The objective of this study was to determine blood lead levels (BLLs) and the possible sources of exposure in the population of Kinshasa, the capital of the Democratic Republic of Congo. A cross-sectional survey was carried out from January to May 2008 in a representative sample of the Kinshasan population. ...

Objectives. To improve our understanding of climate variability and diarrheal disease at the community level and inform predictions for future climate change scenarios, we examined whether the El Niño climate pattern is associated with increased rates of diarrhea among Peruvian children. Methods. We analyzed daily surveillance data for 367 children ...

Objective. To determine whether a relationship exists between asthma exacerbations among elementary school children and daily upper-air observations (temperature, relative humidity, dew point, and mixing ratio) and, if so, to derive a mathematical model that predicts asthma exacerbations among children. Methods. Using an ecological study design, school health records of ...

OBJECTIVE: We sought to identify risk factors for mortality in a large clinical cohort of children with abusive head trauma. STUDY DESIGN: Bivariate analysis and multivariable logistic regression models identified demographic, physical examination, and radiologic findings associated with in-hospital mortality of children with abusive head trauma at 4 pediatric centers. ...

BACKGROUND: While exposures to urban fine particulate matter (PM(2.5)) and soot-black carbon (soot-BC) have been associated with asthma exacerbations, there is limited evidence on whether these pollutants are associated with the new development of asthma or allergy among young inner city children. We hypothesized that childhood exposure to PM(2.5) and ...

Airborne exposure to manganese (Mn) can result in neurologic effects. Stationary air sampling is the traditional technique to assess Mn exposure for communities, yet may not accurately reflect children's personal exposure. The goal of the study was to characterize personal exposure to Mn and PM(2.5) in a cohort of children ...

BACKGROUND: In the last 20 years, there has been an increase in the incidence of allergic respiratory diseases worldwide and exposure to air pollution has been discussed as one of the factors associated with this increase. The objective of this study was to investigate the effects of air pollution on ...

Aim:  To study poisoning mortality from birth to the end of teenage. Methods:  Registry study within the Danish population, including all deaths from poisoning in the 0-19 years age groups for the years 1970-2006. Results:  Poisoning mortality was age dependent with a modest peak in preschool children due to accidents ...

Objective  The objective is to investigate the effect of malaria control with insecticide-treated mosquito nets (ITNs) regarding possible higher mortality in children protected during early infancy, due to interference with immunity development, and to assess long-term effects on malaria prevalence and morbidity. Methods  Between 2000 and 2002, a birth cohort ...

Studies of the impact of long-term exposure to outdoor air pollution on prevalence of respiratory symptoms and lung function in children have yielded mixed results, partly related to differences in study design, exposure assessment, confounder selection and data analysis.We assembled respiratory health and exposure data for more than 45,000 children ...

Previous studies have found inconsistent results on the association between asthma in children and gas cooking emissions. We aimed to assess the effects of the long term exposure to gas cooking on the onset of asthma and respiratory symptoms, focusing on wheezing, in children from two German birth cohorts: LISAplus ...

Air pollution exposures are linked to neuroinflammation and neuropathology in young urbanites. Forty percent of exposed children and young adults exhibit frontal tau hyperphosphorylation and 51% have amyloid-β diffuse plaques compared to 0% in low pollution controls. In older adults, white matter hyperintensities (WMH) are associated with cognitive deficits while ...

Residential concentrations of formaldehyde have been associated with poor respiratory health in children, where formaldehyde has been measured using stationary monitors inside homes. Although children spend most of their time indoors at home, there are few studies of children's personal exposure to formaldehyde. The aim of this study was to ...

To estimate the prevalence of lead poisoning in children and to identify associated factors, as well as possible local sources of contamination. A cross-sectional prevalence study conducted in 2006 with a random sample of 97 children age zero to five years from a neighborhood in Porto Alegre, Southern Brazil. Blood ...

Asthma is common in elite athletes, but our knowledge of asthma in elite canoe and kayak athletes is limited. The aim of the present prospective cross-sectional study was therefore to investigate the prevalence of asthma, including asthma-like symptoms, exhaled nitric oxide, and airway reactivity to mannitol in Danish elite canoe ...

ABSTRACT It is estimated that 1.2 million youth younger than age 20 live on farms; American Indian children constitute an important but understudied subset of this at-risk group. Despite documented risks of injuries and death among children who live and work on farms and a descending trend in the overall ...

In May 2009 the onset of pandemic influenza A (H1N1) began in Buenos Aires schools and a containment program was implemented. We report the first 191 school-aged cases. Influenza (H1N1) was a mild disease in children. Oseltamivir was well tolerated and resulted in a significantly reduced duration of symptoms in ...

