Related Articles

Pregnancy-associated breast cancer: Management of the mother, fetus and tumour

Breast cancer (BC) is the most common cancer affecting females worldwide, accounting for more than 50% of cancers in young females.1 It occurs in 1 in 3000–10,000 pregnancies, with reported incidence rising with delayed childbearing.2 The age standardised incidence rate in Singapore increased by 24.2% from 1993 to 2002.3...

Quality of life of children and young adults with Down syndrome from caregivers’ perspective: A systematic review and meta-analysis

Down syndrome (DS), with an incidence of about 1/1000 to 1/1100 live births1 is the most common autosomal trisomy and genetic cause of intellectual disability. Individuals with DS may have multiple comorbidities including congenital cardiac and gastrointestinal anomalies, obesity, sleep disorders, and visual and hearing impairments.2,3 Despite the comorbidities,...

Long COVID prevalence, risk factors and impact of vaccination in the paediatric population: A survey study in Singapore

On 5 May 2023, more than 3 years since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, the World Health Organization (WHO) declared that COVID-19 no longer constituted a public health emergency. Despite high numbers of children and younger persons (CYPs) having acute COVID-19,1 information on the quality of health and...

Improving neonatal counselling service for premature births

Dear Editor,  Despite the substantial advancement of neonatal care leading to increased survival of infants of periviable gestation, as young as 22 weeks,1 the anticipated birth of an extremely low gestational age infant remains challenging for both the parents and physician, with regard to decision-making in initiating resuscitation post-delivery. Ideally,...

Rapid exome sequencing to aid diagnostics in genetic disorders: Implementation and challenges in the Singapore context

Dear Editor, There is a high burden of genetic disorders in patients admitted to the intensive care unit (ICU), ranging from 45–56%,1,2 and delayed definitive diagnoses with a long diagnostic odyssey often contribute to increased healthcare costs.3 The application of clinical exome sequencing in ICU has been gaining traction, where...

The Omicron-transformer: Rise of the subvariants in the age of vaccines

The emergence and evolution of SARS-CoV-2 have been publicly tracked in unprecedented detail through a combination of intensive genomic sequencing and open-access sharing of data.1 This surveillance information describes how waves of COVID-19 infections have been driven by the emergence of new variants of concern (VOCs) and their subvariants....

High burden of respiratory viral infection-associated mortality among critically ill children

Dear Editor, Acute lower respiratory infections (ALRIs) are a leading cause of under-5 mortality globally—two-thirds could be attributable to respiratory viral infections (RVIs).1,2 The burden of paediatric RVIs in settings of tropical climate with year-long virus circulation is relatively underreported.3,4 Previous studies in these areas have estimated that around 8–11%...

Attitude towards screening for congenital cytomegalovirus infection in newborns in Singapore

Dear Editor, Cytomegalovirus (CMV) infection is the most common congenital infection.1 A systematic review that included 77 studies from 36 countries reported that the overall prevalence of CMV was 0.67% in their newborn population.1 Among newborns with CMV, it was estimated that 15–20% will suffer from potentially deleterious effects including...

Congenital cytomegalovirus infection: Advocating for screening and education

Cytomegalovirus (CMV) infection is the leading non-genetic cause of congenital neurosensory hearing loss in children, accounting for 21% of cases of hearing loss at birth and 25% of deafness at age 4 years.1 It can also give rise to other serious sequelae such as cerebral palsy, cognitive impairment, seizures...

Evaluation of a health screening protocol for recovered COVID-19 patients before “return-to-play” and strenuous physical activity

Dear Editor, We conducted a prospective, single-centre cohort study to develop guidance for military personnel returning to strenuous activities following SARS-CoV-2 infection. The patients underwent a clinical review followed by a protocol to screen for cardiac, respiratory, haematological, endocrine/renal and neurological complications after recovery from infection. Both the study and screening...

Screening for Hearing Impairment in Hospitalised Elderly

The prevalence of hearing impairment in the local elderly population is not known. Hearing loss prevalence estimates that 25% to 40% of individuals over 65 years of age are hearing impaired. However, there is no universal agreement on the definition of “normal hearing” and comparison between studies that report...

Challenges in Perinatal Medicine

One of the significant milestones in the perinatal care in Singapore is the birth of the Perinatal Society of Singapore in March 1989. This signaled the beginning of increased collaboration between the obstetricians and neonatologists in the management of high-risk pregnancies through multidisciplinary birth defect clinics and high-risk perinatal...

Are Sensory and Cognitive Declines Associated in Older Persons Seeking Aged Care Services? Findings From a Pilot Study

Many cross-sectional and longitudinal studies have reported an association between sensory and cognitive functions in the normal ageing population. Few studies have assessed the association between sensory and cognitive impairment as most studies on cognitive ageing excluded those with sensory and cognitive impairments. This article is available only as a...

Establishing a Universal Newborn Hearing Screening Programme

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Outcome of Early Cochlear Implantation

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Improved Health and Development of Children who are Deaf and Hard of Hearing Following Early Intervention

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Recent Advances in the Treatment of Sensorineural Deafness

There have been significant advances in the understanding of middle ear mechanics and inner ear physiology in the past 2 decades. With increasing exchange and co-operation between clinicians, scientists and engineers, many new and exciting developments have emerged. Many are still in the research stage of development whilst others...

Universal Newborn Hearing Screening in Singapore: The Need, Implementation and Challenges

About 1 in 1000 newborns have severe to profound hearing loss and about 5 in 1000 have lesser degrees of loss,1 which suggests that it is the most frequently occurring major birth defect. Unfortunately, for many babies, this disability remains undetected until it is too late to prevent undesirable...

Late Complications Following Tetralogy of Fallot Repair: The Need for Long-term Follow-Up

Tetralogy of Fallot (TOF) is the most common cyanotic congenital heart disease with an incidence of approximately 0.5/1000 live births (5% to 7% of congenital heart lesions). In Singapore with a live birth of over 37, 000 per year,1 the expected number of new TOF cases will be approximately...

Neonatal Outcome of the Late Preterm Infant (34 to 36 Weeks): The Singapore Story

Neonatologists were caught looking the other way in the early part of the millennium. While they were keenly following the progress of extreme preterms and their travails, preterms born at the other end of the spectrum were being quietly ignored as “well babies”. In July 2005, the National Institute...

Permanent visual impairment in dengue fever following platelet transfusion: A series of 5 cases

Dengue fever (DF) is endemic in India and Singapore, and also causes frequent epidemics. Dengue virus belongs to the Flavivirus genus of the family Flaviviridae and its members include the 4 antigenically related serotypes of dengue virus (DENV 1–4). He also had metastatic squamous cell lung carcinoma and last...

Alternating hemiplegia of childhood presenting as recurrent apnoea in a term newborn infant

Recurrent apnoea in a term infant is usually pathologic, warranting a thorough aetiologic evaluation. An accurate diagnosis is essential in guiding subsequent management and understanding long-term prognosis. This article is available only as a PDF. Please click on "Download PDF" to view the full article.