Childhood Obesity

Currently, the prevalence of obesity among children and adolescents and related complications is considered one of the most important nutritional problems globally. The prevalence of childhood obesity in Europe is 10 times higher now than it was in the 1970s. Initial assessments of these patients should include taking a careful history (investigating comorbidities, family history and potentially modifiable behaviors) and physical examination. The degree of investigation is dependent on the patient\u27s age and severity of obesity, the findings on history and physical examination and associated familial risk factors. Childhood obesity treatment is based on sustained lifestyle changes with family involvement. Management intervention strategies include nutrition, physical activity, behavior and lifestyle changes, medication and surgical considerations

Obesity management in Prader-Willi syndrome in children

Universitatea de Medicină și Farmacie „Grigore T. Popa”, Disciplina Pediatrie, Facultatea de Medicină, Iași, RomâniaObezitatea este o boală cronică cu determinism multifactorial și una dintre cele mai importante cauze de morbiditate și mortalitate prematură. Sindroamele genetice sunt principala cauză de obezitate morbidă la vârsta pediatrică. Sindromul Prader-Willi (PWS) este considerat cea mai frecventă cauză genetică a obezității, care apare cu o frecvență de 1: 10.000-1: 30.000 de nou-născuți vii. PWS se caracterizează printr-un apetit excesiv care duce la obezitate severă. Pacienții cu PWS prezintă multe complicații legate de obezitate: diabet zaharat, sindrom metabolic, apnee de somn, insuficiență respiratorie și boli cardiovasculare. În zilele noastre, mecanismele hiperfagiei din PWS nu sunt complet cunoscute și nici un tratament medical nu și-a dovedit eficacitatea în controlul apetitului. În absența supravegherii riguroase a aportului alimentar și în lipsa activității fizice, pacienții cu PWS au o greutate de peste două ori mai mare decât greutatea ideală. Îmbunătățirea controlului greutății rămâne cel mai important obiectiv al oricărui program de tratament în PWS, dar gestionarea obezității la acești pacienți nu este deloc ușoară. Restricționarea aportului de alimente, activitatea fizică și managementul comportamental sunt fundamentale pentru prevenirea și gestionarea obezității în PWS. Deci, tratamentul acestor pacienți necesită o abordare multidisciplinară a obezității și a complicațiilor acesteia, pentru a îmbunătăți calitatea vieții atât a pacienților, cât și a familiei acestora.Obesity is a chronic and multi-factorial disease and one of the most important causes of morbidity and premature mortality. Genetic syndromes are the common cause of morbid obesity in pediatric age. Prader-Willi syndrome (PWS) is considered the most common genetic cause of obesity, occurring in 1:10,000-1:30,000 live births. PWS is characterized by excessive appetite leading to severe obesity. PWS patients presented many complications related to obesity, including diabetes mellitus, metabolic syndrome, sleep apnea, respiratory insufficiency, and cardiovascular disease. Nowadays, the hyperphagia’s mechanisms in PWS are not completely discovered and date no medical treatment has proven their efficacy in controlling appetite. In the absence of rigorous supervision of food intake and lack of physical activity, PWS patients weigh is more than twice their ideal body weight. Improvement in weight control remains the most important goal of any PWS treatment program, but the management of obesity in these patients is not easy. The dietary restriction, physical activity, and behavior management are fundamental in the prevention and management of obesity in PWS. So, the treatment of these patients requires a multidisciplinary approach of obesity and its complications, in order to improve the quality of life both of patients and family

