BACKGROUND Stressful events in the early period of life (for example, maternal deprivation) have been shown to modify adult immune and gastrointestinal tract functions. The present study aimed to establish whether maternal deprivation affects colonic epithelial barrier and the development of an experimental colitis in adult rats. METHODS Male Wistar rat pups were separated during postnatal da...

Health service utilization is an important component of child health promotion. Evidence shows that two-thirds of child deaths in low and middle income countries could be prevented if current interventions were adequately utilized. Aim of this study was to identify determinants of variation in health services utilization for children in communities in Nigeria. Multivariable negative binomial re...

BACKGROUND Maternal social deprivation is associated with an increased risk of adverse maternal and perinatal outcomes. Inadequate prenatal care utilization (PCU) is likely to be an important intermediate factor. The health care system in France provides essential health services to all pregnant women irrespective of their socioeconomic status. Our aim was to assess the association between mate...

Circulating glucocorticoid (GC) levels may increase as a result of reproductive effort or in response to unpredictable events. However, GC secretion can vary with the availability of vital trophic resources such as energy. While water represents another critical resource, the impact of water deprivation on GC secretion during reproduction has not yet been thoroughly investigated. Here, we exami...

Sleep duration in the population has been declining. Women occupy an increasingly prominent place in the work force without reducing most of their responsibilities at home. Consequently, sleep needs are often pushed to the bottom of women's daily priority list. Prior research has indicated that sleep deprivation is associated with higher levels of pro-inflammatory serum cytokines. This is impor...

OBJECTIVE To identify factors associated with infant growth up to 6 months, with a particular focus on maternal distress, and to explore the effect of ethnicity on any relation between maternal distress and infant growth. METHODS Cohort study recruiting White and Pakistani women in the United Kingdom (UK). Infant growth was measured at birth and 6 months. Standard assessment of mental health ...

Schizophrenia is considered a neurodevelopmental disorder; however, all the available treatment options are used when the disease becomes clinically significant in adolescence or early adulthood. Using a developmental rat model of schizophrenia, we examined whether neonatal treatment with memantine, an NMDA receptor modulator, can improve schizophrenic-like symptoms in adulthood. Early maternal...

Although a large number of studies show that photo-period disruption potentially affects hormone secretion in mammals, information about the effects of circadian photo-period disruption during pregnancy on fetal blood reproductive hormone levels is scarce. This study used ewes and their fetuses to determine the effects of circadian photo-period disruption (deprivation of darkness) on follicle-s...

Building upon the transactional model of brain development, we explore the impact of early maternal deprivation on neural development and plasticity in three neural systems: hyperactivity/impulsivity, executive function, and hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal axis functioning across rodent, nonhuman primate, and human studies. Recognizing the complexity of early maternal-infant interactions, we lim...

OBJECTIVES The purpose of the study is to examine whether there is an association between neighbourhood deprivation and incidence of congenital heart disease (CHD), after accounting for family- and individual-level potential confounders. METHODS All children aged 0 to 11 years and living in Sweden (n = 748,951) were followed between January 1, 2000 and December 31, 2010. Data were analysed by...