Microstructural White Matter Abnormalities in Children and Adolescents With Narcolepsy Type 1.

Background: In 2010, the H1N1 Pandemrix vaccination campaign was followed by a sudden increase in narcolepsy type 1 (NT1). We investigated the brain white matter microstructure in children with onset of NT1 within two years after the Pandemrix vaccination.

Methods: We performed diffusion-weighted magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) on 19 children and adolescents with NT1 and 19 healthy controls.

Finnish children who experienced narcolepsy after receiving the Pandemrix vaccine during the 2009-2010 H1N1 pandemic demonstrated high level of psychosocial problems.

Aim: We assessed psychosocial burdens in children who developed narcolepsy after receiving the Pandemrix H1N1 vaccine during the 2009-2010 pandemic. Parental quality of life was also assessed.

Methods: This multicentre study covered four of the five Finnish University Hospital Districts, which dealt with about 90% of the paediatric narcolepsy cases after the Pandemrix vaccination.

Newborn Brain Function Is Affected by Fetal Exposure to Maternal Serotonin Reuptake Inhibitors.

Recent experimental animal studies have shown that fetal exposure to serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SRIs) affects brain development. Modern recording methods and advanced computational analyses of scalp electroencephalography (EEG) have opened a possibility to study if comparable changes are also observed in the human neonatal brain. We recruited mothers using SRI during pregnancy (n = 22) and controls (n = 62).

[Update on current care guidelines: appropriate treatment of medical problems associated with Down's syndrome].

The lifetime prognosis of people with Down's syndrome has improved. Development of the services that health care and society can offer to such people is ongoing. These guidelines are targeted at defining what is required to further increase the lifespan and quality-of-life of people with Down's syndrome.

Subjects with intellectual disability and familial need for full-time special education show regional brain alterations: a voxel-based morphometry study.

Subjects attending full-time special education (SE) often have multifactorial background for their cognitive impairment, and brain MRI may show nonspecific changes. As voxel-based morphometry reveals regional volume differences, we applied this method to 119 subjects with cognitive impairments and familial need for full-time SE--graded into three levels from specific disorders of cognitive processes (level 1) to intellectual disability (IQ <70; level 3)--and to 43 age-matched controls attending mainstream education (level 0). Subjects in SE groups had smaller global brain white matter (WM), cerebrospinal fluid, and total brain volume than controls.

Childhood growth and development associated with need for full-time special education at school age.

Objective: To explore how growth measurements and attainment of developmental milestones in early childhood reflect the need for full-time special education (SE).

Methods: After stratification in this population-based study, 900 pupils in full-time SE groups (age-range 7-16 years, mean 12 years 8 months) at three levels and 301 pupils in mainstream education (age-range 7-16, mean 12 years 9 months) provided data on height and weight from birth to age 7 years and head circumference to age 1 year. Developmental screening was evaluated from age 1 month to 48 months.

Newborns at risk for special education placement: a population-based study.

Objectives: To establish the contributions of birth weight (BW), gender, socioeconomic status (SES), and parental age on risks for special education (SE) placements in school-age children.

Methods: A population-based sample of 900 school-age children attending the following full-time SE groups: at level 1, children had isolated neurodevelopmental, physical, or other impairments; at level 2, borderline to mild intellectual disability (ID); and at level 3, moderate to severe ID. Three hundred and one children enrolled in mainstream education formed the control group (level 0).

Sleep disturbances in aspartylglucosaminuria (AGU): a questionnaire study.

Sleep disturbances are common in many progressive metabolic encephalopathies. The possible presence of disturbed sleep-wake behaviour in the lysosomal storage disorder aspartylglucosaminuria, has not been previously studied, however. The sleep-wake behaviour of 81 patients with aspartylglucosaminuria (AGU, age 3-55 years, median 22 years; 42 female and 39 male) and 49 controls (age 2-57 years, median 18 years; 25 female and 24 male) was assessed through a postal survey.

Sleep fragmentation in mentally retarded people decreases with increasing daylength in spring.

We studied the sleep-wake behavior of mentally retarded people from late winter to early summer at 60 degrees N. During this time the daylength increased 8 h 51 min. The data were collected by observing the sleep-wake status of 293 subjects at 20-min intervals for five randomized 24h periods (= recording days).