Neonatology pioneer at Lucile Packard Children's Hospital Stanford and Stanford Children's Health honored with major national award

Dr. David Stevenson is the recipient of the 2016 Joseph W. St. Geme, Jr. Leadership Award by the Federation of Pediatric Organizations. The prestigious award recognizes Dr. Stevenson’s longstanding commitment to caring for premature and high-risk infants, his dedication to mentoring researchers and trainees, and his investigation of the causes of premature birth in conjunction with the March of Dimes. Dr. Stevenson accepts the award on April 30 at the Pediatric Academic Societies meeting in Baltimore, MD. He serves as the Stanford University School of Medicine’s senior associate dean for maternal and child health and is the principal investigator for our March of Dimes Prematurity Research Center. Business Wire publishes a release about the award and its recipient. Read more>>

Additional Coverage:

Yahoo

American Pediatric Society / Society for Pediatric Research

Checkmate on Rh Disease

The Consortium for Universal Rh-disease Elimination (CURhE) launched with an inaugural meeting here at Stanford on March 7. Business Wire publishes a release about CURhE, a global alliance established to eradicate Hemolytic Disease of the Fetus and the Newborn (HDFN) or Rh disease. Rh disease results from a mismatch between mom’s Rh Negative blood and her developing fetus’ Rh Positive blood, and more than 300,000 babies die or suffer significant morbidity due to this problem that is inexpensive and easy to prevent. Unfortunately, lack of awareness, poor communication and unstable infrastructure still too often lead to tragedy in developing nations. CURhE, directed by three scholar-practitioners including Dr. Vinod Bhutani, is working to change that. Read more>>

Stanford researchers are getting closer to understanding prematurity predictors

How can we predict and prevent preterm birth? The answer: We mostly can’t, but current discoveries may lead to screening tools and treatment in the future. Erin Digitale gives a summary of her feature story on prematurity for Stanford Medicine magazine in this Scope blog post. The story talks about how researchers are finding differences in the inflammatory response of immune cells of women who had preterm deliveries versus women who had carried their baby to term. Targeted immunotherapy for at-risk women to block the pathways involved in preterm birth may be possible, reports Dr. David Stevenson, the principal investigator for the March of Dimes Prematurity Research Center at Stanford. Read more>>

More hospitals offer donor breast milk to help preemie babies

Today, many more preemies in California NICUs are receiving donor breast milk as opposed to formula. A study led by Dr. Henry Lee found that the number of hospitals offering donor breast milk obtained from milk banks rose substantially from 2007 to 2013. As this practice has become more popular, hospitals have also noted an uptick in the percentage of moms breastfeeding before discharge and a reduction in necrotizing enterocolitis among infants. HealthDay News reports, and Dr. Lee is quoted. Read more>>

Contag lab publishes much anticipated paper in cancer research

Instructor Masamitsu Kanada and senior researcher Michael Bachmann are investigating extracellular vesicles and their role in tumor genesis and cancer progression. Their paper was recently published in the Cell Press journal called Trends in Cancer. Read it, here.  

Zika and microcephaly: Jury still out

While there is much hype about the Zika virus spreading throughout South and Central American – its expansion coinciding with an apparent spike in microcephaly in Brazil – no causation has been proven. MedPage Today chronicles what we know thus far. Microcephaly disrupts the process of brain growth in utero, and while etiology varies, congenital infection (including the Zika virus) is among the most common. Since microcephaly is not linked to any one specific condition, Dr. Henry Lee is quoted as saying the greatest difficulty may be in counseling parents because there is no way to know how the child will grow and develop. Read more>>

Study tries to give C-section babies mom's germs they missed

A very small pilot study conducted by New York University is exploring the ability to alter the microbiome of babies who are born by C-section. Typically, C-section babies are not exposed to mom’s vaginal bacteria, which is believed to be protective. In a related line of research at our March of Dimes Prematurity Research Center, Dr. David Relman and his team have found that the vaginal microbiome changes radically at birth, though the impact on newborns remains unknown. Dr. Relman comments in this Associated Press story, saying elective C-sections should be avoided and moms should not take antibiotics unless absolutely necessary. Read more>>

The grand divergence in global child health

Drs. Paul Wise and Gary Darmstadt write a JAMA Pediatrics editorial about the 2013 Global Burden of Disease (GBD) study. While they agree that the GBD represents one of the most critical analytic advances in global health in recent decades, they caution that the study’s analysis misses much of the available data in underserved areas with the worst child health outcomes. Countries with inadequate data sources and poor health delivery systems may be contributing to the "grand divergence" in life expectancies. The editorial was mentioned in a U.S. News & World Report story highlighting the findings from the 2013 GBD study. Read more>>

U.S. lags behind other countries in reducing stillbirths

A collection of research published in The Lancet shows that stillbirth is all too common in the U.S. and rates have barely declined in the last 15 years. NPR reports that the U.S. ranks 22^nd among 186 developed countries for stillbirth rate. While researchers have identified certain factors that put women at risk for stillbirth, Dr. Suzan Carmichael says it’s essential to collect more consistent, complete, detailed and systemic data to understand why this happens. Read more>>

Ending preventable stillbirth: A Q&A with Stanford global-health expert Gary Darmstadt

