http://medicalxpress.com/ en-us Medical Xpress internet news portal provides the latest news on Health and Medicine. In a study of mice, researchers at Johns Hopkins have identified a new molecular pathway involved in the growth of tiny air sacs called alveoli that are crucial for breathing. The scientists say their experiments may lead to the first successful treatments to regrow the air sacs in people who suffer from diseases such as emphysema in which the air sacs have been destroyed by years of smoking. The work may also suggest new therapy for premature infants born before their lungs are fully developed. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2013-02-air-sacs-mouse-emphysema-growth.html Medical research Thu, 14 Feb 2013 17:10:01 EST news280083445 Study in the American Journal of Physiology-Gastrointestinal and Liver Physiology addresses critical component of problem affecting infants with necrotizing enterocolitis. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2013-02-probiotic-derived-treatment-premature-babies.html Medical research Wed, 13 Feb 2013 16:40:06 EST news279994337 New research in Nature concludes the eye – which depends on light to see – also needs light to develop normally during pregnancy. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2013-01-exposure-pregnancy-key-eye.html Ophthalmology Wed, 16 Jan 2013 13:00:05 EST news277561226 (HealthDay)—Varizig (varicella zoster immune globulin) has been approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration to minimize chickenpox symptoms when administered within four days of exposure to the virus that causes the disease. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-12-varizig-chickenpox-symptoms.html Medications Sat, 22 Dec 2012 17:50:01 EST news275416479 Babies born prematurely are at higher risk of having a lower IQ and impaired cognitive and motor skills. Programs aimed at helping these infants and their families once they leave the hospital have been found to increase IQ in the period up to school age and provide lasting improvements in cognitive skills, finds a new review in The Cochrane Library. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-12-early-intervention-premature-infants-iq.html Pediatrics Fri, 21 Dec 2012 09:20:01 EST news275303080 Free fatty acids created during the digestion of infant formula cause cellular death that may contribute to necrotizing enterocolitis, a severe intestinal condition that is often fatal and occurs most commonly in premature infants, according to a study by University of California, San Diego bioengineers. Their report, which was based on in vitro tests comparing the digestion of fresh human breast milk and nine different infant formulas, was published online in the journal Pediatric Research. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-12-vitro-digested-formula-breast-toxic.html Pediatrics Mon, 10 Dec 2012 11:50:50 EST news274362640 (Medical Xpress)—Some infants are more susceptible to potentially life-threatening breathing problems after birth, and rare, inherited DNA differences may explain why, according to research at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-11-gene-linked-respiratory-distress-babies.html Pediatrics Tue, 27 Nov 2012 12:17:55 EST news273241063 (HealthDay)—For stable, preterm infants, daily massage therapy (MT) is positively associated with higher natural killer (NK) cell cytotoxicity and weight gain, according to a study published online Nov. 12 in Pediatrics. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-11-massage-therapy-immunity-preterm-infants.html Pediatrics Tue, 13 Nov 2012 17:20:03 EST news272048422 (Medical Xpress)—Premature infants are born into a world their tiny bodies often are not ready for. Developmental differences between those babies and full-term infants often are apparent prior to a preemie's discharge from the neonatal intensive care unit (NICU), researchers at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis have documented. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-11-documents-preemies-nicu-early-interventions.html Pediatrics Thu, 08 Nov 2012 06:07:59 EST news271577270 Every week, 150 bobwhite quail eggs arrive in the mail for Robert Lickliter, professor and director of graduate studies in the Psychology Department at FIU. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-11-preterm-infant-ease-entrance-world.html Health Fri, 02 Nov 2012 11:15:24 EST news271073698 For the last decade, prematurity has been the leading cause of infant mortality in the United States. As a result of prematurity many infants enter this world too early with a small chance of survival. In order to help treat these extremely premature infants, physicians at Nationwide Children's Hospital developed a set of guidelines tailored to meet the needs of these tiny infants, some born up to four months early. Now, a new study shows that these guidelines are not only improving survival rates for extremely premature infants, but also improving their quality of life. