BACKGROUND Down syndrome is associated with various forms of thyroid dysfunction, hypothyroidism being the most common. The additive effects of both co-morbid conditions lead to further amplification of the clinical problems in these children with Down syndrome. OBJECTIVE The purpose of this prospective study was to know the prevalence of thyroid dysfunction in Down Syndrome children below th...

BACKGROUND Individuals with Down syndrome have an accelerated process of ageing which is thought to be associated with oxidative stress. AIM Since Zn/Cu superoxide dismutase is increased by about 50% in children with Down syndrome, glutathione and other less known antioxidant mechanisms were studied to determine whether there were changes in reactive oxygen species. METHODS Plasma reduced a...

OBJECTIVE Evidence of oxidative stress was reported in individuals with Down syndrome. There is a growing interest in the contribution of the immune system in Down syndrome. The aim of this study is to evaluate the coenzyme Q10 and selected pro-inflammatory markers such as interleukin 6 and tumor necrosis factor α in children with Down syndrome. METHODS Eighty-six children (5-8 years of age) ...

BACKGROUND This paper reports information on the visual and verbal short-term memory of individuals with Down syndrome. METHODS Colour memory in 16 children and adolescents with Down syndrome was compared with that of 16 typically developing children matched for receptive vocabulary. It was suggested that focal colours should be remembered more successfully than non-focal colours on the basis...

Our pilot study investigated if children with Down syndrome engaged in the recommended 60 min of moderate to vigorous physical activity (MVPA) every day. Twenty-three children with Down syndrome (7 girls, 16 boys; mean age 11.7 years, SD = 3.1) wore a triaxial accelerometer for 7 consecutive days to measure their activity levels. The average daily MVPA undertaken was 104.5 min ( SD = 35.3 min)....

Knowledge about Down syndrome and attitudes towards the educational inclusion of children with Down syndrome were examined in a sample of 2,053 people from the community and a group of 538 experienced teachers. Although both groups displayed reasonably accurate knowledge about Down syndrome and its developmental consequences, they significantly underestimated the average life expectancy for a p...

It is clear that arithmetic and number skills are areas of particular difficulty for individuals with Down syndrome. Studies of arithmetic development in typically developing children suggest that a pre-verbal “number sense” system and counting skills provide two critical foundations for the development of arithmetic. Studies of children with Down syndrome suggest that the development of both t...

BACKGROUND In this study, we investigated the early development of stress in mothers of children with Down syndrome, compared with mothers of children with developmental disabilities of mixed aetiologies. Growth modelling analyses were used to explore: (1) whether mothers of children with Down syndrome demonstrated distinct patterns of stress during their children's early development, compared ...

It has long been argued that abnormal cerebral lateralisation might underlie the language problems that characterise Down syndrome, but to date only behavioural evidence has been provided. We used the auditory event-related potentials Ta and Tb of the T-complex to investigate lateralised processing of speech (vowels) and non-speech (simple and complex tones) sounds in children with Down syndrom...

Though cross-sectional studies have yielded important information regarding the trajectory of psychopathology in middle childhood and adolescence in Down syndrome, there has been little exploration of maladaptive behaviour in the earliest years of development. In this study, we explore the emergence of maladaptive behaviour in young children with Down syndrome (n=24) and a mental age-matched co...