Eating habits in school-age children

University of Medicine and Pharmacy „Grigore T. Popa”, Iasi, RomaniaAdopting a healthy lifestyle at childhood would reduce a number of conditions with a great influence on the quality of life, as we can recall obesity and malnutrition. Diet can be both a primary cause of a disease and a protective factor against it. The school-age child can be very easily influenced in one direction by class, teacher, family or media. That is why the education and advice received at this age are very important, as they can „cut off the roots” the possible health problems that could change the whole life course. In view of these considerations, we have focused on the analysis of the nutrition of the school-age children in order to identify non-healthy eating habits and their influence on the nutritional status. Methods: We evaluated the eating habits on a cohort of 270 children aged 7 to 15 from an urban school in Romania. We applied KIDMED questionnaire, by Serra-Majem et al. (2004), comprised of 16 questions with dichotomous response possibilities (YES / NO). Results: Of the study group, 91.48% responded that they consume fresh fruit or fresh fruit juice daily, while 8.51% responded negatively. At second item of the questionnaire, ‘’if they eat more than a fruit by day’’, only 68.51% of the children gave a positive answer. Answer to the question „if they eat once a day a vegetable was positive in 82.59% of cases and negative in 17.40%, but only 57.50 % of the study group eats more than one vegetable by day. From the study group 42.22% of children are not eating breakfast. 66.29% of children eat cereals/cereals products at breakfast, 61.11% of them are eating milk/milk based products at breakfast and 23.70% are eating pastry at breakfast. 36.66% of the study group eats more than once a week fast-food and 52.96% of them eat more than once a day sugar and sweets. 52.59 % of children declared that they eat olive oil at home. Conclusions: A high number of children have unhealthy habits in schools. School-based programs can play an important role in promoting lifelong healthy eating

LIVER DISEASE IN CHILDREN WITH CYSTIC FIBROSIS

Liver disease is an early complication in children with cystic fi brosis (CF).The clinical manifestations in hepatobiliary disease of CF include neonatal cholestasis, liver steatosis, liver fi brosis, biliary lithiasis, focal biliary cirrhosis and multilobular cirrhosis, with or without portal hypertension. Changes in the tests evaluating the liver function are inconsistent and are not correlated with the severity of the liver lesions. The diagnosis of liver disease in CF requires the presence of at least two of the following four diagnosis criteria:clinical manifestations, pathologic liver function tests, ultrasound and histologic changes.The annual follow-up to evaluate the liver function is s recommended for diagnosis of asymptomatic liver disease and early initiation of treatment with ursodeoxycholic acid.The improvement of the liver function infl uences life quality and increases the survival rate in patients with CF

Network analytics for drug repurposing in COVID-19

To better understand the potential of drug repurposing in COVID-19, we analyzed control strategies over essential host factors for SARS-CoV-2 infection. We constructed comprehensive directed protein–protein interaction (PPI) networks integrating the top-ranked host factors, the drug target proteins and directed PPI data. We analyzed the networks to identify drug targets and combinations thereof that offer efficient control over the host factors. We validated our findings against clinical studies data and bioinformatics studies. Our method offers a new insight into the molecular details of the disease and into potentially new therapy targets for it. Our approach for drug repurposing is significant beyond COVID-19 and may be applied also to other diseases.</p

Research and Science Today No. 1(5)/2013

Research and Science Today Journal is a publication founded in 2011 and it is dedicated to the students of all levels (license, master and doctoral) of faculties in the country and abroad. We want to offer the participants the opportunity to present their scientific works in the following areas: Social Sciences, Economic Sciences, Legal Sciences, Humanities, Education Sciences, Engineering, Medicine and Sport. This journal provides students the opportunity to create and/or to improve their abilities to write scientific papers. So each appearance (two appearances per year at which we can add supplements) contains a number of papers written by students, masters and doctoral from the faculties from the country or/and abroad. The journal promotes original studies contributing to the progress of knowledge and it is motivated by the need to address issues of theory and practice in the areas mentioned above

Research and Science Today No. 1(5)/2013

Research and Science Today Journal is a publication founded in 2011 and it is dedicated to the students of all levels (license, master and doctoral) of faculties in the country and abroad. We want to offer the participants the opportunity to present their scientific works in the following areas: Social Sciences, Economic Sciences, Legal Sciences, Humanities, Education Sciences, Engineering, Medicine and Sport. This journal provides students the opportunity to create and/or to improve their abilities to write scientific papers. So each appearance (two appearances per year at which we can add supplements) contains a number of papers written by students, masters and doctoral from the faculties from the country or/and abroad. The journal promotes original studies contributing to the progress of knowledge and it is motivated by the need to address issues of theory and practice in the areas mentioned above

