Child ; Humans ; Nephrotic Syndrome/diagnosis* ; Biomarkers ; Steroids/therapeutic use*

Disease Progression ; Glomerulonephritis, IGA ; surgery ; therapy ; Humans ; Steroids ; therapeutic use ; Tonsillectomy ; Vitamin E ; therapeutic use

Azithromycin ; pharmacology ; therapeutic use ; Humans ; Nephrotic Syndrome ; drug therapy ; Recurrence ; Steroids ; pharmacology ; therapeutic use

Antitubercular Agents ; therapeutic use ; Brain Abscess ; drug therapy ; Humans ; Steroids ; therapeutic use ; Treatment Failure ; Tuberculoma, Intracranial ; drug therapy

Deregulation of soluble apoptosis stimulating fragment (sFas) plays an important role in glomerulonephritis (GN). The study assed the influence of immunosuppressive treatment on serum and urine sFas in patients with proliferative (PGN) and non-proliferative (NPGN) GN, and evaluated the potential of sFas measurements in predicting outcomes. Eighty-four patients with GN (45 males and 39 females) were included. Serum concentration (ng/mL) and urinary excretion (ng/mg of urinary creatinine) of sFas were measured before and after the treatment. After 12 months of therapy with steroids and cyclophosphamide, patients were divided into two subgroups according to the treatment results: Responders (R) and Non-Responders (NR). The sFas urinary excretion was reduced after treatment in both PGN and NPGN (from 17.12 +/- 15 to 5.3 +/- 4.2, P = 0.008 and from 10.11 +/- 6.1 to 3.4 +/- 3.0, P = 0.039; respectively) whereas the sFas serum concentration remained unchanged. In PGN, pre-treatment urinary sFas concentration was significantly lower in the Responders than in Non-Responders (2.3 +/- 3.1 vs 19.4 +/- 14.1, P = 0.003), and was lower still than in both R (P = 0.044) and NR (P = 0.042) subgroups with NPGN. The immunosuppressive treatment reduced sFas urinary excretion in proliferative and non-proliferative GN and results suggest that the lower urinary sFas may be linked with favorable therapy outcomes in patients with PGN.
Adult ; Antigens, CD95/blood/*urine ; Cyclophosphamide/therapeutic use ; Female ; Glomerulonephritis/*drug therapy/metabolism/pathology ; Humans ; Immunosuppressive Agents/*therapeutic use ; Male ; Middle Aged ; Steroids/therapeutic use ; Treatment Outcome

Objective: To investigate the efficacy and safety of adrenocorticotropic hormone (ACTH) in children with frequently relapsing or steroid-dependent nephrotic syndrome. Methods: The clinical data of 38 children with frequently relapsing or steroid-dependent nephrotic syndrome who were admitted to the Department of Nephrology, the Children Hospital, Zhejiang University School of Medicine from January 2015 to December 2020 were retrospectively analyzed. The general information, clinical manifestations, laboratory data of the children and follow-up (till 12 months after treatment) were collected. The patients were divided into ACTH group and Glucocorticoid (GC) group according to treatment plan. Cumulative remission, average recurrence rate, GC dosage, height and weight change and peripheral blood CD19⁺B lymphocyte count were compared between the two groups to evaluate the efficacy and adverse reactions of ACTH. Fisher's exact test, t test or rank sum test was used for comparison between groups. Results: Among the 38 patients, 28 were male and 10 were female, aged 84 (24, 180) months; 19 were in ACTH group and 19 were in GC group. The cumulative remission rate of 12 months in ACTH group was higher than that in GC group (9/19 vs. 2/19,χ²=6.81,P=0.009), the average recurrence rate was lower than that in GC group ((0.7±0.8) vs. (1.7±1.1) times, t=-3.27, P=0.011), and the average dosage of GC was lower than that in GC group ((0.27±0.16) vs. (0.51±0.27) mg/(kg·d), t=-3.21, P=0.014). The increase in height was higher than that in the GC group (4 (3,5) vs. 3 (2, 3) cm/year, Z=2.58, P=0.010), and the peripheral blood CD19⁺B lymphocyte count was lower than that in the GC group ((223±149)×10⁶ vs. (410±213)×10⁶/L,t=-3.35, P=0.009). In safety, 19 cases had transient decreased urine volume, 7 cases had hyperglycemia, and 3 cases had hypertension during the infusion of ACTH, which could be relieved after drug withdrawal. Conclusion: ACTH has a better effect on children with frequently relapsing or steroid-dependent nephrotic syndrome, which can improve cumulative sustained remission rate, lower relapses rate and decrease the dosage of GC, with good safety.
Adolescent ; Adrenocorticotropic Hormone/therapeutic use* ; Child ; Child, Preschool ; Female ; Glucocorticoids/therapeutic use* ; Humans ; Immunosuppressive Agents/therapeutic use* ; Male ; Nephrotic Syndrome/drug therapy* ; Recurrence ; Retrospective Studies ; Steroids ; Treatment Outcome

