J Natl Med Assoc
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Little is known about whether a breast or gynecologic cancer diagnosis increases long-term cardiovascular disease (CVD) risk among Black females. The purpose of this study was to determine whether a breast or gynecologic cancer diagnosis is associated with CVD risk and identify determinants of subsequent CVD risk among Black females with an incident breast or gynecologic cancer diagnosis. ⋯ Like study populations of predominantly White females, our results suggest that, adjusting for covariates, Black females possess a higher risk of CVD following a breast cancer diagnosis compared to women who did not develop breast cancer. Our results suggest a need for active CVD surveillance in the cancer survivorship phase.
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African Americans (AA) have been disproportionately affected with the COVID-19 disease experiencing 30%-60% of the deaths, while only making up 13% of the US population. Early data suggest that pregnant women and those with cardiovascular disease (CVD) may experience worse outcomes with severe coronavirus infection. There is an urgent need to incorporate AA and female perspectives into the design of research on the CVD complications related to COVID-19. ⋯ The project created a research ready stakeholder network, ready to develop a research agenda about COVID-19.
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Review Case Reports
Aicardi syndrome in a Nigerian female child: A case report and literature review of a rare neuro-developmental disorder from North-Western Nigeria.
Aicardi syndrome is a very rare neurodevelopmental disorder, inherited as an X-linked dominant condition with a triad of infantile spasm, partial or complete agenesis of the corpus callosum, and chorio-retinal "lacunae." We report a case of a female infant with the classical triad of Aicardi syndrome. A female infant presented to the Paediatric Neurology Clinic of the Federal Medical Centre Birnin-Kebbi, North-western Nigeria, at the age of two months with complaints of recurrent afebrile convulsions typical for infantile spasms. The patient was delivered at term with normal Apgar scores and anthropometry. ⋯ The frequency of the seizures had also reduced from >100 episodes per day to 2-3 episodes per day, but the child had developed right-sided spastic hemiparesis. The patient was commenced on physiotherapy and the anti-epileptic drugs were maintained. We recommend clinicians consider Aicardi syndrome in the differential diagnosis of any child presenting with infantile spasms.
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Risk stratification enables care providers to make the proper clinical decision for the management of patients with COVID-19 infection. We aimed to explore changes in the importance of predictors for inpatient mortality of COVID-19 over one month. ⋯ The importance of some patients' characteristics changes with the length of hospital stay. This should be considered in developing and deploying predictive models and the management of patients with COVID-19 infection.
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We studied racial differences in post-stroke outcomes using a prospective, population-based cohort of stroke survivors as part of the Brain Attack Surveillance in Corpus Christi (BASIC) project. ⋯ In this prospective, population-based community sample, BAs had worse neurologic, functional and cognitive outcomes at 90 days compared to NHWs. Future research should investigate how social determinants of health including structural racism, neighborhood factors and access to preventive and recovery services influences these racial disparities.