Epidemiological characteristics of common respiratory infectious diseases in children before and during the COVID-19 epidemic.

Background: Since the outbreak of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19), public's awareness of infection prevention and control has increased overall, and various prevention and control measures have been adopted. These measures may also have a certain impact on the occurrence of other infectious diseases. Therefore, we collected information on children with several respiratory infectious diseases in Jinan Children's Hospital in China from 2016 to 2022 and analyzed their changes. Method: We collected data on age, sex and number of cases of pertussis, measles, scarlet fever, pulmonary tuberculosis, mumps and influenza, which were diagnosed by clinical and laboratory criteria, from 1 January 2016 to 31 December 2022 in Jinan Children's Hospital in Jinan, Shandong Province, China. Data on the number of people affected by these diseases in China from the Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention were compared. Then, we processed the data by using WPS Excel 2019 and SPSS. Results: A total of 12,225 cases were included in this study in Jinan Children's Hospital, which consisted of 3,688 cases of pertussis (2,200 cases before COVID-19 and 1,488 during COVID-19), 680 cases of measles (650 cases before COVID-19 and 30 during COVID-19), 4,688 cases of scarlet fever (4,001 cases before COVID-19 and 687 during COVID-19), 114 cases of tuberculosis (86 cases before COVID-19 and 28 during COVID-19), 449 cases of mumps (340 cases before COVID-19 and 109 during COVID-19) and 2,606 cases of influenza (1,051 cases before COVID-19 and 1,555 during COVID-19). The numbers of children in the hospital with pertussis, measles, scarlet fever, mumps and influenza decreased substantially during COVID-19 in 2020-2022 compared with numbers in 2016-2019, while numbers of patients in China with all six respiratory infectious diseases, including pulmonary tuberculosis, declined during the pandemic. A rebound of pertussis, scarlet fever and influenza was observed in 2021 and 2022. Conclusions: The study found that viral pathogens such as those causing measles, mumps and influenza all decreased during the pandemic, after which influenza rebounded. Infection diseases caused by bacteria such as scarlet fever and pertussis also decreased during COVID-19, and then a rebound occurred. However, tuberculosis stayed relatively constant.

[Analysis of the positive rate of otitis media in 1-12 years old children based on brain MRI].

Objective:To investigate the positive imaging rate of otitis media in children aged 1-12 years by analyzing the positive rate of otitis media suggested by cranial magnetic resonance imaging（MRI） images in children. Methods:By collecting the brain MRI images of children aged 1-12 in Department of Otolaryngology, Jinan children's Hospital from January 2014 to December 2020, the overall incidence of otitis media and mastoiditis was firstly determined, and then it was divided into 12 age groups according to age, each age group was split into boy and girl groups according to gender, each group was divided into left, right and bilateral groups, with the changes of otitis media and mastoiditis in the scanning field as the positive standard statistical analysis of the results. Results:Among 12 439 children in the study, 1321 cases were diagnosed with tympanitis, with a positive rate of 10.62%. Among them, 892 patients were male, with a positive rate of 67.52%, and 429 cases were female, with a positive rate of 32.48%. The positive rate of the male was higher than that of female children, 1.84 times higher than that of female children. The positive momentum in male and female children was negatively correlated with age （P<0.01）. The favorable rates of male children in the left ear, right ear, and both ears were higher than those in female children of the same age（P<0.05）. There was no difference in the positive rate of the left and right ear in children with tympanitis （P=0.76）. Conclusion:Craniocerebral MRI examination in children with tympanitis can clarify the inflammation of the middle ear cavity and the effusion in the mastoid air chamber. The positive rate of children at two years old showed a steep decline, which may be due to the acceleration of mastoid gasification, the change of tympanic environment, the increase of air chamber in the tympanic room, the evolution of air pressure could offset the negative pressure caused by poor Eustachian tube function, to reduce the incidence of tympanitis.

Multiomics Analysis Reveals Aberrant Metabolism and Immunity Linked Gut Microbiota with Insomnia.

Studies have confirmed that insomnia is related to gut microbiota. Previous research suggests that immunity and metabolism are also associated with insomnia. However, to our knowledge, the integration of these factors has not been investigated in insomnia. Here, we explored the correlations across gut microbiota, serum metabolism, and inflammatory factors in insomnia. Our results showed that the composition and structure of gut microbiota and metabolism in insomnia patients were different from healthy controls. Compared to healthy controls, the relative abundances of Lactobacillus, Streptococcus, and Lactobacillus crispatus were significantly increased in insomniacs. There were five metabolic pathways in insomniacs (glycerophospholipid metabolism; glutathione metabolism; nitrogen metabolism; alanine, aspartate, and glutamate metabolism; aminoacyl-tRNA biosynthesis) significantly different between the two groups. Moreover, we found that IL-1ß levels were significantly higher in insomnia patients while TNF-α was significantly reduced. We further identified that the changes in the level of IL-1ß and TNF-α were associated with some specific bacteria and metabolites, such as Prevotella amnii, Prevotella buccalis, Prevotella timonensis, and Prevotella colorans. Mediation analysis further determined that the immune factors and metabolites could mediate the relationship between gut microbes and insomnia. IMPORTANCE Our study indicated that systematic inflammation and metabolites might be a pathway linking the gut microbiome with insomnia. These findings provide new insights and a better understanding of gut microbiota's role in insomnia as well as potential novel microbiome-related etiologies for insomnia.