Neonatal Abstinence Syndrome and Infant Hearing Assessment: A Kids’ Inpatient Database Review

Objective: Neonatal abstinence syndrome (NAS) has become an epidemic. This study assesses documented rates of failed newborn hearing screening (NBHS) or hearing loss diagnosis (HL) in NAS infants, and sociodemographic factors associated with abnormal inpatient hearing results. Methods: The 2016 HCUP/KID national database was used to identify a weighted sample of infants with failed NBHS/HL during birth hospitalization. Independent variables included diagnoses of NAS/in-utero opioid exposure, HL risk factor presence and sociodemographic data. Univariate analyses and multivariate logistic regression were used to determine associations between NAS and abnormal hearing assessment. Results:NAS infants had lower odds ratio (OR) of documented failed NBHS (OR=0.76, p Conclusion: NAS children have lower rates of inpatient documented failed NBHS and higher rates of HL diagnosis. The complex medical care of these infants could complicate NBHS, documentation, and subsequent follow-up. Certain sociodemographic factors result in a higher risk of hearing loss

A cross-sectional study of peripartum blood transfusion in the Eastern Cape, South Africa

Background. Obstetric haemorrhage (OH) remains a major contributor to maternal morbidity and mortality. Blood transfusion is critical in OH management; yet, data on peripartum transfusion are lacking. A pilot study reported high rates of peripartum transfusion in a sample of South African (SA) hospitals, which was independently associated with HIV status.Objectives. To assess the incidence of peripartum transfusion in a sample of Eastern Cape, SA hospitals to evaluate generalisability of preceding study findings.Methods. Hospital chart reviews were conducted of all deliveries at three large regional hospitals from February to June 2013. Additional clinical data were collected for patients who sustained OH and/or were transfused.Results. A total of 7 234 women were enrolled in the study; 1 988 (27.5%) were HIV-positive. Of the 767 HIV-positive women with a CD4 count <350 cells/μL, 86.0% were on full antiretroviral therapy and 9.9% received drugs for prevention of mother-to-child transmission. The overall transfusion rate was 3.2%, with significant variability by hospital: Frere Hospital (1.5%), Dora Nginza Hospital (3.8%) and Cecilia Makiwane Hospital (4.6%). The number of red blood cell units per transfused patient and per delivery varied significantly by hospital. Bivariate analysis showed significant association between transfusion and HIV status. In a multivariate analysis, controlling for OH, age, mode of delivery, gestational age, parity and birthweight, this association (odds ratio 1.45; 95% confidence interval 0.78 - 2.71) was no longer significant.Conclusion. These findings confirm high rates of peripartum transfusion in SA. While this can be possibly ascribed to variability in practice and patient profile, variation in care and improvement in HIV treatment should be considered

Energy cost and return for hunting in African wild dogs and Cheetahs

African wild dogs (Lycaon pictus) are reported to hunt with energetically costly long chase distances. We used high-resolution GPS and inertial technology to record 1,119 high-speed chases of all members of a pack of six adult African wild dogs in northern Botswana. Dogs performed multiple short, high-speed, mostly unsuccessful chases to capture prey, while cheetahs (Acinonyx jubatus) undertook even shorter, higher-speed hunts. We used an energy balance model to show that the energy return from group hunting and feeding substantially outweighs the cost of multiple short chases, which indicates that African wild dogs are more energetically robust than previously believed. Comparison with cheetah illustrates the trade-off between sheer athleticism and high individual kill rate characteristic of cheetahs, and the energetic robustness of frequent opportunistic group hunting and feeding by African wild dogs

Dynamics of direct inter-pack encounters in endangered African wild dogs

Aggressive encounters may have important life history consequences due to the potential for injury and death, disease transmission, dispersal opportunities or exclusion from key areas of the home range. Despite this, little is known of their detailed dynamics, mainly due to the difficulties of directly observing encounters in detail. Here, we describe detailed spatial dynamics of inter-pack encounters in African wild dogs (Lycaon pictus), using data from custom-built high-resolution GPS collars in 11 free-ranging packs. On average, each pack encountered another pack approximately every 7 weeks and met each neighbour twice each year. Surprisingly, intruders were more likely to win encounters (winning 78.6% of encounters by remaining closer to the site in the short term). However, intruders did tend to move farther than residents toward their own range core in the short-term (1 h) post-encounter, and if this were used to indicate losing an encounter, then the majority (73.3%) of encounters were won by residents. Surprisingly, relative pack size had little effect on encounter outcome, and injuries were rare (<15% of encounters). These results highlight the difficulty of remotely scoring encounters involving mobile participants away from static defendable food resources. Although inter-pack range overlap was reduced following an encounter, encounter outcome did not seem to drive this, as both packs shifted their ranges post-encounter. Our results indicate that inter-pack encounters may be lower risk than previously suggested and do not appear to influence long-term movement and ranging