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-10-guidelines-extremely-premature-infants-nch.html Pediatrics Wed, 31 Oct 2012 16:11:46 EST news270918670 Adding the right prebiotic to the diets of pediatric patients with intestinal failure could replace intravenous feeding, says a new University of Illinois study. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-10-prebiotic-patients-intestinal-failure-gut.html Medical research Mon, 15 Oct 2012 16:21:15 EST news269536866 Kangaroo Mother Care—a technique in which a breastfed premature infant remains in skin-to-skin contact with the parent's chest rather than being placed in an incubator—has lasting positive impact on brain development, revealed Université Laval researchers in the October issue of Acta Paediatrica. Very premature infants who benefited from this technique had better brain functioning in adolescence—comparable to that of adolescents born at term—than did premature infants placed in incubators. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-09-preemies-brains-reap-long-term-benefits.html Pediatrics Wed, 19 Sep 2012 11:11:15 EST news267271836 Retinopathy of prematurity (ROP) is the second most common cause of childhood blindness in the United States, occurring in half of premature infants born earlier than or at 28 weeks gestational age. The condition is caused by abnormal blood vessel development in the retina of the eye. ROP risk increases with decreasing gestational age. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-06-antioxidant-shown-extremely-premature-babies.html Pediatrics Fri, 15 Jun 2012 01:00:01 EST news258913754 Cerebral damage and retinopathy of prematurity appear to be independently associated with visual impairment among preschool children who were born extremely premature, according to a report published Online First by Archives of Ophthalmology. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-06-factors-visual-impairment-preschool-children.html Ophthalmology Mon, 11 Jun 2012 15:58:29 EST news258649093 (HealthDay) -- Maternal smoking has been identified as a risk factor associated with the development of necrotizing enterocolitis (NEC) in premature infants, according to a study published June 11 in Pediatrics. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-06-preemies-maternal-tied-necrotizing-enterocolitis.html Pediatrics Mon, 11 Jun 2012 13:36:53 EST news258640517 (Medical Xpress) -- In parts of the world without reliable electricity, a pedal-powered nebulizer could provide life-saving asthma treatments. Small wax-filled sleeping bags could keep premature infants warm. A salad spinner centrifuge for blood samples could help clinicians diagnose anemia. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-04-students-wiki-medical-devices-low-income.html Other Tue, 24 Apr 2012 08:38:58 EST news254475530 From the 31st week of pregnancy, preterm babies are capable of recognizing with one hand an object they have already explored with the other. This ability, known as "intermanual transfer", has been demonstrated in premature infants by a team from the Laboratoire de Psychologie et Neurocognition in collaboration with the Laboratoire de Psychologie de la Perception and the CHU de Grenoble. These results show that the corpus callosum, also known as the colossal commissure, i.e. the brain structure involved in information transfer, is functional from this early age. This work has been published online, on the journal Child Development's website. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-04-left-premature-babies-link.html Psychology & Psychiatry Thu, 12 Apr 2012 07:20:01 EST news253433224 Late gestation is a busy time for babies getting ready for life outside the womb, particularly for functions critical to life such as breathing and maintaining an adequate heartbeat. These two functions are connected in mature infants and healthy people throughout life, so measuring their level of connectedness can give doctors a cue about whether an infant is ready to head home or needs to remain in the care of the neonatal intensive care unit (NICU). Current methods to analyze this connection are not yet fully developed, leaving doctors and nurses without an optimal way to deal with periodically missing data or natural variations in breathing or heartbeat. Now, however, researchers in Virginia have found a way around this problem by using a new analytical method that looks for so-called cardiorespiratory interaction using individual breaths and heartbeats and relating the two in time. The findings shed light on which infants may be mature enough to leave the NICU, showing that postnatal age seems to be an indicator of maturity, but birth weight or gestational age at birth are not. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-03-analysis-premature-infants-heartbeats-cues.html Health Mon, 26 Mar 2012 16:25:03 EST news251997884 (HealthDay) -- When parents of very small premature infants are stressed or depressed, their children are more likely to develop behavioral problems by age 3, according to new research. