Behavioural, educational and respiratory outcomes of antenatal betamethasone for term caesarean section (ASTECS trial).

Objectives: To determine whether antenatal betamethasone prior to elective term caesarean section (CS) affects long term behavioural, cognitive or developmental outcome, and whether the risk of asthma or atopic disease is reduced.

Design: A questionnaire based follow-up of a multicentre randomised controlled trial (Antenatal Steroids for Term Elective Caesarean Section, BMJ 2005).

Setting: Four UK study centres from the original trial.

Antenatal betamethasone and incidence of neonatal respiratory distress after elective caesarean section: pragmatic randomised trial.

Objective: To test whether steroids reduce respiratory distress in babies born by elective caesarean section at term.

Design: Multicentre pragmatic randomised trial.

Setting: 10 maternity units.

Severe congenital myotonic dystrophy and severe anaemia of prematurity in an infant of Jehovah's Witness parents.

Severe congenital myotonic dystrophy (CMD) is an autosomal dominant condition characterized by hypotonia and respiratory insufficiency at birth. Terminal outcome has been reported in infants requiring ventilation for longer than 30 days. The case is reported of an infant born at 34 weeks' gestation with severe CMD.

Assessment of health status at two years of very low birthweight infants--clinical governance.

Aims to establish a mechanism to determine prospectively the health status at two years of babies who weighed less than 1.5 kg at birth, born and receiving neonatal intensive care in North Wales. Maternal and neonatal data on all babies discharged from each of the three units in North Wales meeting this criteria were collated by the study coordinator.

Linear growth and weight gain in diabetic children--a cross-sectional and longitudinal evaluation.

Objective: To examine linear growth and weight gain in diabetic children and to assess the influence of the age at onset of diabetes on growth.

Subjects And Methods: A retrospective longitudinal and cross-sectional analysis of the growth data of 61 children attending the diabetic clinic for the whole year of 1998 was completed.

Results: The children were of average height and weight at onset with mean (SD) Height SDS = -0.

Ciprofloxacin in neonatal Enterobacter cloacae septicaemia.

Multiresistant Enterobacter cloacae infection in six premature infants was eradicated with intravenous ciprofloxacin (10 mg/kg/day). Bacterial resistance did not develop. Adequate plasma ciprofloxacin concentrations were achieved in all treated patients.

A prospective study of symptomatic hypoglycaemia in childhood diabetes.

A prospective study of symptomatic hypoglycaemia was conducted in 47 children over a 14-week period using a questionnaire completed at home for each episode of hypoglycaemia. Twenty-nine children (62%) experienced 150 episodes during the study. The average incidence was once every 33 days (range 0-5.

Electrolytes and glucose in cerebrospinal fluid of premature infants with intraventricular haemorrhage: role of potassium in cerebral infarction.

Potassium, sodium, and glucose concentrations in cerebrospinal fluid and plasma were determined in 73 infants whose gestational ages ranged from 25 to 40 weeks. Six of 29 (21%) neonates with intraventricular haemorrhages had raised potassium concentrations in the cerebrospinal fluid (3.7-30 mmol/l); five developed cerebral infarctions.

HLA type, islet cell antibodies, and glucose intolerance in cystic fibrosis.

Impaired glucose tolerance, assessed by a raised glycated haemoglobin (HbA1) concentration, was found in 24 (39%) out of 61 patients with cystic fibrosis with an age range of 1-23 years. No correlation between age and HbA1 concentration was found indicating that factors other than progressive pancreatic fibrosis may be important in the aetiology. HLA typing, islet cell antibodies, and autoantibody screen were completed.

Phototherapy and the use of heat shields in very low birthweight infants.

The irradiance produced by phototherapy units in use on a neonatal unit was measured. The phototherapy tubes were found to decline at a variable rate. Heat shields used to decrease heat and evaporative losses in the very low birthweight infant reduce irradiance and may appreciably limit the effectiveness of phototherapy.

Glycosylated haemoglobin and glucose intolerance in cystic fibrosis.

Sixty four patients, age range 1-20 years, with cystic fibrosis had their tolerance to glucose assessed according to their glycosylated haemoglobin (HbA1) concentrations. Raised concentrations were found in 24 (37.5%).

X-linked mesangiocapillary glomerulonephritis.

Two related male patients with mesangiocapillary glomerulonephritis (MCGN) are described demonstrated by renal biopsy, inherited as an X-linked disorder. Family investigations failed to reveal any underlying immunological defects or a marker for the female carrier state. The age at diagnosis, the result of discovery of proteinuria on routine urine testing during infancy, is earlier than in any other reported cases of MCGN.

Glutaric aciduria type I misdiagnosed as Leigh's encephalopathy and cerebral palsy.

Two cases are reported of boys who suffer epileptic seizures only after playing video games. It is suggested that the amount of time the patient spends in front of the screen before the seizure is important, and also that video games trigger electrocortical activity far more efficiently than either television or intermittent photic stimulation.