Preliminary evidence suggests that handwriting difficulties are common to children with Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD). However, the nature of the task-specific impairments is needed to be clarified. The aim of this study was to describe handwriting capacity in ADHD children without DCD and identify underlying factors of performance by ...

OBJECTIVES/HYPOTHESIS: Passive exposure to cigarette smoke has been implicated in a number of respiratory childhood disorders. Most studies concerning smoking were directed to its carcinogenic effect on the lungs. However, the effects of smoking on nasal respiratory mucosa have not been widely studied. The aim of the present study was, ...

BACKGROUND: Relationships between indoor air quality (IAQ) found in schools and the allergic and respiratory health of schoolchildren have been insufficiently explored. A survey was conducted in a large sample of classrooms of primary schools in France to provide objective assessments of IAQ to which young schoolchildren are exposed in ...

The effects of air pollution on health have been studied worldwide. Given that air pollution triggers oxidative stress and inflammation, it is plausible that high levels of air pollutants cause higher number of hospitalisations. This study aimed to assess the impact of air pollution on the emergency hospitalisation for respiratory ...

The prevalence of allergic diseases in children has increased for several decades. We evaluated the correlation between pollen count of weeds and their sensitization rate in Seoul, 1997-2009. Airborne particles carrying allergens were collected daily from 3 stations around Seoul. Skin prick tests to pollen were performed on children with ...

ABSTRACT: BACKGROUND: Malaria intermittent preventive treatment of malaria in infant with sulphadoxine-pyrimethamine (IPTi-SP) reduced the incidence of malaria and anaemia by 30% and 20% respectively. The strategy is now a recommended policy for malaria control. However, there was no published study on the impact of the strategy on mortality. The ...

OBJECTIVE: The goal of this study is to identify individual, family/cultural, and illness-related protective factors that may minimize asthma morbidity in the context of multiple urban risks in a sample of inner-city children and families. METHODS: Participating families are from African-American (33), Latino (51) and non-Latino white (47) backgrounds. A ...

ABSTRACT: BACKGROUND: The Amazon represents an area of 61% of Brazilian territory and is undergoing major changes resulting from disorderly economic development, especially the advance of agribusiness. Composition of the atmosphere is controlled by several natural and anthropogenic processes, and emission from biomass burning is one with the major impact ...

Aims:  We evaluated risks associated with diaper changing in Finnish kindergartens where children were using either modern disposable paper or reusable cloth diapers. Methods and Results:  We determined enteric microorganisms and ammonia in diaper changing rooms in four kindergartens in autumn and winter in the ambient air. No coliphages were ...

Lack of data on daily inhalation rate and activity of children has been an issue in health risk assessment of air pollutants. This study aimed to obtain the daily inhalation rate and intensity and frequency of physical activity in relation to the environment in Japanese preschool children. Children aged four-six ...

Small proline rich protein 2B (SPRR2B) is a skin and lung epithelial protein associated with allergic inflammation in mice that has not been evaluated in human atopic diseases. To determine whether single-nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) in SPRR2B are associated with childhood eczema and with the phenotype of childhood eczema combined with ...

Exposure to traffic-related air pollutants plays a role in several health outcomes. A large body of evidence tends to link asthma in children with traffic exposure. Increasing asthma prevalence and incidence in children in Canadian cities has been of concern for public health authorities. The following study focuses on estimating ...

Little attention has been devoted to the effects on children's respiratory health of exposure to sulphur dioxide (SO2) in ambient air from local industrial emissions. Most studies on the effects of SO<span style="vertical-align: sub">2<⁄span> have assessed its impact as part of the regional ambient air pollutant mix. To examine the ...

Differential exposure to combustion by-products and allergens may partially explain the marked disparity in asthma prevalence (3-18%) among New York City neighborhoods. Subclinical changes in airway inflammation can be measured by fractional exhaled nitric oxide (FeNO). FeNO could be used to test independent effects of these environmental exposures on airway ...

This paper explores current conceptual understanding of urban social, environmental, and health inequality and inequity, and looks at the impact of these processes on urban children and young people in the 21st century. This conceptual analysis was commissioned for a discussion paper for UNICEF's flagship publication: State of the World's ...

Objective: To analyse the changes in nasal air flow and school grades after rapid maxillary expansion (RME) in oral breathing children with maxillary constriction. Material and Methods: Forty-four oral breathing children (mean age 10.57 y) underwent orthodontic RME with a Hyrax screw. Forty-four age-matched children (mean age 10.64 y) with ...

Particulate matter (PM) is an important metric for studying the health effects of household air pollution. There are limited data on PM exposure for children in homes that use biomass fuels, and no previous study has used direct measurement of personal exposure in children younger than 5 years of age. ...

