Publications by authors named "Lyttle M"

Background: Between 1% and 4% of febrile infants, aged from birth to 90 days of age, presenting to hospital will be diagnosed with an invasive bacterial infection (IBI). Traditional teaching has advocated a treat all approach but more recently a number of clinical decision aids (CDA) have been developed to classify febrile infants into lower and higher risk cohorts, with lower risk infants suitable for management without immediate parenteral antibiotics and lumbar puncture. The aim of this study was to apply these CDA to a UK and Irish cohort.

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  • * The study used adult zebrafish to explore how social interactions influence reactions to caffeine in different environments (isolated vs. social).
  • * Results showed that isolated zebrafish were more affected by caffeine's anxiety-inducing effects and less by its stimulating effects, while socially-exposed fish were less inclined to approach others when under caffeine's influence.
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Background: In 2021 we launched the BronchStart study, which collected information on 17,899 presentations in children with serious respiratory tract infections following the release of lockdown restrictions. Our study informed the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation's decision to recommend the introduction maternal respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) vaccination, which was introduced in the United Kingdom in August/September 2024.

Study Question: We modified our original protocol to conduct a United Kingdom-wide assessment of maternal vaccination against RSV.

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  • The study explored the rise in respiratory diseases among young children in the UK and Ireland after interventions for COVID-19 led to a decline in childhood infections.
  • It tracked nearly 18,000 kids aged 0-23 months with bronchiolitis or wheezing across 59 emergency departments over a year.
  • Results showed that while RSV accounted for many hospital admissions, most were in healthy infants, and over half of the admissions had no connection to the virus.
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Background: Paediatric convulsive status epilepticus is the most common neurological emergency presenting to emergency departments. Risks of resultant neurological morbidity and mortality increase with seizure duration. If the seizure fails to stop within defined time-windows, standard care follows an algorithm of stepwise escalation to more intensive treatments, ultimately resorting to induction of general anaesthesia and ventilation.

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High spinal cord injury (SCI) leads to persistent and debilitating compromise in respiratory function. Cervical SCI not only causes the death of phrenic motor neurons (PhMNs) that innervate the diaphragm, but also damages descending respiratory pathways originating in the rostral ventral respiratory group (rVRG) located in the brainstem, resulting in denervation and consequent silencing of spared PhMNs located caudal to injury. It is imperative to determine whether interventions targeting rVRG axon growth and respiratory neural circuit reconnection are efficacious in chronic cervical contusion SCI, given that the vast majority of individuals are chronically-injured and most cases of SCI involve contusion-type damage to the cervical region.

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Objectives: The aim of this review was to identify factors associated with multiple visits to emergency department (ED) services for mental health care in adolescents.

Methods: Electronic databases (MEDLINE, PsycINFO, Embase, CINAHL, Web of Science and ProQuest Dissertations & Thesis Global) were searched for evidence that presented an association between risk factors or correlates of multiple visits to the emergency departmental for mental health care by 10-24 year olds. High impact use was defined as at least one return ED visit for mental health care.

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Objective: Recovery from acute wheeze and asthma attacks should be supported with safety netting, including treatment advice. We evaluated emergency department (ED) discharge practices for acute childhood wheeze/asthma attacks to describe variation in safety netting and recovery bronchodilator dosing.

Design: Two-phase study between June 2020 and September 2021, comprising (1) Departmental discharge practice survey, and (2) Analysis of written discharge instructions for caregivers.

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Objective: Hospital-based clinical decision tools support clinician decision-making when a child presents to the emergency department with a head injury, particularly regarding CT scanning. However, there is no decision tool to support prehospital clinicians in deciding which head-injured children can safely remain at scene. This study aims to identify clinical decision tools, or constituent elements, which may be adapted for use in prehospital care.

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Rationale: There is significant practice variation in acute paediatric asthma, particularly severe exacerbations. It is unknown whether this is due to differences in clinical guidelines.

Objectives: To describe and compare the content and quality of clinical guidelines for the management of acute exacerbations of asthma in children between geographic regions.

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Unlabelled: High spinal cord injury (SCI) leads to persistent and debilitating compromise in respiratory function. Cervical SCI not only causes the death of phrenic motor neurons (PhMNs) that innervate the diaphragm, but also damages descending respiratory pathways originating in the rostral ventral respiratory group (rVRG) located in the brainstem, resulting in denervation and consequent silencing of spared PhMNs located caudal to injury. It is imperative to determine whether interventions targeting rVRG axon growth and respiratory neural circuit reconnection are efficacious in chronic cervical contusion SCI, given that the vast majority of individuals are chronically-injured and most cases of SCI involve contusion-type damage to the cervical region.

