Health and socio-demographic background of Ukrainian minors and their families in Germany - challenges for refugee medicine : A cross-sectional study from the German Network University Medicine (NUM).

Unlabelled: In 2022, over 1,000,000 people from Ukraine fled to Germany, mostly women and children. The aim of this study was to determine health status and socio-demographic background of Ukrainian refugee minors in Germany and to compare that to German minors. In this study, Ukrainian refugees of all ages, who voluntarily made contact with the study centres via flyers or refugee shelters, were interviewed with the help of trained interpreters from 09-12/2022.

The Effect of Selective Dorsal Rhizotomy on Scoliosis in Children With Cerebral Palsy: A Long-term Follow-up Study.

Background: Selective dorsal rhizotomy (SDR) is commonly used to reduce spasticity in children with cerebral palsy (CP). Children with CP have an increased risk of spinal deformities that increase with age and Gross Motor Function Classification System (GMFCS) level. Few studies have considered the risk of spinal deformity post-SDR by GMFCS level.

Effect of omalizumab on inflammatory markers in COVID-19: an exploratory analysis of the COVID-19 immunologic antiviral therapy with omalizumab (CIAO) trial.

Background: The CIAO trial recently demonstrated a probable clinical benefit of omalizumab in the treatment of severe COVID-19; however, the mechanism underlying this benefit remains unclear. Therefore, we sought to longitudinally assess the impact of omalizumab on serum cytokines in CIAO trial patients to determine its mechanism of action.

Methods: Blood samples were collected on days 0, 2, 7, and 14 from patients recruited into the CIAO trial and who consented to this substudy.

Evaluating renal disease in pediatric-onset anti-neutrophil cytoplasmic antibody-associated vasculitis: disease course, outcomes, and predictors of outcome.

Objectives: We aimed to study the disease course, outcomes, and predictors of outcome in pediatric-onset anti-neutrophil cytoplasmic antibody (ANCA)-associated vasculitis (AAV) affecting the kidneys.

Methods: Patients eligible for this study had a diagnosis of granulomatosis with polyangiitis (GPA), microscopic polyangiitis (MPA), or ANCA positive pauci-immune glomerulonephritis, were ≤ 18 years at diagnosis, had renal disease defined by biopsy or dialysis dependence, and had clinical data at diagnosis and either 12- or 24-months. Ambispective data from the ARChiVE/PedVas Registry was used.

Development and internal validation of time-to-event risk prediction models for major medical complications within 30 days after elective colectomy.

Background: Patients undergoing colectomy are at risk of numerous major complications. However, existing binary risk stratification models do not predict when a patient may be at highest risks of each complication. Accurate prediction of the timing of complications facilitates targeted, resource-efficient monitoring.

Bayesian Decision Curve Analysis With Bayesdca.

Clinical decisions are often guided by clinical prediction models or diagnostic tests. Decision curve analysis (DCA) combines classical assessment of predictive performance with the consequences of using these strategies for clinical decision-making. In DCA, the best decision strategy is the one that maximizes the net benefit: the net number of true positives (or negatives) provided by a given strategy.

Eosinophilic esophagitis drives tissue fibroblast regenerative programs toward pathologic dysfunction.

Background: Pathologic tissue remodeling with scarring and tissue rigidity has been demonstrated in inflammatory, autoimmune, and allergic diseases. Eosinophilic esophagitis (EoE) is an allergic disease that is diagnosed and managed by repeated biopsy procurement, allowing an understanding of tissue fibroblast dysfunction. While EoE-associated tissue remodeling causes clinical dysphagia, food impactions, esophageal rigidity, and strictures, molecular mechanisms driving these complications remain under investigation.

Accuracy of real-time polymerase chain reaction test for Group B Streptococcus detection in pregnant women: A systematic review and meta-analysis.

Objectives: This study aimed to determine the performance of RT PCR of GBS screening in pregnant women under different situations, especially compared to different reference methods (culture or composite standards) and preprocessing before detection (directly or enrichment).

