Disturbance of Glucose Homeostasis After Pediatric Cardiac Surgery

This study aimed to evaluate the time course of perioperative blood glucose levels of children undergoing cardiac surgery for congenital heart disease in relation to endogenous stress hormones, inflammatory mediators, and exogenous factors such as caloric intake and glucocorticoid use. The study prospectively included 49 children undergoing cardiac surgery. Blood glucose levels, hormonal alterations, and inflammatory responses were investigated before and at the end of surgery, then 12 and 24 h afterward. In general, blood glucose levels were highest at the end of surgery. Hyperglycemia, defined as a glucose level higher than 8.3 mmol/l (>150 mg/dl) was present in 52% of the children at the end of surgery. Spontaneous normalization of blood glucose occurred in 94% of the children within 24 h. During surgery, glucocorticoids were administered to 65% of the children, and this was the main factor associated with hyperglycemia at the end of surgery (determined by univariate analysis of variance). Hyperglycemia disappeared spontaneously without insulin therapy after 12–24 h for the majority of the children. Postoperative morbidity was low in the study group, so the presumed positive effects of glucocorticoids seemed to outweigh the adverse effects of iatrogenic hyperglycemia

Recognition of familiar objects is impaired by contrast reversal

Previous research has shown that faces are difficult to recognize when viewed in reverse contrast (Galper, 1970). In a previous study, we demonstrated that the contrast reversal effect can also be found with a set of non-face novel objects (Peissig et al., 2003), and that the effect was significantly greater for faces and novel objects with nonuniform surface texture than those with uniform surface texture. Here, we tested observers in a within-category, same/different sequential-matching task using gray scale images of common objects. We found a significant contrast effect for these common objects, indicating that the contrast reversal effect is not specific to faces or face-like stimuli

Efficacy and Safety of a Tight Glucose Control Protocol in Critically Ill Term Neonates

Background: A large single-center randomized trial showed that treating hyperglycemia in critically ill children improved outcome, despite an increased incidence of hypoglycemia, especially in infants. Objectives: We evaluated the efficacy and incidence of hypoglycemia using a tight glucose protocol in critically ill term neonates. Methods: Term hyperglycemic (>8 mmol·l -1; >144 mg·dl -1) neonates treated with a tight glucose protocol during a 3.5-year period