The lockdown that was imposed by governments as part of the attempt to contain the COVID-19 pandemic included extreme measures, such as home confinement and the shutting down of special education systems. Our aim was to learn about the core experiences of parents of children with autism during this significant life disturbance. Thirty-one parents of 25 children with autism participated in semi-structured telephone interviews which were transcribed verbatim and underwent a qualitative, immersion/crystallization analysis. The analysis was conducted in an iterative consensus-building process to identify parents’ experiences, concerns, challenges, coping strategies, and perceived needs during the lockdown. The main themes that emerged related to the various parental concerns; the major difficulties encountered during this unique time, the functional, social, and behavioral implications the lockdown had on these children; and the manner in which the parents coped as an indication of their resourcefulness and outlook. Our findings broaden the insight into the underlying elements of the hardships and gains experienced by children with autism and their parents in times of significant life adversity. Programs in such times should be directed at supporting and guiding parents on how to better accommodate to the situation, thereby optimizing their coping strategies and resilience. Lay The lockdown and home isolation due to the COVID-19 pandemic led to significant transformation in lifestyles. Being a parent in this situation was not easy for anyone, much less for parents of children with special needs. The shutting down of special education systems meant that parents lost a vital support network and had to be the sole full-time caregivers despite often lacking the skills to cope with this new and daunting situation. We interviewed parents and learned that the main difficulties faced by homebound autistic children stemmed from the change in routine, lack of special education services, limited physical space, and food- and sleep-related issues. Some children experienced worsening in behavioral, social, and developmental domains, yet others seemed to not only overcome the challenges of changing conditions but even benefit from them. The children’s success or failure was directly related to how their parents coped. The key factors that enabled successful coping were the parents’ ability to accommodate to the child’s needs, their own creativeness and resourcefulness, and a generally positive outlook. The results of this analysis revealed that the best way to benefit autistic children caught up in drastic changes in their routine lifestyle is to invest in a strong support system for their parents.

Epilepsy is estimated to exist in approximately 40% of individuals with cerebral palsy; however, the specific features that make it drug resistant are not well defined. The main aim of this study was to determine the clinical risk factors that could predict drug-resistant epilepsy, in children with cerebral palsy. The study was performed via a retrospective chart review, analyzing clinical parameters of 118 children with cerebral palsy with either drug-resistant epilepsy or controlled epilepsy, between the years 2013 and 2018. We established a predictive model for drug-resistant epilepsy in children with cerebral palsy that is simple to apply in clinical settings and composed of the additive effect of a low Apgar score at 5 minutes, neonatal seizures, focal-onset epilepsy, and focal slowing on electroencephalogram (EEG; area under the receiver operating characteristic of 0.840). Early prediction of drug-resistant epilepsy may benefit to achieve better seizure control in children with cerebral palsy.

Night eating syndrome (NES) is an eating disorder (ED) characterized by nocturnal ingestion (NI), evening hyperphagia, morning anorexia, as well as mood and sleep disturbances. This study compared subjective and objective sleep quality and ED-related psychopathologies in patients seeking treatment for ED. Method: The sample was composed of 170 women, aged 18–68, who were referred for an ED assessment from 2011 to 2020. The participants were divided into three subgroups: NES-NI only (n = 30), NES+ binge eating (BE) (including binge eating disorders or bulimia nervosa (n = 52), and BE-only (n = 88). The measures consisted of a psychiatric evaluation, objective sleep monitoring measured by an actigraph for 1 week, a subjective sleep self-report, and ED-related psychopathology questionnaires. Results: Objective sleep monitoring revealed significant group differences, with higher sleep efficiency in participants with BE-only and longer sleep durations for the NES-NI only group. Subjectively, the BE-only group described a significantly lower sleep quality than either the NES-NI only or the NES+BE groups. ED-related psychopathology was lower in the NES-NI-only group. A stepwise linear regression revealed that general psychopathology (the brief symptom inventory total score) was a significant predictor of subjective sleep quality. Conclusion: NES-NI-only was correlated with less psychopathology, but with more subjective and objective sleep disturbances. These results lend weight to the supposition that NES lies on a continuum of ED psychopathologies, and that NES-NI-only appears to be a separate entity from NES+BE and BE-only in terms of its psychopathology.