Dysregulation of Airway and Systemic Interferon Responses Promote Asthma Exacerbations in Urban Children.

Background: Determining why some upper respiratory illnesses provoke asthma exacerbations remains an unmet need.

Objective: To identify transcriptome-wide gene expression changes associated with colds that progress to exacerbation.

Methods: 208 urban children (6-17 years) with exacerbation-prone asthma were prospectively monitored for up to two cold illnesses.

Caregiver worry about COVID-19 as a predictor of social mitigation behaviours and SARS-CoV-2 infection in a 12-city U.S. surveillance study of households with children.

Objective: Understanding compliance with COVID-19 mitigation recommendations is critical for informing efforts to contain future infectious disease outbreaks. This study tested the hypothesis that higher levels of worry about COVID-19 illness among household caregivers would predict lower (a) levels of overall and discretionary social exposure activities and (b) rates of household SARS-CoV-2 infections.

Methods: Data were drawn from a surveillance study of households with children ( = 1913) recruited from 12 U.

Development and Pilot Testing of Children's National Hospital's New Faculty Orientation Program.

New faculty orientation (NFO) programs are shown to increase faculty satisfaction, enhance collaboration, and support promotion, retention, and academic success. In an effort led by a clinical psychologist, the Children's National Hospital (CNH) NFO was developed, piloted, and is in its 3rd year. Data are shared regarding program development process, feasibility, and acceptability.

Research Priorities in Pediatric Asthma Morbidity: Addressing the Impacts of Systemic Racism on Children with Asthma in the United States. An Official American Thoracic Society Workshop Report.

In the United States, Black and Latino children with asthma are more likely than White children with asthma to require emergency department visits or hospitalizations because of an asthma exacerbation. Although many cite patient-level socioeconomic status and access to health care as primary drivers of disparities, there is an emerging focus on a major root cause of disparities-systemic racism. Current conceptual models of asthma disparities depict the historical and current effects of systemic racism as the foundation for unequal exposures to social determinants of health, environmental exposures, epigenetic factors, and differential healthcare access and quality.

Caregiver Language Preference and Health Care Utilization Among Children With Asthma.

Background And Objectives: Asthma is a leading cause of health care utilization in children and disproportionately affects historically marginalized populations. Yet, limited data exist on the role of caregiver language preference on asthma morbidity. The study aim was to determine whether caregiver non-English language preference (NELP) is associated with unscheduled asthma-related health care utilization in pediatric patients.

The Child Opportunity Index and asthma morbidity among children younger than 5 years old in Washington, DC.

Background: Place-based social determinants of health are associated with pediatric asthma morbidity. However, there is little evidence on how social determinants of health correlate to the disproportionately high rates of asthma morbidity experienced by children <5 years old.

Objectives: This study sought to evaluate census tract associations between the Child Opportunity Index ±COI) and at-risk rates (ARRs) for pediatric asthma-related emergency department (ED) encounters and hospitalizations in Washington, DC.

StethAid: A Digital Auscultation Platform for Pediatrics.

(1) Background: Mastery of auscultation can be challenging for many healthcare providers. Artificial intelligence (AI)-powered digital support is emerging as an aid to assist with the interpretation of auscultated sounds. A few AI-augmented digital stethoscopes exist but none are dedicated to pediatrics.

Nasal airway microRNA profiling of infants with severe bronchiolitis and risk of childhood asthma: a multicentre prospective study.

Background: Severe bronchiolitis ( bronchiolitis requiring hospitalisation) during infancy is a major risk factor for childhood asthma. However, the exact mechanism linking these common conditions remains unclear. We examined the longitudinal relationship between nasal airway miRNAs during severe bronchiolitis and the risk of developing asthma.

Associations between outdoor air pollutants and non-viral asthma exacerbations and airway inflammatory responses in children and adolescents living in urban areas in the USA: a retrospective secondary analysis.

Background: Asthma prevalence and severity have markedly increased with urbanisation, and children in low-income urban centres have among the greatest asthma morbidity. Outdoor air pollution has been associated with adverse respiratory effects in children with asthma. However, the mechanisms by which air pollution exposure exacerbates asthma, and how these mechanisms compare with exacerbations induced by respiratory viruses, are poorly understood.

Stakeholder engagement in eight comparative effectiveness trials in African Americans and Latinos with asthma.