Child, Preschool ; Epilepsy, Rolandic ; diagnosis ; drug therapy ; physiopathology ; Humans ; Male ; Prognosis ; Steroids ; therapeutic use ; Treatment Outcome

Child ; Evidence-Based Medicine ; Guidelines as Topic ; Humans ; Nephrotic Syndrome ; diagnosis ; therapy ; Steroids ; therapeutic use

Objective: To study the influence of steroid withdrawal protection strategy on height growth in pediatric patients after kidney transplantation. Methods: The prospective cohort study enrolled 40 stage 5 chronic kidney disease children receiving kidney transplantation from July 2017 to September 2022 at Guangzhou Women and Children's Medical Center. Based on the primary preoperative disease, patients with immune abnormality-associated glomerular diseases or unknown causes were assigned to the steroid maintenance group, in which patients received steroid tapering within 3 months after surgery to a maintenance dose of 2.5 to 5.0 mg/d. While patients with hereditary kidney disease or congenital urinary malformations were assigned to the steroid withdrawal group, in which patients had steroids tapered off within 3 months. The characteristics of height catch-up growth and clinical data were compared between the 2 groups at baseline, 6, 12, 18 and 24 months after kidney transplantation. T-test, repeated measurement of variance analysis, Mann-Whitney U test, and Fisher exact test were used for the comparison between the 2 groups. Results: Among the 40 children, 17 were males, 23 were females, 25 were in the steroid withdraw group ((7.8±2.8) years old when receiving kidney transplantation) and 15 cases were in the steroid maintenance group ((7.6±3.5) years old when receiving kidney transplantation). The study population was followed up for (26±12) months. The total dose per unit body weight of steroids in the steroid withdrawal group was lower than that in the steroid maintenance group ((0.13±0.06) vs. (0.36±0.19) mg/(kg·d), t=5.83, P<0.001). The height catch-up rate (ΔHtSDS) in the first year after kidney transplantation in the steroid withdraw and steroid maintenance groups was 1.0 (0.7, 1.4) and 0.4 (0.1, 1.0), respectively; in the second year, the ΔHtSDS in the steroid withdraw group was significantly higher than that in the steroid maintenance group (1.1 (0.2, 1.7) vs. 0.3 (0, 0.8), U=28.00, P=0.039). The HtSDS in the steroid withdrawal group at the five follow-up time points was -2.5±0.8, -2.0±0.8, -1.5±0.8, -1.3±0.9 and -0.5±0.3, respectively, while in the steroid maintenance was -2.4±1.3, -2.2±1.1, -2.0±1.0, -1.8±1.0 and -1.6±1.0, respectively. There were statistically significant differences in HtSDS at different follow-up time points in both 2 groups (F=19.81, P<0.01), but no statistical differences in overall impact between the 2 groups (F=1.13, P=0.204). The steroid treatment was interaction with the increase of follow-up time (F=3.62, P=0.009). At the 24^th month after transplantation, the HtSDS in the steroid withdrawal group was significantly higher than that in the steroid maintenance group (P=0.047). Six patients in the steroid withdrawal group experienced antibody-mediated immune rejection (AMR), while 3 did in the steroid maintenance group. Moreover, there was no significant difference in AMR between the two groups (χ²=0.06, P=0.814). Conclusion: The steroid withdrawal protection strategy favors the height catch-up growth in pediatric patients after kidney transplantation and does not increase the risk of postoperative antibody-mediated immune rejection.
Male ; Humans ; Child ; Female ; Child, Preschool ; Kidney Transplantation ; Prospective Studies ; Steroids/therapeutic use* ; Antibodies ; Body Weight

