Skin and self-injury: a possible link between peripheral innervation and immune function?

The aim of this preliminary case study series was to investigate epidermal innervation in pediatric patients with significant neurological impairment and self-injurious behavior. We enrolled four pediatric patients with self-injury (two males, two females; mean age 12y, range 9-14y) and used archival specimens from healthy, age-matched children with typical development for comparison purposes. Epidermal nerve fiber density, peptide content, and mast cell degranulation patterns from non-damaged skin were tested between the patients and the comparison group.

Clinical validation of a continuous intravascular neonatal blood gas sensor introduced through an umbilical artery catheter.

Introduction: Arterial blood gas (ABG) values are a necessary diagnostic measurement in the management of critically ill neonates. We hypothesized that a fiberoptic intravascular blood gas sensor, adapted for use through an umbilical artery catheter, would produce blood gas results with clinically acceptable bias and precision, in comparison to laboratory values, but with no blood loss.

Methods: We evaluated a fiberoptic intravascular blood gas sensor (Neotrend) in 23 consecutive neonates suffering respiratory failure.

Respiratory instability of term and near-term healthy newborn infants in car safety seats.

Objective: Premature infants who are discharged from intensive care nurseries are known to be at increased risk for apnea, bradycardia, and oxygen desaturation while in the upright position. These small infants also do not fit securely in standard infant car seats. Because of these problems, the American Academy of Pediatrics recommends a period of observation in a car seat for all infants who are born at <37 weeks' gestation.

Randomized controlled trial of volume-targeted synchronized ventilation and conventional intermittent mandatory ventilation following initial exogenous surfactant therapy.

We set out to evaluate the impact of volume-targeted synchronized ventilation and conventional intermittent mandatory ventilation (IMV) on the early physiologic response to surfactant replacement therapy in neonates with respiratory distress syndrome (RDS). We hypothesized that volume-targeted, patient-triggered synchronized ventilation would stabilize minute ventilation at a lower respiratory rate than that seen during volume-targeted IMV, and that synchronization would improve oxygenation and decrease variation in measured tidal volume (V(t)). This was a prospective, randomized study of 30 hospitalized neonates with RDS.

Surgical management of Crohn's disease in children.

Crohn's disease is a chronic, transmural inflammatory disease of the intestinal tract most frequently involving the terminal ileum and colon. It is a disorder of undetermined etiology that shares many pathophysiologic clinical aspects with chronic ulcerative colitis. Surgical treatment of Crohn's disease continues to be generally limited to the treatment of the complications of the disease.