The safety of tumor necrosis factor (TNF) inhibitors has been demonstrated for over two decades. However, their effects on cardiovascular function in patients with rheumatic diseases remain controversial, and conclusions are additionally hampered by the cardiovascular complications inherent in such diseases. We present two 15-year-old patients diagnosed with ankylosing spondylitis and juvenile idiopathic arthritis classified as polyarthritis with positive rheumatoid factor, respectively.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFGenet Test Mol Biomarkers
September 2024
Obesity is a significant health problem with a continuously increasing prevalence among children and adolescents that has become a modern pandemic during the last decades. Nowadays, the genetic contribution to obesity is well-established. For this narrative review article, we searched PubMed and Scopus databases for peer-reviewed research, review articles, and meta-analyses regarding the genetics of obesity and current pharmacological treatment, published in the English language with no time restrictions.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFObjective: To assess the impact conferred by variants on the clinical spectrum of patients with systemic autoinflammatory diseases (SAIDs) in Greece.
Methods: Consecutive patients (n=167) with confirmed SAIDs who underwent screening by next generation sequencing (NGS) targeting 26 SAID-associated genes, and carried at least one gene variant, were retrospectively studied. The demographic, clinical and laboratory parameters were recorded.
Adolescent obesity constitutes a disorder with physical and psychosocial implications. Childhood and adolescent obesity rates are constantly increasing worldwide. Since adolescent obesity is a chronic disease, which is part of noncommunicative degenerative diseases, its holistic approach decisively includes the assessment of its impact on quality of life.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFRheumatic diseases are often complicated by lung disease, commonly presenting as interstitial lung disease (ILD), with potentially detrimental consequences for patient survival. Although less frequent in pediatric patients, pulmonary involvement may be observed in almost all childhood-onset rheumatic conditions. The development of biological disease-modifying anti-rheumatic drugs has significantly improved clinical outcomes.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFBackground: Polycystic ovary syndrome (PCOS) is a common endocrine disorder that affects women of reproductive age and female adolescents. The diagnosis of PCOS is difficult during puberty due to overlapping of the criteria with normal variations of menstruation during this age period. There are insufficient data on the gut microbiome and PCOS and potential mechanisms linking the two.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFPurpose: Autoimmune thyroid disease seems to occur more often in children with juvenile idiopathic arthritis (JIA) than in the general pediatric population. We investigated the prevalence of autoimmune thyroiditis (Hashimoto's thyroiditis) in young patients with JIA in Greece, which has not been evaluated previously.
Methods: This descriptive study included patients with JIA followed up at the Pediatric Rheumatology Unit of the Second Department of Pediatrics of a tertiary general hospital in Thessaloniki, Greece.
Neurofibromatosis type 1 (NF1) is the most prevalent autosomal dominant genetic disorder among humans. NF1 vasculopathy is a significant but underrecognized complication of the disease, affecting both arterial and venous blood vessels of all sizes. Moyamoya syndrome is a cerebral vasculopathy that is only rarely observed in association with NF1, particularly in the pediatric age range.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFHemolytic-uremic syndrome (HUS) is characterized by the clinical and laboratory manifestations of acute renal failure, thrombocytopenia and microangiopathic hemolytic anemia. In children, the majority of cases occur after an infectious diarrhea mainly associated with the serotype Escherichia coli O157:H7. We present a case of a 5-year-old boy with post-diarrhea HUS due to cryptosporidium.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFBackground And Objectives: Pemetrexed is a multitargeted folate pathway inhibitor with documented activity in non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC). The presumed maximum tolerated dose is 500 mg/m2 every 3 weeks, but pemetrexed-related toxicity is ameliorated when folate and B12 supplementation is provided and therefore a higher dose intensity may be tolerated. The current exploratory study assessed the feasibility of administration of pemetrexed at a fixed dose of 1000 mg every 2 weeks in patients with relapsed or refractory NSCLC.
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