Stanford’s Scope blog features a Q&A with Dr. Gary Darmstadt on the importance of raising global awareness about stillbirths and how we might work to prevent them, improving the care for pregnant women, infants and children. This story follows a series of articles in The Lancet called “Ending Preventable Stillbirth,” for which Dr. Darmstadt was the series adviser. Read more>>

Stanford Children's Health opens new, 80,000-square-foot specialty services center in Sunnyvale

After its first few weeks of operation, Stanford Children’s Health Specialty Services – Sunnyvale had already seen over 3,500 pediatric patients. May 2 marked the official opening for the Sunnyvale clinic, one of 10 Bay Area multi-specialty service centers that are part of Stanford Children’s Health. The state-of-the-art facility is designed to feel less like a hospital and more like a kid-friendly, soothing place. Our Developmental Behavioral-Pediatrics group now provides care at the Sunnyvale location. For more information on their clinical services, click here. Read more>>

Additional coverage

The Mercury News

Drop in birth defects slowed after folic acid fortification

Senior investigator Dr. Gary Shaw cautions against simplistic interpretations of new study findings showing that folic acid fortification in grains may not have contributed significantly to the reduction of certain birth defects. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention had claimed that a 1998 mandate from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration that called for folic acid fortification of grains was correlated with a 36 percent reduction in neural tube defects. New research suggests, however, the rate of decline in neural tube defects actually slowed post-fortification mandate. Shaw says we need more research and notes that other factors may have influenced the results. He urges women to continue to follow the U.S. recommendations for folic acid intake. Reuters reports. Read more>>

Additional Coverage:

U.S. News & World Report

HealthDay

California Healthline

Stanford Medicine News

Impressive divisional scholarship on display at 2016 Pediatric Academic Societies Meeting

The annual Pediatric Academic Societies (PAS) 2016 Meeting took place in Baltimore, MD April 30 to May 3, and scholarly representation from our Division was especially strong. In total, the meeting featured work by 38 faculty, trainees and staff members. Academic output included 28 poster presentations, 10 platform presentations and 6 topic symposiums. Dr. David Stevenson was honored with the Joseph W. St. Geme, Jr. Leadership Award on April 30 at the PAS Opening General Session.

Prenatal steroids reduce risk of brain bleeding in preemies

New research from Dr. Henry Lee and co-authors from our division, Drs. Jochen Profit and Jeffrey Gould, found that delivery of prenatal steroids may be protective for premature infants and reduce the risk of severe intraventricular hemorrhage by half. This study is significant in that it’s shown beneficial effects of steroid treatment in babies born as early as 22 to 24 weeks gestation – a finding that may expand the population for whom doctors recommend steroid treatment. Current NIH recommendations are for mothers likely to deliver between 24 and 34 weeks into their pregnancy. Lee speculates that steroids may accelerate the maturation of blood vessels in the brain. The study was published in the Journal of Perinatology, and HealthCanal.com reports. Read more>>

This American Academy of Pediatrics News story reports on the gains made since the implementation of Freedom of Breath, Fountain of Life – China’s Neonatal Resuscitation Program (NRP). More than 150,000 lives have been saved, and death due to birth-related asphyxia is down by 75 percent in the country. About to enter its third phase, China’s NRP will expand in tandem with Helping Babies Breathe. Dr. Henry Lee, a member of the NRP Steering Committee, comments about China’s progress. Read more>>

During her residency, Dr. Emily Whitgob worked with Dr. Jonathan Santoro on a project to add to the medical school curricula by integrating training designed to help students understand different types of disability. This Scope blog story summarizes a Neurology Today article that quotes different medical students about their experiences treating a person with a disability and their thoughts on the training. The Stanford program appears to be the first focused on children with neurological disabilities, and Dr. Whitgob has since completed her residency and is now one of our developmental-behavioral pediatrics fellows. Read more>>

Celebrating tiny voices of praise

Dr. Henry Lee visited Beijing in July for the 10-year anniversary of the Neonatal Resuscitation Program (NRP) in China and considers the experience a highlight of his professional career to date. In his American Academy of Pediatrics blog post, Dr. Lee reflects on the leadership and pioneering efforts that contributed to the success of Helping Babies Breathe and NRP in China and around the world. Read more>>

Kangaroo mother care: Researchers search for biological basis of its effectiveness

Dr. Vinod Bhutani discusses the importance of kangaroo mother care. This practice whereby the baby is placed on the bare chest of its mother (or father and other family members) has been shown to have many health benefits. These include keeping the baby warm, improved maternal-infant bonding, and reduced mortality in low birth weight infants. By measuring brain hormones in babies, Dr. Bhutani and his colleagues hope to identify hormones particularly associated with birthing stress and develop a test for these using a sample of baby’s saliva. Drs. Kari McCallie, Susan Crowe, and David Stevenson are partners on this research project. Read more>>

Guatemala project inspires and motivates Stanford medical students

Dr. Paul Wise visits Guatemala with Stanford medical students to show them what a difference they can make by working to support the needs and rights of those living in impoverished communities. Stanford partners with local health promoters to operate the Rural Guatemala Child Health and Nutrition Program, which uses nutritional supplements and health education to save the lives of children under five. This Scope blog story quotes Dr. Wise and one of the students who traveled with him. Read more>>