(Press-News.org) The next generation of cardiometabolic biomarkers should pave the way for earlier detection of risk factors for conditions such as obesity, diabetes and heart disease in children, according to a new scientific statement from the American Heart Association published in the journal Circulation.
“The rising number of children with major risk factors for cardiometabolic conditions represents a potential tsunami of preventable disease for our healthcare system,” says the statement’s lead author Michele Mietus-Snyder, M.D., a preventive cardiologist and clinical research scientist at Children’s National Hospital. “But by the time a child is identified based on today’s clinical biomarkers, it’s often too late to reverse the disease trajectory.”
The big picture
The scientific statement included biomarkers that met three criteria:
Early and precise clinical detection of metabolic abnormalities before a child begins to show the current clinical signs such as high body mass index (BMI), blood pressure or cholesterol.
Mechanistic intervention targets providing immediate risk measures and giving clinicians new targets to personalize and optimize interventions.
Modifiable biomarkers that are capable of tracking progression toward or away from cardiometabolic health.
The statement’s identified biomarkers included measures of:
Epigenetic, or environmental, factors
Gut microbiome health
Small particle metabolites in the body
Different types of lipids and their impacts on cell membranes
Inflammation and inflammatory mediators
The authors proposed these biomarkers with the goal of “expanding awareness to include a whole new realm of biomarkers that precede the traditional risk factors we currently rely upon, such as BMI, blood pressure, cholesterol and blood sugar,” says Mietus-Snyder. “Ideally, these new biomarkers will be added to the array of measures used in clinical research to better assess their value for earlier identification and prevention of global patterns of cardiometabolic health and risk.”
Why it matters
The next generation cardiometabolic biomarkers outlined by the authors are all currently used in research studies and would need to be validated for clinical use. However, Mietus-Snyder notes that the data already collected from these biomarkers in research can make a difference in clinical practice by enhancing our understanding of the deep metabolic roots for children at risk.
Evidence reviewed in the statement shows the risk factors children are exposed to, even before birth, can set the stage for cardiovascular and metabolic health across the lifespan.
Interestingly, all the different factors reviewed have been found to alter the functioning of the mitochondria — the complex organelles responsible for producing the energy for the body that every cell and organ system in turn needs to function. Every class of biomarkers reviewed is also favorably influenced by heart-healthy nutrition, a simple but powerful tool known to improve mitochondrial function.
What’s next
Even as the new so-called ‘omic’ biomarkers reviewed in this statement are developed for clinical applications, there are things clinicians can do to optimize them and improve mitochondrial function, according to Mietus-Snyder.
Most important is to strengthen the collective dedication of care providers to removing the barriers that prevent people, especially expecting mothers and children, from living heart-healthy lifestyles.
We have long known lifestyle factors influence health. Even as complicated metabolic reasons for this are worked out, families can reset their metabolism by decreasing sedentary time and increasing activity, getting better and screen-free sleep, and eating more real foods, especially vegetables, fruits and whole grains, rich in fiber and nutrients, with fewer added sugars, chemicals, preservatives and trans fats. Clinicians can work with their patients to set goals in these areas.
“We know diet and lifestyle are effective to some degree for everyone but terribly underutilized. As clinicians, we have compelling reasons to re-dedicate ourselves to advocating for healthy lifestyle interventions with the families we serve and finding ways to help them implement them as early as possible. The evidence shows the sooner we can intervene for cardiometabolic health, the better.”
Contact: Jennifer Stinebiser, Children’s National Hospital, 202-476-4500
# # #
Children’s National Hospital, based in Washington, D.C., was established in 1870 to help every child grow up stronger. Today, it is the No. 5 children’s hospital in the nation and ranked in all specialties evaluated by U.S. News & World Report. Children’s National is transforming pediatric medicine for all children. The Children’s National Research & Innovation Campus opened in 2021, a first-of-its-kind pediatric hub dedicated to developing new and better ways to care for kids. Children’s National has been designated three times in a row as a Magnet® hospital, demonstrating the highest standards of nursing and patient care delivery. This pediatric academic health system offers expert care through a convenient, community-based primary care network and specialty care locations in the D.C. metropolitan area, including Maryland and Virginia. Children’s National is home to the Children’s National Research Institute and Sheikh Zayed Institute for Pediatric Surgical Innovation. It is recognized for its expertise and innovation in pediatric care and as a strong voice for children through advocacy at the local, regional and national levels. As a non-profit, Children's National relies on generous donors to help ensure that every child receives the care they need.
For more information, follow us on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter and LinkedIn.
