Pediatrics News

A social robot teddy bear, known as Huggable, has been shown to improve the mood of a group of hospitalized children, according to research published in Pediatrics. Researchers suggested that this technology could be used to improve the care and quality of life of ill children.

Childhood maltreatment may be a risk factor for disorders related to and characterized by hyperactive amygdala response, according to findings published in JAMA Psychiatry.

Latinx teens in California who have at least one immigrant parent have reported increasing levels of anxiety related to how immigration policies in the United States may personally affect them. Researchers wrote that this anxiety increased significantly after the 2016 presidential election.

The suicide rate for adolescents aged 15 to 19 years and young adults aged 20 to 24 years increased in 2017 to its highest point since 2000, according to a research letter published in JAMA.

Results from a large population-based cohort study in Sweden showed no evidence that initiation of methylphenidate treatment increased the risk for psychotic events among teenagers and young adults, including among those with a history of psychosis.

States that expanded their Medicaid programs under the Affordable Care Act saw larger reductions in cases of child neglect compared with states that did not, according to an ecological study published in JAMA Network Open.

Youth unresponsive to stimulant medication alone saw greater improvement in severe irritability symptoms when they received add-on citalopram than those who received add-on placebo, according to double-blind randomized placebo-controlled trial results.

Childhood behaviors, especially inattention, among kindergarten students in Canada were associated with future earnings in adulthood, according to a longitudinal study published in JAMA Psychiatry.

Frequent nightmares were an independent risk factor of suicide attempt and nonsuicidal self-injury among teenagers in China, according to a longitudinal study published in Journal of Clinical Psychiatry.

A team of researchers known as the Firearm Safety Among Children and Teens, or FACTS, Consortium have identified specific areas in which urgent information is needed within the next 5 years to reduce firearm injuries and deaths among children and teens.