There is a need to better define phenotypes of asthma. However, many studies have data available only on asthma and atopy, so they are often used to define 'atopic' and 'non-atopic' asthma. We discuss and illustrate the problems of analyzing such outcomes. We used the 31 year follow-up of the Northern ...

BACKGROUND: Health effects due to air pollution is becoming a major public health problem with growing traffic congestion and establishment of small- to medium-scale industries with poor emission controls in urban cities of Sri Lanka. METHODS: Respiratory health status of 7- to 10-year-old children in two settings (urban and semi-urban) ...

Inhaled corticosteroids (ICSs) are the mainstay of anti-inflammatory treatment in subjects with asthma and COPD. This review evaluates the role of nebulizers as alternative to inhalers for delivering ICSs in asthma and COPD. We have selected 16 randomized, placebo-controlled, blinded, long-term studies, mostly (N=14) carried out in asthma and COPD. ...

ABSTRACT: BACKGROUND: Cow's milk allergy is one of the most common food allergies among younger children. We investigated IgE antibodies to milk, and IgE and IgG4 antibodies to casein, alpha-lactalbumin and beta-lactoglobulin in cow's milk allergic (CMA) and non-allergic (non-CMA) children in order to study their clinical usefulness. METHODS: Eighty-three ...

Objectives: Children with severe cerebral palsy (CP) commonly have gastrointestinal (GI) dysfunction. Whey-based enteral formulas have been postulated to reduce gastroesophageal reflux (GOR) and accelerate gastric emptying (GE). The authors investigated whether whey-based (vs casein-based) enteral formulas reduce GOR and accelerate GE in children who have severe CP with a ...

The city of Windsor is recognized to have poor air quality in comparison with other Canadian cities. However, relatively few studies have evaluated associations between day-to-day fluctuations in air pollution levels and respiratory health in Windsor. In this study, we examined associations between short-term changes in ambient air pollution and ...

The disparity in under-five year-old mortality rates between rural and urban areas in Kenya (also reported in other in sub-Saharan African countries), is a critical national concern. The objective of this study was to investigate the influence of geographical location and maternal factors on the likelihood of mortality among under-five ...

Previous studies revealed that reduction of airway caliber in infancy might increase the risks for wheezing and asthma. However, the evidence for the predictive effects of pulmonary function on respiratory health in children was still inconsistent. We conducted a population-based prospective cohort study among children in 14 Taiwanese communities. There ...

Asthma affects approximately 23 million American children and adults, resulting in almost 15 million physician office and hospital visits, and nearly 2 million emergency department visits each year. Despite the publication of National Asthma Education and Prevention Program guidelines, asthma remains poorly controlled, with annual costs estimated at up to ...

While several studies suggest that traffic-related air pollutants are detrimental for respiratory health, few studies have examined relationships between residential proximity to a major roadway and asthma control in children. Furthermore, a major limitation of existing research is reliance on self-reported outcomes. We therefore determined the spatial relationship between the ...

A high level of air pollutants can increase the number of patients with allergy-related diseases such as asthma and allergic rhinitis (AR). To analyze the association between air pollution and allergic disease, we investigated 2 areas in Korea: Incheon, an industrial area, and Jeju, a non-industrialized area. Second grade students ...

To investigate the association of polymorphisms of STAT6 gene and air pollutants of PM(10), NO(2), and SO(2), with asthma in Chinese children. 418 subjects aged 14 years and under were recruited in a case-control study. The association between STAT6 polymorphisms and childhood asthma were tested by allele frequency, genotype analysis, ...

Nanoparticles have unique physico-chemical properties compared to larger particles that have the potential to provide promising new possibilities for biomedical applications. Considerable research is currently exploring these potentials of nanotechnology. In contrast, airborne particles as components of indoor air, ambient air pollution associated with traffic-related pollution, industry, power plants, and ...

Parental investment decisions guide parental actions regarding children's productive work and are shaped by ecological context. Urban ecology enhances long-term payoffs to investment in human capital, increasing opportunity costs for work performed by children, and decreased workload should result. Using an embodied capital framework, self-reported data on urban and rural ...

Data from 368 families of children with autism and other developmental disabilities in the People's Republic of China were gathered to understand the stresses that families experience and the coping strategies they employ. Chinese families of children with developmental disabilities perceived high levels of stress related to pessimism, child characteristics, ...

The changes of higher-order aberrations (HOAs) after bilateral lateral rectus muscle recession were evaluated. Forty eyes of 20 children were enrolled and their wavefront information was assessed until postoperative 3 months. Even though the root mean square (RMS) of total aberration was not changed, the RMS of HOA was transiently ...