Background: The effects of stakeholder engagement, particularly in comparative effectiveness trials, have not been widely reported. In 2014, eight comparative effectiveness studies targeting African Americans and Hispanics/Latinos with uncontrolled asthma were funded by the Patient-Centered Outcomes Research Institute (PCORI) as part of its Addressing Disparities Program. Awardees were required to meaningfully involve patients and other stakeholders.

Mepolizumab for urban children with exacerbation-prone eosinophilic asthma in the USA (MUPPITS-2): a randomised, double-blind, placebo-controlled, parallel-group trial.

Background: Black and Hispanic children living in urban environments in the USA have an excess burden of morbidity and mortality from asthma. Therapies directed at the eosinophilic phenotype reduce asthma exacerbations in adults, but few data are available in children and diverse populations. Furthermore, the molecular mechanisms that underlie exacerbations either being prevented by, or persisting despite, immune-based therapies are not well understood.

Social Determinants of Health and At-Risk Rates for Pediatric Asthma Morbidity.

Background And Objectives: Compared with population-based rates, at-risk rates (ARRs) account for underlying variations of asthma prevalence. When applied with geospatial analysis, ARRs may facilitate more accurate evaluations of the contribution of place-based social determinants of health (SDOH) to pediatric asthma morbidity. Our objectives were to calculate ARRs for pediatric asthma-related emergency department (ED) encounters and hospitalizations by census-tract in Washington, the District of Columbia (DC) and evaluate their associations with SDOH.

Effect of the coronavirus disease 2019 pandemic on morbidity among children hospitalized for an asthma exacerbation.

Background: Pediatric asthma exacerbations account for substantial morbidity, including emergency department (ED) visits and hospitalizations. Although the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic was associated with a decrease in pediatric asthma ED visits and hospitalizations, there is limited information on the clinical characteristics of children hospitalized with an asthma exacerbation during the pandemic.

Objective: To investigate the clinical characteristics of children hospitalized with an asthma exacerbation during the pandemic as compared with those hospitalized during the same months in the year prior.

Stressful life events, caregiver depressive symptoms, and child asthma symptom-free days: a longitudinal analysis.

Objective: To examine relationships among stressful life events (SLE), caregiver depression, and asthma symptom free days (SFDs) in publicly insured Black children aged 4-12 years with persistent asthma.

Methods: Secondary analysis of longitudinal data from a clinical trial assessing the efficacy of a six-month parental stress management intervention. Using repeated measures Poisson regression, we constructed four models of SLE (Rochester Youth Development Stressful Life Events scale-Parent Items), caregiver depression (Center for Epidemiologic Studies Depression scale ≥ 11), and child asthma symptom-free days (SFDs) in the prior 14 days.

Early Outcomes of a New NIH Program to Support Research in Residency.

The work of physician-investigators has historically led to key discoveries and developments in modern medicine, but recent decades have seen significant declines in the number of U.S. physician-investigators.

Seasonal airway microbiome and transcriptome interactions promote childhood asthma exacerbations.

Background: Seasonal variation in respiratory illnesses and exacerbations in pediatric populations with asthma is well described, though whether upper airway microbes play season-specific roles in these events is unknown.

Objective: We hypothesized that nasal microbiota composition is seasonally dynamic and that discrete microbe-host interactions modify risk of asthma exacerbation in a season-specific manner.

Methods: Repeated nasal samples from children with exacerbation-prone asthma collected during periods of respiratory health (baseline; n = 181 samples) or first captured respiratory illness (n = 97) across all seasons, underwent bacterial (16S ribosomal RNA gene) and fungal (internal transcribed spacer region 2) biomarker sequencing.

SARS-CoV-2-Specific T Cell Responses Are Stronger in Children With Multisystem Inflammatory Syndrome Compared to Children With Uncomplicated SARS-CoV-2 Infection.

Background: Despite similar rates of infection, adults and children have markedly different morbidity and mortality related to severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus-2 (SARS-CoV-2). Compared to adults, children have infrequent severe manifestations of acute infection but are uniquely at risk for the rare and often severe Multisystem Inflammatory Syndrome in Children (MIS-C) following infection. We hypothesized that these differences in presentation are related to differences in the magnitude and/or antigen specificity of SARS-CoV-2-specific T cell (CST) responses between adults and children.