Methylation-based biological age and cardiotoxicity risk in breast cancer patients treated with trastuzumab.

Background: Trastuzumab is an effective treatment for HER2-positive cancers that has known cardiotoxic properties. Discovering biomarkers that assess cardiotoxicity risk before trastuzumab therapy is essential for protecting the cardiovascular health of cancer patients.

Objective: To examine the associations between pre-treatment epigenetic age acceleration, circulating leukocyte composition, and candidate single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) with cardiotoxicity risk in breast cancer patients receiving trastuzumab.

Incidence of Thrombosis in COVID-19 Patients Compared to Non-COVID-19 Sepsis Patients in the Intensive Care Unit.

The hypercoagulable state associated with COVID-19 infection is associated with adverse outcomes and mortality. Studies have also demonstrated high rates of venous thromboembolism (VTE) events among patients with sepsis. We aimed to evaluate how the increase in thrombotic events in critically ill patients with COVID-19 infection compares to that of critically ill patients with non-COVID-19 sepsis.

Clinical Presentation and Stroke Incidence Differ by Moyamoya Etiology.

Introduction: Moyamoya arteriopathy, which can be idiopathic or associated with sickle cell disease, neurofibromatosis, Down syndrome, or cranial radiation therapy, is a progressive cerebral arteriopathy associated with high rates of incident and recurrent stroke. Little is known about how these subgroups differ with respect to clinical presentation, radiographic findings, stroke risk, and functional outcomes.

Methods: Using ICD codes, we identified children ages 28 days to 18 years treated for moyamoya arteriopathy at our tertiary care center between 2003 and 2019.

Intrathecal chemotherapy-associated cerebral vasospasm in children with hematologic malignancies.

Background: Mechanisms of chemotherapy-associated neurotoxicity are poorly understood, and therefore, prevention strategies have not been developed. We hypothesized that a subgroup of children receiving intrathecal cytarabine develops subclinical vasospasm, which may contribute to long-term neurocognitive sequelae of cancer.

Methods: We used transcranial Doppler ultrasound to serially evaluate cerebral blood flow velocities in participants ≤25 years old receiving intrathecal cytarabine for hematologic malignancies.

Performance of a Pediatric Stroke Alert Team Within a Comprehensive Stroke Center.

Background: Childhood stroke is rare, and diagnosis is frequently delayed. The use of pediatric stroke teams has the potential to decrease time to neurology evaluation and imaging, hastening appropriate diagnosis and treatment for acute neurologic presentations in children.

Methods: We performed a retrospective analysis of our institutional pediatric stroke or "brain attack" team (pedsBAT) activations from October 2014 to July 2017.