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-03-stressed-parents-affect-preemie-behavior.html Psychology & Psychiatry Fri, 16 Mar 2012 06:00:03 EST news251093614 Many premature infants throughout the United States continue to receive inhaled nitric oxide (iNO) during their NICU stay, despite the lack of evidence to support its use. Whether or not a preemie will receive iNO treatment, when and for how long, varies greatly throughout the country, as its use in premature infants appears to be unstandardized. These are the findings of a Nationwide Children's Hospital study appearing in the journal Pediatrics. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-03-preemies-inhaled-nitric-oxide-lack.html Health Mon, 12 Mar 2012 14:11:03 EST news250780257 When babies are born prematurely, they are thrust into a hospital environment that while highly successful at saving their lives, is not exactly the same as the mother's womb where ideal development occurs. The Neonatal Intensive Care Unit (NICU) is equipped with highly skilled care givers and incubators that regulate temperature and humidity, but Amir Lahav, ScD, PhD, director of the Neonatal Research Lab at Brigham and Women's Hospital (BWH) thought that something was missing - simulation of the maternal sounds that a baby would hear in the womb. Now, new research conducted by Lahav and colleagues links exposure to an audio recording of mom's heartbeat and her voice to lower incidence of cardiorespiratory events in preterm infants. This research is published online in The Journal of Maternal-Fetal and Neonatal Medicine. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-03-mom-voice-health-premature-babies.html Health Thu, 08 Mar 2012 11:20:01 EST news250426209 Scientists at University College Dublin have discovered a new way of measuring the potential success rate of an embryo before it is transferred back into the womb during in vitro fertilisation (IVF). http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-02-successful-ivf-embryos-scientists.html Obstetrics & gynaecology Wed, 29 Feb 2012 10:10:14 EST news249732608 New study suggests that baby rats deprived of oxygen, but kept warm, had bigger swings in glucose and insulin, metabolic and physiologic effects that could increase the chances of brain damage. Findings could have implications for premature infants, who often suffer from hypoxia. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-02-oxygen-deprived-baby-rats-fare-worse.html Medical research Mon, 13 Feb 2012 16:19:42 EST news248372358 In a study to be presented today at the Society for Maternal-Fetal Medicine's annual meeting, The Pregnancy Meeting, in Dallas, Texas, researchers will report that early transplantation of human placenta-derived mesenchymal stem cells into the lateral ventricles of neonatal rats with birth-related brain damage is possible, and that the donor cells can survive and migrate in the recipient's brain. The study was designed to have the rat's brain damage mimic brain injury in infants with very low birth weight. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-02-neurologic-rats-stem-cell-transplant.html Medical research Fri, 10 Feb 2012 06:20:01 EST news248073922 (Medical Xpress) -- Premature infants often do better at home than in hospitals. The relationships with parents and siblings are more natural, and they run a lower risk of contracting contagious diseases than at the hospital. With the new Internet service developed and tested by Chalmers, patients can be at home and at the same time get better follow-up and maintain a dialog with caring staff. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2011-12-internet-newborns-chronically-ill.html Health Mon, 19 Dec 2011 08:50:43 EST news243507033 At birth, Melinda Star Guido was so tiny she could fit into the palm of her doctor's hand. Weighing just 9 1/2 ounces - less than a soda can - she is among the smallest babies ever born in the world. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2011-12-palm-sized-baby-2nd-smallest.html Health Thu, 15 Dec 2011 05:01:21 EST news243147330 Peter Steyger's research on hearing is very personal. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2011-12-ground-drug-induced-deafness.html Health Thu, 01 Dec 2011 09:50:01 EST news241954860 Many premature infants suffer a life-threatening destruction of intestinal tissue called necrotizing enterocolitis (NEC). http://medicalxpress.com/news/2011-11-life-threatening-condition-preemies-linked-blood.html Medical research Mon, 21 Nov 2011 16:53:44 EST news241116813 A detailed study from Malawi, published in this week's PLoS Medicine, shows that during the first 2 years of life, infants who were born prematurely (before 37 weeks gestation) continue to have a higher risk of death than infants born at term and are also more likely to have poorer growth and developmental delay. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2011-11-surviving-premature-babies-malawi-poor.html Health Tue, 08 Nov 2011 17:58:33 EST news239997504