Patient Stories
We didn’t give up hope: Emily’s fighting chance with her lung transplant
Emily lights up every room she’s in with her giggles and confidence — not to mention her sparkly painted nails and glittery makeup. At 6 years old, she’s able to win people over with her bright smile and electric personality. All this is made possible because Emily was given the gift of life — an ... Read More about We didn’t give up hope: Emily’s fighting chance with her lung transplant
Research
Study shows young adults don’t easily transition to self-care of diabetes
Diabetes is challenging to manage at any age, but even more so for young adults who are handling the condition on their own for the first time. They need to transition from pediatric to adult care as smoothly as possible — but a recent study finds this isn’t happening. Research led by Katharine Garvey, MD, MPH, ... Read More about Study shows young adults don’t easily transition to self-care of diabetes
Research
Girls and women in sports win the medal of lifelong health
Title IX, the law that prohibits sports discrimination on the basis of sex, has transformed sports for girls and women. Before its passage in 1972, only 295,000 female athletes participated in U.S. high school sports. Today that number is 3.2 million. In that same period, the number of female college athletes swelled from 30,000 to ... Read More about Girls and women in sports win the medal of lifelong health
Patient Stories
How Robin sequence paved a dad’s road to the Boston Marathon: Chad and Izzy’s story
Go to any marathon starting line and you’re bound to find someone who was “never a runner” until something — or someone — motivated them to tie up their laces. Chad Goyette is one such runner. But today, he’s fresh off the Atlanta Marathon and gearing up to run Boston. His inspiration? His daughter, Izzy. ... Read More about How Robin sequence paved a dad’s road to the Boston Marathon: Chad and Izzy’s story
Research
Going out of the box to tackle pancreatic cancer
Pancreatic cancers are deadly and hard to treat, in part because they are so often detected at an advanced stage; overall five-year survival rates are about 11 percent. Two separate labs at Boston Children’s Hospital took out-of-the-box approaches to this difficult cancer, and both uncovered some very promising leads. Wiping out pancreatic tumors’ immune defense ... Read More about Going out of the box to tackle pancreatic cancer
Health and Parenting
Spring into good health: Tips for allergies, poison ivy, and tick bites
Spring is here — and so are allergies, poison ivy, and ticks carrying Lyme disease. But that doesn’t mean your family shouldn’t embrace springtime. Here are some tips to help your child best control allergies and avoid (and treat, if necessary) poison ivy and tick bites. Simple steps and home remedies can tame allergies Managing spring allergies doesn’t have ... Read More about Spring into good health: Tips for allergies, poison ivy, and tick bites
Research
Could gene therapy relieve post-hemorrhagic hydrocephalus?
Premature infants, especially very low birthweight babies, are at risk for intraventricular hemorrhage. A frequent complication of these brain bleeds is hydrocephalus, an accumulation of cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) in the brain ventricles that can gravely disrupt brain development. If hydrocephalus develops, a child may need shunt operations throughout life to manage the fluid buildup. Could ... Read More about Could gene therapy relieve post-hemorrhagic hydrocephalus?
Research
A promising target for ALS and other neurodegenerative disorders: Curbing inflammation
When cells recognize a danger, such as an infection, they activate the innate immune system. Sentinel molecules sound an alarm, recruiting immune cells to take down the threat. In 2016, Judy Lieberman, MD, PhD and her colleagues at Boston Children’s Hospital showed that a protein called gasdermin D initiates a final, decisive step: pyroptosis, a ... Read More about A promising target for ALS and other neurodegenerative disorders: Curbing inflammation
Clinical Care
‘The teamwork is outstanding’: A look inside the Colorectal and Pelvic Malformation Center
In honor of Women’s History Month, we sat down with some of the clinicians in Boston Children’s Colorectal and Pelvic Malformation Center (CPMC), one of the only centers of its kind led and staffed primarily by women. Here’s what they had to say about their work, their patients — and their hopes for the future. ... Read More about ‘The teamwork is outstanding’: A look inside the Colorectal and Pelvic Malformation Center
Research
Why do so many dementia treatments fail? Questioning mouse models of tau accumulation
To date, the search for effective treatments for dementia has yielded only disappointments. Many recent drug candidates target the tau protein, which aggregates and forms tangles in patients’ brain tissue and is involved in 75 percent of all dementias. While tau-targeting drugs have looked promising in mouse models, they’ve failed in clinical trials. A recent ... Read More about Why do so many dementia treatments fail? Questioning mouse models of tau accumulation