Materials And Methods: We searched PubMed, the Cochrane Library: Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews, EMBASE, and Google Scholar, and clinical trial registries such as ClinicalTrials.gov and WHO ICTRP until March 2024.

Comparison of nasal microbiota between preterm and full-term infants in early life.

Background: The respiratory microbiota influences infant immune system maturation. Little is known about how perinatal, physiological, and environmental exposures impact the nasal microbiota in preterm infants after discharge, or nasal microbiota differences between preterm and healthy full-term infants.

Methods: Nasal swabs (from 136 preterm and 299 full-term infants at mean postmenstrual age of 45 weeks from the prospective Basel-Bern Infant Lung Development cohort) were analyzed by 16S-rRNA gene amplification and sequencing (Illumina MiSeq).

A function-based mapping of sensory integration along the cortical hierarchy.

Sensory information mainly travels along a hierarchy spanning unimodal to transmodal regions, forming multisensory integrative representations crucial for higher-order cognitive functions. Here, we develop an fMRI based two-dimensional framework to characterize sensory integration based on the anchoring role of the primary cortex in the organization of sensory processing. Sensory magnitude captures the percentage of variance explained by three primary sensory signals and decreases as the hierarchy ascends, exhibiting strong similarity to the known hierarchy and high stability across different conditions.

Polyphenol-Scaffolded Modular Assembly of Heterotypic Cell-Cell Assemblies for Potentiating Cancer Immunotherapy.

Cells existing in the form of clusters often exhibit distinct biological functions from their single-cell counterparts. However, the ability to modulate cell-cell interactions among multiple cell types through molecular scaffolds remains an ongoing challenge. Here, a supramolecular phenolic network on surfaces of live cells designed is engineered to act as modular scaffolds that promote intercellular interactions, presenting a universal platform for the construction of cell-cell assemblies (CCAs).

Family member experience with restricted family presence in Canadian PICUs: an interpretive descriptive study.

Purpose: We performed this study to explore family member experiences with restrictions to family presence during their child's PICU admission, leveraging the unique context of the COVID-19 pandemic to aid in future ethical and informed decision-making.

Methods: Qualitative interpretive descriptive study with family members of Canadian PICU patients admitted from March 2020 to April 2021 who experienced restricted family presence (RFP) policies. Respondents were purposively sampled for demographic-based maximum variation.

Antimicrobial utilisation patterns between 2013 and 2022 in Canadian neonates born at less than 33 weeks gestation: a retrospective cohort study.

Background: Excessive antimicrobial exposure is associated with an increase in neonatal mortality, morbidities and adverse neurodevelopment. Canadian Neonatal Network has been promoting judicious antimicrobial use through the Evidence-based Practice for Improving Quality processes. Our objective was to evaluate the antimicrobial consumption among neonates in tertiary neonatal intensive care units (NICU) in Canada in the recent decade.

Perspectives on Codebook: sequence specificity of uncharacterized human transcription factors.

We describe an effort ("Codebook") to determine the sequence specificity of 332 putative and largely uncharacterized human transcription factors (TFs), as well as 61 control TFs. Nearly 5,000 independent experiments across multiple and assays produced motifs for just over half of the putative TFs analyzed (177, or 53%), of which most are unique to a single TF. The data highlight the extensive contribution of transposable elements to TF evolution, both in and , and identify tens of thousands of conserved, base-level binding sites in the human genome.

Cross-platform DNA motif discovery and benchmarking to explore binding specificities of poorly studied human transcription factors.

A DNA sequence pattern, or "motif", is an essential representation of DNA-binding specificity of a transcription factor (TF). Any particular motif model has potential flaws due to shortcomings of the underlying experimental data and computational motif discovery algorithm. As a part of the Codebook/GRECO-BIT initiative, here we evaluated at large scale the cross-platform recognition performance of positional weight matrices (PWMs), which remain popular motif models in many practical applications.