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Background: Data on imported infections in children and young people (CYP) are sparse.

Aims: To describe imported infections in CYP arriving from malaria-endemic areas and presenting to UK emergency departments (ED) who were screened for malaria.

Methods: This is a retrospective, multi-centre, observational study nested in a diagnostic accuracy study for malaria rapid diagnostic tests.

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The early post-trauma period is a key time to provide psychological support to acutely injured children. This is often when they present to emergency departments (EDs) with their families. However, there is limited understanding of the feasibility of implementing psychological support for children and their families in EDs.

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Objective: The objective of the study is to demonstrate that with the use of artificial intelligence (AI) in computed tomography (CT), radiation doses of CT kidney-ureter-bladder (KUB) and CT urogram (CTU) can be reduced to less than that of X-ray KUB and CT KUB, respectively, while maintaining the good image quality.

Materials And Methods: We reviewed all CT KUBs ( = 121) performed in September 2019 and all CTUs ( = 74) performed in December 2019 at our institution. The dose length product (DLP) of all CT KUBs and each individual phase of CTU were recorded.

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Objective: To identify the outcomes considered important, and factors influencing the patient experience, for parents and caregivers of children presenting to hospital with a severe acute exacerbation of asthma. This work contributes to the outcome-identification process in developing a core outcome set (COS) for future clinical trials in children with severe acute asthma.

Design: A qualitative study involving semistructured interviews with parents and caregivers of children who presented to hospital with a severe acute exacerbation of asthma.

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Testicular germ cell tumour regression is a rare phenomenon, where the primary testicular tumour spontaneously regresses, typically with metastatic disease at presentation. We present a case of a regressed germ cell tumour (GCT) in a 44-year-old post-pubertal male. Initially treated for suspected infection, the patient's testicular swelling prompted further investigation, leading to a radical orchidectomy that revealed the unusual histomorphologic findings of an entirely necrotic, non-seminomatous GCT consistent with a pure embryonal carcinoma.

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Introduction: Febrile infants 90 days and younger are at risk of invasive bacterial infections (bacteraemia and meningitis) and urinary tract infections. Together this is previously termed serious bacterial infection with an incidence of approximately 10-20%. The National Institute for Health and Care Excellence guidance advocates a cautious approach with most infants requiring septic screening, parenteral broad-spectrum antibiotics and hospital admission.

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Objective: To investigate if preschool children differ to school age children with mild traumatic brain injury (TBI) with respect to injury causes, clinical presentation, and medical management.

Design: A secondary analysis of a dataset from a large, prospective and multisite cohort study on TBI in children aged 0-18 years, the Australian Paediatric Head Injury Rules Study.

Setting: Nine pediatric emergency departments (ED) and 1 combined adult and pediatric ED located across Australia and New Zealand.

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Background: It has been estimated that around 31% of children will experience a traumatic event during childhood, most commonly serious accidents that lead to hospitalisation. Around 15% of children who experience such events go onto develop post-traumatic stress disorder. Emergency department (ED) clinicians have a unique opportunity to intervene during the early peri-trauma period, which can involve incorporating a trauma-informed approach within their care.

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Importance: Ileocolic intussusception is an important cause of intestinal obstruction in children. Reduction of ileocolic intussusception using air or fluid enema is the standard of care. This likely distressing procedure is usually performed without sedation or analgesia, but practice variation exists.

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Objectives: To describe the incidence of new onset paediatric diabetes mellitus, clinical characteristics and patterns of presentation to emergency departments (ED) during the COVID-19 pandemic, and to assess whether this increase was associated with SARS-CoV-2 infection.

Design: Retrospective medical record review.

Setting: Forty nine paediatric EDs across the UK and Ireland.

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While it may be more common to think of a disaster volunteer as someone from outside the community who comes to assist during times of need, it is important not to forget those members of the community who are well poised to build grassroots resilience when provided with the necessary training and tools. This paper examines the state of disaster volunteerism in Latin America and Spanish-speaking communities in the USA who have been exposed to the Community Emergency Response Team (CERT) programme, with an emphasis on the perceptions of and motivations for grassroots volunteerism from the perspective of both local emergency managers and CERT volunteers. The research team developed an online survey and shared it with active Spanish-speaking emergency management groups throughout the USA, Mexico, Central and South America.

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