Research and Science Today No. 1(5)/2013

Research and Science Today Journal is a publication founded in 2011 and it is dedicated to the students of all levels (license, master and doctoral) of faculties in the country and abroad. We want to offer the participants the opportunity to present their scientific works in the following areas: Social Sciences, Economic Sciences, Legal Sciences, Humanities, Education Sciences, Engineering, Medicine and Sport. This journal provides students the opportunity to create and/or to improve their abilities to write scientific papers. So each appearance (two appearances per year at which we can add supplements) contains a number of papers written by students, masters and doctoral from the faculties from the country or/and abroad. The journal promotes original studies contributing to the progress of knowledge and it is motivated by the need to address issues of theory and practice in the areas mentioned above

Insulin Pump Therapy Efficacy and Key Factors Influencing Adherence in Pediatric Population&mdash;A Narrative Review

Objective: we aimed to highlight the state of the art in terms of pediatric population adherence to insulin pumps. This study intends to underline the significance of identifying and minimizing, to the greatest extent feasible, the factors that adversely affect the juvenile population&rsquo;s adherence to insulin pump therapy. Materials and methods: articles from PubMed, Embase, and Science Direct databases were evaluated using the following search terms: adherence, pump insulin therapy, children, pediatric population, and type 1 diabetes, in combination with several synonyms such as compliance, treatment adherence, pump adherence, patient dropouts, and treatment refusal. Results: A better glycemic control is connected to a better adherence to diabetes management. We identify, enumerate, and discuss a number of variables which make it difficult to follow an insulin pump therapy regimen. Several key factors might improve adherence to insulin pump therapy: efficient communication between care provider and patients (including home-based video-visits), continuous diabetes education, family support and parental involvement, as well as informational, practical assistance, and emotional support from the society. Conclusions: every cause and obstacle that prevents young patients from adhering to insulin pumps optimally is an opportunity for intervention to improve glycemic control and, as a result, their quality of life

IMPACTUL INFECŢIEI CU STAPHYLOCOCCUS AUREUS ASUPRA EVOLUŢIEI FIBROZEI CHISTICE LA COPIII DINTR-UN CENTRU REGIONAL DIN NORD-ESTUL ROMÂNIEI

Introducere. Infecţiile bacteriene cronice şi, adesea, exacerbările infecţioase acute sunt caracteristice bolii pulmonare din fi broza chistică (FC). Obiectivul studiului a fost reprezentat de identifi carea copiilor cu FC, depistarea infecţiei cu Staphylococcus aureus la aceşti bolnavi şi cuantifi carea impactului infecţiei asupra statusului clinic. Material şi metodă. S-a realizat un studiu prospectiv pe o perioadă de 3 ani pe un lot de 37 de copii cu FC afl aţi în evidenţa Centrului Regional din Clinica III Pediatrie Iaşi, România. La aceşti bolnavi s-a urmărit prezenţa S. aureus, prevalenţa tulpinilor de S.aureus meticilino-rezistente (SAMR), impactul infecţiei cronice cu SAMR asupra funcţiei pulmonare concomitent cu prezenţa unor elemente de severitate în FC. Rezultate. 22 de pacienţi dintre cei 37 cu FC au prezentat culturi pozitive pentru S. aureus; la 9 dintre aceştia s-a izolat SAMR, 5 având infecţie cronicǎ. Grupul SAMR pozitiv a prezentat valori semnifi cativ mai mici ale volumului de gaz expirat în prima secundǎ a expirului forţat (FEV1), status nutriţional mai precar, bronşiectazii severe, un număr mai mare de exacerbări pulmonare şi implicit de spitalizări, insufi cienţă pancreatică în majoritatea cazurilor şi o asociere mai mare cu genotipul F508del. Concluzii. S. aureus rămâne un patogen important în FC. Din cauza patogenicităţii sale crescute, S. aureus şi în special tulpinile SAMR pot contribui la evoluţie clinică nefavorabilă