Considerations for Cell Type Heterogeneity in Pediatric Salivary DNA Methylation Analyses: Comparison of Reference Panels & Stratification by Estimated Cell Type Proportion.

Saliva is a widely used sample in epigenetic research with children due to its non-invasive nature. Since DNA methylation (DNAm) profile is cell type (CT) specific, salivary DNAm associations with exposures may be influenced by CT compositions, which is highly variable in saliva as it contains immune and buccal epithelial cells (BEC). Reference-based CT deconvolution and statistically adjusting estimated CT in DNAm analyses have become an increasingly common practice.

ELAVL1 governs breast cancer malignancy by regulating cell stemness.

Despite advances in understanding breast cancer (BC) molecular subtypes, the mechanisms underlying its grade of malignancy remain unclear. Our study reveals that low expression of the RNA-binding protein ELAVL1 is linked to higher-grade malignancy and poorer prognosis in malignant BC subtypes. Notably, knockdown of ELAVL1 increased the expression of key stem cell markers (CD44, SOX2, OCT4, KLF4, and NANOG) and enhanced tumorsphere formation.

Influenza A Viruses in the Swine Population: Ecology and Geographical Distribution.

Despite the efforts of practical medicine and virology, influenza viruses remain the most important pathogens affecting human and animal health. Swine are exposed to infection with all types of influenza A, B, C, and D viruses. Influenza viruses have low pathogenicity for swine, but in the case of co-infection with other pathogens, the outcome can be much more serious, even fatal.

Perioperative Observations and Outcome in Surgical Treatment of Malignant Peripheral Nerve Sheath Tumors.

Background/objectives: This retrospective observational study aimed to investigate the perioperative outcome in Malignant Peripheral Nerve Sheath Tumors (MPNSTs) with and without relation to Neurofibromatosis Type 1 (NF1) and to detect possible influencing factors.

Methods: Clinical reports, histopathological evaluations, imaging, and treatment characteristics were reviewed in 35 operated MPNSTs in 33 patients. Possible predictive valuables included disease type, preoperative tumor volume, SUV and MIB-1 proliferation index, resection margins, the presence of metastasis, and whether radio-/chemotherapy was received.

Minimal Variation in Functional Connectivity in Relation to Daily Affect.

Reported associations between functional connectivity and affective disorder symptoms are minimally reproducible, which can partially be attributed to difficulty capturing highly variable clinical symptoms in cross-sectional study designs. "Dense sampling" protocols, where participants are sampled across multiple sessions, can overcome this limitation by studying associations between functional connectivity and variable clinical states. Here, we characterized effect sizes for the association between functional connectivity and time-varying positive and negative daily affect in a nonclinical cohort.

The Impact of Public Policy on Equitable Access to Technology for Children and Youth Living with Type 1 Diabetes in British Columbia, Canada.

Structural inequities impede technology uptake in marginalized populations living with type 1 diabetes (T1D). Our objective was to describe hemoglobin A1c (HbA), time in range (TIR), and pump use to evaluate the impact of a universal funding policy for continuous glucose monitoring (CGM) across levels of deprivation in children with T1D in the Canadian province of British Columbia (BC). Patients with T1D and at least one outpatient visit after June 10, 2020 (1-year before universal CGM funding) who were enrolled in the BC Pediatric Diabetes Registry were included ( = 477).

The evolution of nutritional care in children with food allergies - With a focus on cow's milk allergy.

Cow's milk allergy (CMA) remains one of the most common and complex paediatric food allergies. In the last decade, our understanding has advanced in terms of immunoglobulin E (IgE)-mediated CMA and focus is now also paid to non-IgE-mediated CMA, particularly in some Western countries where incidence rates are high. We have had significant progress in the last 10 years in relation to our understanding of existing supportive tests for IgE-mediated CMA, with the advancement of newer tests, such as the basophil activation test (BAT), which have shown great promise.