Neurological Disorders

This was a strong session with three speakers who looked at AI from three angles. Geraldine Boylan covered what it can already do, Sampsa Vanhatalo covered what we should ask of it, and Petra Hüppi covered what imaging can tell us about mechanisms. Two of the three opened by saying “I’m not an AI expert”, which suited a session that cared more about clinical questions than about technology. 1. AI for neonatal seizure detection — Geraldine Boylan (Cork, Ireland)The case. A term baby had a markedly discontinuous EEG from about 3 hours of age. Seizures followed in the middle of the night between Friday and Saturday. Full video-EEG was eventually set up and a neurologist conf…

Hi everyone, checking in from the neonatal neurology sessions at CEPAS here in Lyon! We just wrapped up a fantastic morning diving deep into neurocritical care and early intervention. For those who couldn't be here, I wanted to share a quick summary of the core take-home messages from our first two speakers, along with some points to chew on. What is Neurocritical Care and who are the babies at risk? (Lina Chalak, USA) NIRS as a CO2 Proxy: Dr. Chalak highlighted using near-infrared spectroscopy (NIRS) practically to monitor CO2 levels. Keeping CO2 strictly between 40–45 during the first five days is vital; outside this window, autoregulation fails and blood pressure fluct…

A nice detail first: the chairs were a mentor–mentee pair from the society’s mentoring programme. The programme pairs established and early-career researchers to co-write papers and co-chair sessions, and it is always looking for new mentors. This summary covers three abstracts. 1. Cerebral sinovenous thrombosis (CSVT) in preterm infants: risk factors and imaging patternsBregje van Oldenmark (Netherlands) – NEO-O-012, European multicentre case-control study Why it matters: Preterm CSVT is probably more common than we think. In a German nationwide study, about one-third of neonatal CSVT cases were preterm. One single centre that routinely scans all infants born before 29 w…

What an incredible morning session here at CEPAS! We just wrapped up a packed HIE-block covering everything from late-preterm cooling debates to trial integrity and family-centered neurocritical care. For those following our live reporting, here is a quick breakdown of the core messages from each talk: Therapeutic Hypothermia in Late Preterm Infants (Floris Groenendaal) Recent data highlights that there are higher risks and complications associated with cooling late preterm infants, calling into question the overall positive effect of the intervention in this population. Major cooling trials have historically underrepresented these infants, making it difficult to establi…

An interesting CEPAS poster from the Swedish EXPRESS cohort explored self-reported quality of life among 300 children born at 22–27 weeks of gestation, compared with 208 term-born controls. Using the Kidscreen-52 questionnaire, the researchers found that overall health-related quality of life was similar between the groups. However, children born extremely preterm reported lower scores for physical well-being, peer relationships/social support, and bullying. Also, children diagnosed with autism or ADHD were more likely to report difficulties across several domains. What do you think about these findings? I interpret results are encouraging! Despite a challenging start in …

I would be very interested to learn how follow-up and physiotherapy referral are organized in different NICUs after discharge. Are all preterm infants routinely referred to or enrolled in physiotherapy follow-up programmes, or does your team first perform a developmental assessment and refer only those infants who demonstrate specific risk factors, abnormal findings, or emerging developmental concerns? If referral is selective, what criteria do you use, who makes the decision, and which developmental assessment tools are part of your follow-up pathway? I would be grateful to hear what you actually do in your everyday clinical practice.

I am looking for research on best practices for treatment of methamphetamine exposed infants in order to create a bundle for my unit. We currently use Eat, Sleep, Console for our opioid exposed infants, but we want to differentiate between the two and create a pathway for the stimulant exposed infants. A quick overview of literature turned up almost nothing, so I would trully appreciate any help that can be provided.

Thanks to our latest page about Latest Research with the automated feed on PubMed, this AAP Clinical Report came on my radar about Therapeutic Hypothermia for Neonatal Hypoxic-Ischemic Encephalopathy. Great write-up about the background and evidence about HIE and hypothermia treatment. In the recommendation (last page!), AAP recommends 1) blood gas aligning with asphyxia and 2) moderate-severe HIE, before initiating hypotherma. Here in the Outer Rim (i.e. Sweden!), we have a more diverse #1 criteria in our national guideline, Apgar score ≤5 at 10 min, need of ongoing resusc beyond 10 min, and/or acidosis (pH <7.0 or BE <-16 first 60 min). We published about those so…

2 month old. Premature 32 week. Irritability after acellular pertussis. No daylight sleep (there is no problem in night sleep). What to do ? Paracetamol ? Dose ? Phenobarbital ? What must be our advice for later vaccines ?

What do you do for hipotony in one upper extremity ? Xray ? Wait and see ? Pyhsioterapy ? Neurology consultation ? Brain surgery consultation ?