin group (2×500 mg/day, n=36) in addition to ongoing lifestyle intervention for another 6 months.

Results: Age was 13.

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Context: Activating mutations in the TSHR gene were found in patients suffering from nonautoimmune hyperthyroidism. In the past, it was assumed that thyroid hyperplasia is due to constitutive activation of the Gs/adenylyl cyclase signaling pathway; however, the physiological role of the Gq/11 pathway in this context remains unclear.

Objective: In this study, we investigated molecular details of the TSHR in a patient with nonautoimmune and nongoitrous hyperthyroidism.

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Background/objectives: Insulin resistance (IR) and hypertension are common in overweight children, and the adipocyte-derived hormones resistin, adiponectin, and leptin may modulate IR and blood pressure (BP). Few data exist in children on dietary determinants of IR, BP, or leptin, and no data exist on dietary determinants of resistin and adiponectin. Therefore, the objective of this study was to investigate dietary determinants of IR, BP, resistin, adiponectin, and leptin concentrations, as well as the interrelationship among these variables, in normal and overweight children.

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Although randomized controlled trials demonstrated the long-term efficacy of lifestyle interventions in overweight children, the effects of these interventions in clinical practice under real-life conditions are largely unknown. One hundred twenty-nine centers specialized in outpatient pediatric obesity care participated in this quality assessment. All patients presenting before the year 2006 for lifestyle intervention of at least 6 months duration in these institutions were analyzed in a 2-year follow-up.

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Objective: To explore how foot growth relates to musculoskeletal loading in children with Prader-Willi syndrome (PWS).

Study Design: In 37 children with PWS, foot length (FL) before and after 6 years of growth hormone therapy (GHT) was retrospectively evaluated with parental and sibling's FL, height, and factors reflecting musculoskeletal loading, such as weight for height (WfH), lean body mass (LBM; dual energy X-ray absorptiometry, deuterium labeled water), physical activity (accellerometry), and walk age. Because of the typically biphasic evolution of body mass and the late walk age in PWS, 2 age groups were separated (group 1, >2.

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Muscle hypotonia and failure to thrive are key symptoms of Prader-Willi syndrome (PWS) allowing diagnosis during infancy already. Improved general care as well as Coenzyme Q(10) (CoQ(10)) and growth hormone (GH) are administered to improve PWS children's outcome. This study aims to investigate psychomotor development of young PWS children in relation to body weight and body composition at baseline as well as to the effects of GH or CoQ(10) therapy.

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Background: High amounts of dietary fructose may contribute to dyslipidemia in adults, but there are few data in children. Childhood adiposity is associated with smaller LDL particle size, but the dietary predictors of LDL size in overweight children have not been studied.

Objectives: We aimed to determine whether LDL particle size is associated with dietary factors and specifically with fructose intake in normal-weight and overweight children.

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Context: Although retinol-binding protein (RBP)-4 concentrations are elevated in animal models of obesity and insulin resistance (IR), the link between RBP4 and IR in humans is less clear. There are few published data on RBP4 levels in overweight children, and most previous studies did not control for vitamin A (VA) status and/or subclinical inflammation.

Objective: The objective of the study was to measure serum RBP4, serum retinol (SR), the RBP4-to-SR molar ratio, and dietary VA intakes in normal-weight and overweight children and investigate the relationship of these variables to IR, subclinical inflammation, and the metabolic syndrome in this age group.

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Background: In boys with Prader-Labhart-Willi syndrome (PWS), hypogonadism causes pubertal arrest and reduces pubertal muscle growth. Formerly, it was assumed that therapy with gonadal hormones accentuates behaviour abnormalities in PWS. Our aim was to assess the clinical effects of human chorionic gonadotropin (hCG) therapy on pubertal development, muscle mass and behaviour in adolescents with PWS.

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Background: In obese children, subclinical inflammation is often present and is correlated with the metabolic syndrome. Dietary factors, such as fatty acids and antioxidants, potentially modulate the association between adiposity and subclinical inflammation, but few data are available in children.

Objective: The aim of the study was to determine whether dietary fat or antioxidant intakes influence circulating tumor necrosis factor alpha (TNF-alpha), interleukin 6 (IL-6), C-reactive protein (CRP), and leptin concentrations in overweight children.

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Unlabelled: The reduction of spontaneous physical activity (PA) and of muscle tissue are thought to be major causes of fat accretion and metabolic deterioration in Prader-Labhart-Willi syndrome (PWS). We investigated whether a generalized physical training programme in a home setting improves these parameters. The prospective study included 11 prepubertal children (mean age 8.

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