OBJECTIVES The majority of mothers do not correctly identify their child's weight status. The reasons for the misperception are not well understood. This study's objective was to describe maternal perceptions of their child's body mass index (BMI) and maternal report of weight concerns raised by a health professional. DESIGN Prospective, community-based cohort. PARTICIPANTS Data were collec...

The purpose of this geographically defined national study was to evaluate the performance of extremely low birthweight children (ELBW < 1000 g) born in Iceland in 1991-1995 and compare to a cohort of matched control children born full term. The Miller Assessment for Preschoolers (MAP) was used to provide an overall profile of 32 ELBW children and 55 control children at 5 years of age. The resul...

Two cases of traumatic asphyxia in young children are reported. The first was a 2 year old child run over at low speed by the front wheels of a delivery van. He made an uncomplicated recovery. The second child was pinned to the floor by an empty chest of drawers in an unwitnessed accident. He was discovered in cardiac arrest and resuscitation was unsuccessful. The outcome following traumatic as...

OBJECTIVE The aim of this study was to identify socio-demographic and home environmental predictors of shorter sleep in early childhood, and to examine whether effects were mediated by the timing of bedtime or wake time. METHODS Participants were from Gemini, a British birth cohort of twins, and included 1702 children; one randomly selected from each twin pair. Parents reported night-time sle...

BACKGROUND The purpose of this study was to investigate breastfeeding as a health indicator through routine data registered at public child health centres. The prevalence and course of breastfeeding were surveyed, as well as factors that affect breastfeeding. MATERIAL AND METHOD Breastfeeding status at six weeks and six months of age and other routine data were systematically recorded in a ne...

OBJECTIVE Clinic-based treatments of childhood obesity are effective but typically have limited reach and are costly. In this study, we evaluated the effects of a scalable weight management program for children and teenagers. METHODS Participants were 155 children and their parent/guardian. Children had a mean ± SD age of 11.3 ± 2.8 years, BMI z score of 2.23 ± 0.41, and a percentage overweig...

This study investigates whether rights to parental leave improve pediatric health. Aggregate data are used for 16 European countries over the 1969 through 1994 period. More generous paid leave is found to reduce deaths of infants and young children. The magnitudes of the estimated effects are substantial, especially where a causal effect of leave is most plausible. In particular, there is a muc...

AIM To investigate whether breastfeeding during infancy is a determinant of intelligence at 3.5 y. METHODS Five hundred and fifty European children enrolled at birth in the Auckland Birthweight Collaborative Study were assessed at 3.5 y of age. Approximately half were small for gestational age (SGA < or =10th percentile) at birth and half were appropriate for gestational age (AGA >10th percen...

Maternal history of abuse has been proposed as a risk factor for child maltreatment, but the background of this "cycle of abuse" is as yet poorly understood. As a contribution toward a deeper understanding of this phenomenon, this study analyzed whether emotional availability is altered by maternal experiences of physical or sexual abuse during their upbringing. Mothers were contacted by mail a...