END
A new compact, lightweight, gel-free and waterproof electrocardiogram (ECG) sensor offers more comfort and less skin irritation, compared to similar heart monitoring devices on the market.
ECGs help manage cardiovascular disease – which affects around 4 million Australians and kills more than 100 people every day – by alerting users to seek medical care.
The team led by RMIT University in Australia has made the wearable ECG device that could be used to prevent heart attacks for people with cardiovascular disease, including in remote healthcare and ...
BINGHAMTON, N.Y. -- A new drug developed by professors from the School of Pharmacy and Pharmaceutical Sciences at Binghamton University has received Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approval for the treatment of patients with Duchenne muscular dystrophy (DMD), a common genetic disease that mostly affects young boys.
DMD is the most common genetic disease. It leads to the loss of the dystrophin protein in muscle tissues, with progressive weakness and challenges with day-to-day activities. The DMD gene is the largest gene in the human genome, ...
The antibody-drug conjugate trastuzumab deruxtecan is approved for various therapeutic indications. Since March 2023, it can also be used as monotherapy for the treatment of adults with unresectable or metastatic HER2-low breast cancer who have received prior chemotherapy at this disease stage or developed disease recurrence early after adjuvant chemotherapy. Treatment with trastuzumab deruxtecan is the first approved therapy for patients with HER2-low breast cancer. The German Institute for Quality and Efficiency in Health Care (IQWiG) examined in an early benefit assessment whether the antibody-drug ...
Children and young people with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) use healthcare services twice as often in the two years before their diagnosis, a study by researchers at the University of Nottingham and King’s College London has found.
The research, published today in the journal Archives of Disease in Childhood shows that children with the neurodevelopmental disorder are twice as likely to see their GP, go to hospital for an admission, and even have operations, compared to children without ADHD.
The researchers say the results support the need for healthcare professionals to consider a potential diagnosis of ADHD in children who ...
In the late 1970s, the relationship between the c-Src gene and cancer was discovered. The first oncogene was identified.
Since then, c-Src has been found to be overactivated in half of colon, liver, lung, breast, prostate and pancreatic tumors, but its function is not yet fully understood.
CNIO researchers have now discovered that this oncogene is capable of 'self-activation', by means of a previously undescribed molecular mechanism. This finding has implications for the development of new drugs.
In ...
Philadelphia, October 31, 2023 – Heart attacks, or acute myocardial infarction (MI), are one of the leading causes of death worldwide. The newly released Canadian Cardiovascular Society Classification of Acute Myocardial Infarction (CCS-AMI) appearing in the Canadian Journal of Cardiology, published by Elsevier, presents a four-stage classification of heart attack based on heart muscle damage. This work by a group of noted experts has the potential to stratify risk more accurately in heart attack patients and lays the groundwork for development of new, injury-stage-specific and tissue ...
Researchers from MIT and NVIDIA have developed two techniques that accelerate the processing of sparse tensors, a type of data structure that’s used for high-performance computing tasks. The complementary techniques could result in significant improvements to the performance and energy-efficiency of systems like the massive machine-learning models that drive generative artificial intelligence.
Tensors are data structures used by machine-learning models. Both of the new methods seek to efficiently exploit what’s ...
A paper published in Trends in Cancer explains the advantages of RENACER, the world’s first repository of live brain metastases samples, created by researchers at CNIO.
Live samples allow researchers to study the way cancer cells respond to drugs. This paves the way to create avatars for each individual patient to test out possible therapies before applying them.
RENACER is made up of around twenty hospitals, who attended their first general assembly meeting today at the Fundación Ramón Areces, the foundation that is funding the ...
UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. — Voice speed and interaction style may determine whether a user sees a digital assistant like Alexa or Siri as a helpful partner or something to control, according to a team led by Penn State researchers. The findings reveal insights into the parasocial, or one-sided, relationships that people can form with digital assistants, according to the researchers.
They reported their findings in the Journal of Business Research.
“We endow these digital assistants with personalities and human characteristics, and it impacts how we interact with the devices,” said Brett Christenson, assistant clinical professor of marketing at Penn State and first author ...
WASHINGTON, Oct. 31, 2023 – When COVID-19 began to spread across the globe, its effects were significantly pronounced on cruise ships. Indeed, compared to other population segments, cruise ship passengers became disproportionately infected and often, ironically, stranded on board to quarantine. That’s why focus has been directed at addressing the need for improved ventilation on cruise ships – since dispersing fresh air in cabins and other enclosed spaces is critical for mitigating viral spread.
In Physics of Fluids, by AIP Publishing, a group of researchers from Cyprus examined how ventilation can affect ...
