Children News and Research

RSS

Sugary drinks may be addictive and are harmful to health, study suggests

Just as we might have guessed, those tasty, sugar-sweetened beverages that increase risk of diabetes and other chronic diseases may actually be addictive.

21 Nov 2018

Genetic therapy may help children with Angelman syndrome to overcome seizures

Angelman syndrome is a genetic disease with no cure. Children grow up with severe intellectual disabilities and a range of other problems, arguably the worst of which are epileptic seizures. Now scientists at the UNC School of Medicine have found evidence that genetic therapy may prevent the enhanced seizure susceptibility.

21 Nov 2018

Myriad biological, societal factors that impact CKD severity for children of African descent

Myriad biological and societal factors can impact the occurrence and accelerate progression of chronic kidney disease for children of African descent - including preterm birth, exposure to toxins during gestation and lower socioeconomic status - and can complicate these children's access to effective treatments, according to an invited commentary published in the November 2018 edition of American Journal of Kidney Diseases.

21 Nov 2018

New data mapping method improves capacity to identify diet-disease relationships

Researchers at Trinity College Dublin have developed a new data mapping method which improves the quality of dietary data collected by short frequency questionnaires, thereby improving the capacity to identify diet-disease relationships.

21 Nov 2018

Peanut allergies could soon have a drug treatment

Millions of individuals worldwide suffer from peanut allergies. Researchers are developing a new treatment for fighting this allergy. A clinical trial had been conducted and the results are in.

20 Nov 2018

First modeling system developed for testing age-specific human immune responses to vaccines

A team of scientists at Boston Children's Hospital has developed the first modeling system for testing age-specific human immune responses to vaccines -- outside the body. The practical, cost-effective new platform, using all human components, is expected to accelerate and de-risk the development, assessment and selection of vaccines.

20 Nov 2018

Buyers of short-term health plans: Wise or shortsighted?

Supporters of the nation's health law condemn them. A few states, including California and New York, have banned them. Other states limit them.

20 Nov 2018

Abramson Cancer Center becomes the 28th member institution of National Comprehensive Cancer Network

The Abramson Cancer Center (ACC) at the University of Pennsylvania announced today that it is joining the National Comprehensive Cancer Network (NCCN) as its 28th member institution.

20 Nov 2018

Study warns that potential epigenetic therapy may boost lung cancer stem cells

Epigenetic therapies -- targeting enzymes that alter what genes are turned on or off in a cell -- are of growing interest in the cancer field as a way of making a cancer less aggressive or less malignant.

20 Nov 2018

Study evaluates second-hand marijuana smoke exposure among children

In a study designed to evaluate second-hand marijuana smoke exposure among children--a topic that scientists have not yet widely addressed--researchers at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai found that nearly half of children whose parents smoked marijuana showed evidence of second-hand marijuana smoke exposure.

20 Nov 2018

Researchers identify multisystem disorder caused by bi-allelic variants in CCDC47 gene

Researchers and clinicians through a multicenter collaboration have identified a novel multisystem disorder caused by bi-allelic variants in the CCDC47 gene. Their findings are reported in the American Journal of Human Genetics.

20 Nov 2018

Cessation fatigue predicts relapse rate after attempts to quit smoking

Although there is good news about smoking -- only 14 percent of Americans smoke, the lowest number ever, according to a 2017 National Health Interview Survey -- challenges remain. In a given year, more than 40 percent of smokers make no attempt to quit.

20 Nov 2018

Towards finding a druggable cancer target

It's known that cancer involves unchecked cell growth and that a biological pathway that regulates organ size, known at the Hippo pathway, is also involved in cancer.

19 Nov 2018

New drug shows promise for treating people with peanut allergy

Controlled ingestion of peanut protein could help build tolerance in peanut allergy sufferers. Authors of a new study published in the New England Journal of Medicine say an oral immunotherapy drug they tested could be the first FDA-approved medication of its kind for people with peanut allergy.

19 Nov 2018

Participation project calls for relaxing research ban on germline interventions

Are genetic defects allowed to be repaired by intervening with sperm or egg cells, or even human embryos? Thanks to genetic scissors such as CRISPR/Cas, such interventions in the germline could soon become a medical reality.

19 Nov 2018

Researchers identify molecule to fight myotubular myopathy

Myotubular myopathy is a severe genetic disease that leads to muscle paralysis from birth and results in death before two years of age. Although no treatment currently exists, researchers from the University of Geneva, Switzerland, - working in collaboration with the University of Strasbourg, France, - have identified a molecule that not only greatly reduces the progression of the disease but also boosts life expectancy in animal models by a factor of seven.

19 Nov 2018