Gradient language dominance affects talker learning

Traditional conceptions of spoken language assume that speech recognition and talker identification are computed separately. Neuropsychological and neuroimaging studies imply some separation between the two faculties, but recent perceptual studies suggest better talker recognition in familiar languages than unfamiliar languages. A familiar-language benefit in talker recognition potentially implies strong ties between the two domains. However, little is known about the nature of this language familiarity effect. The current study investigated the relationship between speech and talker processing by assessing bilingual and monolingual listeners' ability to learn voices as a function of language familiarity and age of acquisition. Two effects emerged. First, bilinguals learned to recognize talkers in their first language (Korean) more rapidly than they learned to recognize talkers in their second language (English), while English-speaking participants showed the opposite pattern (learning English talkers faster than Korean talkers). Second, bilinguals' learning rate for talkers in their second language (English) correlated with age of English acquisition. Taken together, these results suggest that language background materially affects talker encoding, implying a tight relationship between speech and talker representations

Mitigating Scoring Errors in Microsatellite Data from Wild Populations

Microsatellite data are widely used to test ecological and evolutionary hypotheses in wild populations. In this paper, we consider three typical sources of scoring errors capable of biasing biological conclusions: stuttering, large-allele dropout and null alleles. We describe methods to detect errors and propose conventions to mitigate scoring errors and report error rates in studies of wild populations. Finally, we discuss potential bias in ecological or evolutionary conclusions based on data sets containing these scoring errors

Differential processing of consonants and vowels in the auditory modality: A cross-linguistic study

International audienceFollowing the proposal by Nespor, Peña, and Mehler (2003) that consonants are more important in constraining lexical access than vowels, New, Araújo, and Nazzi (2008) demonstrated in a visual priming experiment that primes sharing consonants (jalu-JOLI) facilitate lexical access while primes sharing vowels do not (vobi-JOLI). The present study explores if this asymmetry can be extended to the auditory modality and whether language input plays a critical role as developmental studies suggest. Our experiments tested French and English as target languages and showed that consonantal information facilitated lexical decision to a greater extent than vocalic information, suggesting that the consonant advantage is independent of the language’s distributional properties. However, vowels are also facilitatory, in specific cases, with iambic English CVCV or French CVCV words. This effect is related to the preservation of the rhyme between the prime and the target (here, the final vowel), suggesting that the rhyme, in addition to consonant information and consonant skeleton information is an important unit in auditory phonological priming and spoken word recognition

Beyond aggression: Androgen-receptor blockade modulates social interaction in wild meerkats

In male vertebrates, androgens are inextricably linked to reproduction, social dominance, and aggression, often at the cost of paternal investment or prosociality. Testosterone is invoked to explain rank-related reproductive differences, but its role within a status class, particularly among subordinates, is underappreciated. Recent evidence, especially for monogamous and cooperatively breeding species, suggests broader androgenic mediation of adult social interaction. We explored the actions of androgens in subordinate, male members of a cooperatively breeding species, the meerkat (Suricata suricatta). Although male meerkats show no rank-related testosterone differences, subordinate helpers rarely reproduce. We blocked androgen receptors, in the field, by treating subordinate males with the antiandrogen, flutamide. We monitored androgen concentrations (via baseline serum and time-sequential fecal sampling) and recorded behavior within their groups (via focal observation). Relative to controls, flutamide-treated animals initiated less and received more high-intensity aggression (biting, threatening, feeding competition), engaged in more prosocial behavior (social sniffing, grooming, huddling), and less frequently initiated play or assumed a ‘dominant’ role during play, revealing significant androgenic effects across a broad range of social behavior. By contrast, guarding or vigilance and measures of olfactory and vocal communication in subordinate males appeared unaffected by flutamide treatment. Thus, androgens in male meerkat helpers are aligned with the traditional trade-off between promoting reproductive and aggressive behavior at a cost to affiliation. Our findings, based on rare endocrine manipulation in wild mammals, show a more pervasive role for androgens in adult social behavior than is often recognized, with possible relevance for understanding tradeoffs in cooperative systems