Determining the prevalence of malnutrition in hospitalised paediatric patients

No Abstract. South African Medical Journal Vol. 96(9) (Part 2) 2006: 993-99

Determining the prevalence of malnutrition in hospitalised paediatric patients

No Abstract

Prevalence of bacterial contamination of powdered infant feeds in a hospital environment

Background The study arose as part of a nutrition model regarding the introduction of ready-to-use (RTU) infant feeds in place of powdered infant feeds (PIFs) as a standard formula for infants under the age of 1 year who are unable to be breastfed. Internationally and locally there is grave concern regarding the safety and efficacy of PIFs, especially in a hospital setting, and the resultant bacterial contamination causing enteric infections, in premature, immunocompromised and sick infants.Objective. To evaluate the of bacterial contamination of PIPs given to infants at Red Cross War Memorial Children's Hospital, Cape Town.Methods. Quantitative levels of bacterial contamination were determined and were expressed as colony-forming units (CFUs) per millilitre of sample. Aliquots of milk were inoculated onto agar, and the milk samples were then incubated at 25°C overnight (N = 10), 30°C overnight (N = 48) and 30°C for 6 hours (N 34). Post-incubation milk samples were cultured again Contamination was defined as any positive culture administration (i.e. pre incubation) or> 102 CFU/ ml after administration (i.e. post incubation).Results. Fifty samples of PIFs (N 82) were contaminated pre incubation, with (30.4%) being heavily contaminated(> 104 CFU /ml). Post incubation, 43/92 samples (46.7%) were contaminated with> 102 CFU /mi. The acidified PIFs appeared to have some bactericidal effect against some of the organisms, but not all.Conclusions. RTU infant feeds are sterile and are recommended for use in all hospitalised infants. The results of this study indicate that even when milk is prepared in a controlled environment there is bacterial contarnination of PIFs post production. As feeds are now readily available in South Africa every attempt should be made to use a sterile RTU system for hospitalised infants

The effect of 2 mMol glutamine supplementation on HSP70 and TNF-α release by LPS stimulated blood from healthy children.

OBJECTIVE: Glutamine has been shown to promote heat shock protein 70 (HSP70) release both within experimental in vitro models of sepsis (2-10 mM) and in adults post trauma (0.5 g/kg), although the efficacy varies and is dependent on the model used. The effect of glutamine supplementation on HSP70 release in children is less clear. Therefore, the aim of this study was to investigate the effect of 2 mM glutamine added to incubation media on HSP70 and inflammatory mediator release in an in vitro model of paediatric sepsis using whole blood from healthy paediatric volunteers. METHODS: An in vitro whole blood endotoxin stimulation model using 1 μg/ml lipopolysaccharide (LPS) over a 24 h time period was used to investigate the effects of 2 mM glutamine on HSP70 and inflammatory mediator release in healthy children. RESULTS: The addition of 2 mM glutamine to the incubation media significantly increased HSP70 release over time (p < 0.05). This was associated with an early pro-inflammatory effect on TNF-α release at 4 h (p < 0.005) which was not seen at 24 h. There was a non significant trend towards higher levels of IL-6 and IL-10 following the addition of 2 mM glutamine, which appears to differ from the response reported in adult and animal models. CONCLUSION: Glutamine supplementation of incubation media promotes HSP70 and early TNF- α release in an in vitro model using blood samples from healthy children.This is the author accepted manuscript. The final version is available via Elsevier at http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.clnu.2014.12.00

Research priorities for pediatric intensive care nutrition within the United Kingdom : a National Institute of Health Research James Lind Alliance priority setting partnership

To determine research priorities in PICU nutrition, which represent the shared priorities of patients, parents, carers, and PICU healthcare professionals within the United Kingdom. A national multiphase priority setting methodology in partnership with the James Lind Alliance delivered over 16 months (June 2020-September 2021). Part 1: a national scoping survey asked respondents to submit their research uncertainties related to PICU nutrition. Part 2: summarizing and evidence-checking the submitted uncertainties. Part 3: interim prioritization survey. Part 4: consensus workshop. PICU. Patients, parents, and carers of patients who had been admitted to PICU, and PICU healthcare professionals involved in the treatment of these patients within the United Kingdom. None. A national scoping survey asked respondents to submit their research uncertainties related to PICU nutrition. In the first survey, 165 topic ideas were suggested (12% by parents/carers and 88% by PICU healthcare professionals). These were categorized into 57 summary questions. The existing evidence was searched to ensure that the proposed summary questions had not already been answered. Forty were judged to be true uncertainties following a systematic literature review. These 40 uncertainties were grouped into eight themes for the second interim survey, which asked respondents to prioritize their top research questions. One hundred and forty participants contributed to this second interim survey. A final shortlist of 25 questions was derived, with the top 18 questions taken to a multistakeholder workshop where a consensus was reached on the top 10 priorities. This research identified important research gaps in the management of patients in PICU. Areas that need to be addressed as a priority include energy requirements in ventilated neonates, nutritional supplementation of probiotics to manage and prevent sepsis, the impact of postintensive care syndrome on nutrition and growth, and when to commence parenteral (IV) nutrition. The challenge now is to refine and deliver answers to these research priorities. [Abstract copyright: Copyright © 2022 The Authors. Published by Wolters Kluwer Health, Inc. on behalf of the Society of Critical Care Medicine.

