Addition of MII to conventional pH monitoring significantly increases the diagnostic yield in detecting REs, prevalently in infants, and in revealing an association between refluxes and symptoms, prevalently respiratory ones and in infants group.
Lung disease and Pseudomonas aeruginosa (P. aeruginosa) airway colonization represent a major cause of morbidity and mortality in cystic fibrosis (CF). Human b-defensin (hBD)-1 is believed to play an important role in mucosal innate immunity in the lung. This study aimed to investigate whether three single-nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) in the 5 0 -untranslated region of DEFB1, G-52A, C-44G and G-20A were associated with P. aeruginosa airway colonization in CF. A total of 224 CF patients and 196 control subjects were studied. DEFB1 SNPs were characterized by restriction fragment length polymorphisms. Patients' sputum samples were collected and analyzed by standard methods. Single SNP analysis suggested that CF patients carrying the À52AA and the À20GG genotypes had a higher rate of P. aeruginosa airway colonization than patients homozygous and heterozygous for the À52G and À20A alleles (P ¼ 0.01 and P ¼ 0.007, respectively). A significant association between the ACG haplotype and chronic P. aeruginosa infection was also identified (odds ratio (95% confidence interval): 3.00 (1.42-6.36), P ¼ 0.004). These results indicate that variant alleles in DEFB1 might contribute to the colonization of P. aeruginosa in CF.
Irradiation of the head in children may cause impairment of mucociliary function, even permanently, which may predispose children to upper respiratory infections. We would suggest careful monitoring of such patients to detect as early as possible the clinical effects of the functional changes and to prevent the evolution to chronic diseases.
A study was designed to determine the sensitivity and specificity of a cold air bronchial provocation test. A total of 18 children with asthma (mean age 12 years) and 18 normal children (mean age 14 years) were studied. The cold air challenge consisted of a 4 min period of isocapnic hyperventilation of subfreezing air (mean temperature -15 degrees C). In-Induced response in forced expiratory volume in 1 sec (FEV1) expressed as a percentage of predicted normal values was obtained at 4, 6, and 8 min post-challenge. The average response to the cold air was a 27% decrease of FEV1 in asthmatics, which was significantly different from that of the normal children, who showed no statistically significant drop. In both the asthmatic and normal groups, the maximal drop in FEV1 had occurred by the time measurements 4 min post-challenge had been made. At that time, the smallest overlap was observed between normal and asthmatic children. This suggests that the fourth minute post-challenge can be chosen as a cut-off time to distinguish normal from asthmatic children. Considering a decrease of FEV1 greater than 10% as a positive test, the sensitivity of the cold air challenge was 95% and the specificity was 89%.
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.