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Research

Infants aged <6 months are vulnerable to severe influenza disease and no vaccine is approved for use in this age group. We aimed to describe the epidemiology, risk factors associated with severe outcomes and management of influenza in Australian infants aged <6 months.

Research

The COVID-19 pandemic has overwhelmed health systems in both developed and developing nations alike. Africa has one of the weakest health systems globally, but there is limited evidence on how the region is prepared for, impacted by and responded to the pandemic.

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General Practitioners (GPs) play a crucial role in the identification and support of young people at risk of suicidal behaviour and self-harm; however, no studies have explored GPs’ perspectives, approaches, challenges, and resource needs when working with this cohort in an Australian setting.

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Cross-presenting dendritic cells (DC) offer an attractive target for vaccination due to their unique ability to process exogenous antigens for presentation on MHC class I molecules. Recent reports have established that these DC express unique surface receptors and play a critical role in the initiation of anti-tumor immunity, opening the way for the development of vaccination strategies specifically targeting these cells.

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Living with a long-term medical condition is associated with heightened risk for mental health and psychosocial difficulties, but further research is required on this risk for children and adolescents with a rare disease in the educational setting. The aim of this study is to describe parents’ perceptions of the psychosocial impact of rare diseases on their school-aged children in Western Australia.

Research

Increased severity of neurological soft signs (NSS) in schizophrenia have been associated with abnormal brain morphology in cerebello-thalamo-cortical structures, but it is unclear whether similar structures underlie NSS prior to the onset of psychosis. The present study investigated the relationship between severity of NSS and grey matter volume in individuals at ultra-high risk for psychosis stratified for later conversion to psychosis.

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Many children with intellectual disability live with medical comorbidities. This study examined the impacts of comorbidities on quality of life (QOL) of children with intellectual disabilities and whether impacts varied with caregiver perceptions that medical needs had been met.

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There is no consensus on how best to measure responses to interventions among children and adults with cystic fibrosis (CF). We have systematically reviewed and summarised the characteristics and measurement properties of tests and tools that have been used to capture outcomes in studies among people with CF, including their reliability, validity and responsiveness. This review is intended to guide researchers when selecting tests or tools for measuring treatment effects in CF trials. A consensus set of these tests and tools could improve consistency in how outcomes are captured and thereby facilitate comparisons and synthesis of evidence across studies.

Research

The prognosis for high-risk childhood acute leukaemias remains dismal and established treatment protocols often cause long-term side effects in survivors. This study aims to identify more effective and safer therapeutics for these patients.

Research

Developing new methods for modelling infectious diseases outbreaks is important for monitoring transmission and developing policy. In this paper we propose using semi-mechanistic Hawkes Processes for modelling malaria transmission in near-elimination settings. Hawkes Processes are well founded mathematical methods that enable us to combine the benefits of both statistical and mechanistic models to recreate and forecast disease transmission beyond just malaria outbreak scenarios.