HHMD: the human histone modification database

Histone modifications play important roles in chromatin remodeling, gene transcriptional regulation, stem cell maintenance and differentiation. Alterations in histone modifications may be linked to human diseases especially cancer. Histone modifications including methylation, acetylation and ubiquitylation probed by ChIP-seq, ChIP-chip and qChIP have become widely available. Mining and integration of histone modification data can be beneficial to novel biological discoveries. There has been no comprehensive data repository that is exclusive for human histone modifications. Therefore, we developed a relatively comprehensive database for human histone modifications. Human Histone Modification Database (HHMD, http://bioinfo.hrbmu.edu.cn/hhmd) focuses on the storage and integration of histone modification datasets that were obtained from laboratory experiments. The latest release of HHMD incorporates 43 location-specific histone modifications in human. To facilitate data extraction, flexible search options are built in HHMD. It can be searched by histone modification, gene ID, functional categories, chromosome location and cancer name. HHMD also includes a user-friendly visualization tool named HisModView, by which genome-wide histone modification map can be shown. HisModView facilitates the acquisition and visualization of histone modifications. The database also has manually curated information of histone modification dysregulation in nine human cancers

Elimination, reversal, and directional bias of optical diffraction

We experimentally demonstrate the manipulation of optical diffraction, utilizing the atomic thermal motion in a hot vapor medium of electromagnetically-induced transparency (EIT). By properly tuning the EIT parameters, the refraction induced by the atomic motion may completely counterbalance the paraxial free-space diffraction and by that eliminates the effect of diffraction for arbitrary images. By further manipulation, the diffraction can be doubled, biased asymmetrically to induced deflection, or even reversed. The latter allows an experimental implementation of an analogy to a negative-index lens

Jet energy measurement with the ATLAS detector in proton-proton collisions at root s=7 TeV

The jet energy scale and its systematic uncertainty are determined for jets measured with the ATLAS detector at the LHC in proton-proton collision data at a centre-of-mass energy of √s = 7TeV corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 38 pb-1. Jets are reconstructed with the anti-kt algorithm with distance parameters R=0. 4 or R=0. 6. Jet energy and angle corrections are determined from Monte Carlo simulations to calibrate jets with transverse momenta pT≥20 GeV and pseudorapidities {pipe}η{pipe}<4. 5. The jet energy systematic uncertainty is estimated using the single isolated hadron response measured in situ and in test-beams, exploiting the transverse momentum balance between central and forward jets in events with dijet topologies and studying systematic variations in Monte Carlo simulations. The jet energy uncertainty is less than 2. 5 % in the central calorimeter region ({pipe}η{pipe}<0. 8) for jets with 60≤pT<800 GeV, and is maximally 14 % for pT<30 GeV in the most forward region 3. 2≤{pipe}η{pipe}<4. 5. The jet energy is validated for jet transverse momenta up to 1 TeV to the level of a few percent using several in situ techniques by comparing a well-known reference such as the recoiling photon pT, the sum of the transverse momenta of tracks associated to the jet, or a system of low-pT jets recoiling against a high-pT jet. More sophisticated jet calibration schemes are presented based on calorimeter cell energy density weighting or hadronic properties of jets, aiming for an improved jet energy resolution and a reduced flavour dependence of the jet response. The systematic uncertainty of the jet energy determined from a combination of in situ techniques is consistent with the one derived from single hadron response measurements over a wide kinematic range. The nominal corrections and uncertainties are derived for isolated jets in an inclusive sample of high-pT jets. Special cases such as event topologies with close-by jets, or selections of samples with an enhanced content of jets originating from light quarks, heavy quarks or gluons are also discussed and the corresponding uncertainties are determined. © 2013 CERN for the benefit of the ATLAS collaboration

Measurement of the inclusive and dijet cross-sections of b-jets in pp collisions at sqrt(s) = 7 TeV with the ATLAS detector

The inclusive and dijet production cross-sections have been measured for jets containing b-hadrons (b-jets) in proton-proton collisions at a centre-of-mass energy of sqrt(s) = 7 TeV, using the ATLAS detector at the LHC. The measurements use data corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 34 pb^-1. The b-jets are identified using either a lifetime-based method, where secondary decay vertices of b-hadrons in jets are reconstructed using information from the tracking detectors, or a muon-based method where the presence of a muon is used to identify semileptonic decays of b-hadrons inside jets. The inclusive b-jet cross-section is measured as a function of transverse momentum in the range 20 < pT < 400 GeV and rapidity in the range |y| < 2.1. The bbbar-dijet cross-section is measured as a function of the dijet invariant mass in the range 110 < m_jj < 760 GeV, the azimuthal angle difference between the two jets and the angular variable chi in two dijet mass regions. The results are compared with next-to-leading-order QCD predictions. Good agreement is observed between the measured cross-sections and the predictions obtained using POWHEG + Pythia. MC@NLO + Herwig shows good agreement with the measured bbbar-dijet cross-section. However, it does not reproduce the measured inclusive cross-section well, particularly for central b-jets with large transverse momenta.Comment: 10 pages plus author list (21 pages total), 8 figures, 1 table, final version published in European Physical Journal

Search for the neutral Higgs bosons of the minimal supersymmetric standard model in pp collisions at root s=7 TeV with the ATLAS detector

A search for neutral Higgs bosons of the Minimal Supersymmetric Standard Model (MSSM) is reported. The analysis is based on a sample of proton-proton collisions at a centre-of-mass energy of 7TeV recorded with the ATLAS detector at the Large Hadron Collider. The data were recorded in 2011 and correspond to an integrated luminosity of 4.7 fb-1 to 4.8 fb-1. Higgs boson decays into oppositely-charged muon or τ lepton pairs are considered for final states requiring either the presence or absence of b-jets. No statistically significant excess over the expected background is observed and exclusion limits at the 95% confidence level are derived. The exclusion limits are for the production cross-section of a generic neutral Higgs boson, φ, as a function of the Higgs boson mass and for h/A/H production in the MSSM as a function of the parameters mA and tan β in the mhmax scenario for mA in the range of 90GeV to 500 GeV. Copyright CERN