Objective: To identify the clinically relevant factors of steroid-resistant nephrotic syndrome (SSNS) in children and establish a predictive model followed by verifying its feasibility. Methods: A retrospective analysis was performed in a total of 111 children with nephrotic syndrome admitted to Children's Hospital of ShanXi from January 2016 to December 2021. The clinical data of general conditions, manifestations, laboratory tests, treatment, and prognosis were collected. According to the steroid response, patients were divided into SSNS and steroid resistant nephrotic syndrome (SRNS) group. Single factor Logistic regression analysis was used for comparison between the 2 groups, and variables with statistically significant differences were included in multivariate Logistic regression analysis. The multivariate Logistic regression analysis was used to identify the related variables of children with SRNS. The area under the receiver operating characteristic curve (ROC), the calibration curve and the clinical decision curve were used to evaluate its effectiveness of the variables. Results: Totally 111 children with nephrotic syndrome was composed of 66 boys and 45 girls, aged 3.2 (2.0, 6.6) years. There were 65 patients in the SSNS group and 46 in the SRNS group.Univariate Logistic regression analysis showed that the 6 variables, including erythrocyte sedimentation rate, 25-hydroxyvitamin D, suppressor T cells, D-dimer, fibrin degradation products, β2-microglobulin, had statistically significant differences between SSNS and SRNS groups (85 (52, 104) vs. 105 (85, 120) mm/1 h, 18 (12, 39) vs. 16 (12, 25) nmol/L, 0.23 (0.19, 0.27) vs. 0.25 (0.20, 0.31), 0.7 (0.6, 1.1) vs. 1.1 (0.9, 1.7) g/L, 3.1 (2.3, 4.1) vs. 3.3 (2.7, 5.8) g/L, 2.3 (1.9,2.8) vs. 3.0 (2.5, 3.7) g/L, χ²=3.73, -2.42, 2.24, 3.38, 2.24,3.93,all P<0.05), were included in the multivariate Logistic regression analysis. Finally, we found that 4 variables including erythrocyte sedimentation rate, suppressor T cells, D-dimer and β2-microglobulin (OR=1.02, 1.12, 25.61, 3.38, 95%CI 1.00-1.04, 1.03-1.22, 1.92-341.04, 1.65-6.94, all P<0.05) had significant correlation with SRNS. The optimal prediction model was selected. The ROC curve cut-off=0.38, with the sensitivity of 0.83, the specificity of 0.77 and area under curve of 0.87. The calibration curve showed that the predicted probability of SRNS group occurrence was in good agreement with the actual occurrence probability, χ²=9.12, P=0.426. The clinical decision curve showed good clinical applicability. The net benefit is up to 0.2. Make the nomogram. Conclusions: The prediction model based on the 4 identified risk factors including erythrocyte sedimentation rate, suppressor T cells, D-dimer and β2-microglobulin was suitable for the early diagnosis and prediction of SRNS in children. The prediction effect was promising in clinical application.
Male ; Female ; Humans ; Child ; Nephrotic Syndrome/diagnosis* ; Retrospective Studies ; Models, Statistical ; Prognosis ; Steroids/therapeutic use*