Background: Childhood cancer is fast becoming an important paediatric problem in Nigeria and several parts of Africa, with the progressive decline of infectious and nutritional diseases. The following study was a 5-year retrospective review of paediatric solid tumours as seen at the Jos University Teaching Hospital, Nigeria. Objective: To determine the relative frequencies of childhood solid malignant tumours in Jos, Central Nigeria and compare with reports of previous studies both locally and abroad. Materials and Methods: Cancer registers and medical records of patients were used to extract demographic data, specimen number and/or codes. Archival materials were retrieved from the histopathology laboratory and sections were made from paraffin embedded blocks of these specimens. Slides of these histological sections were reviewed and reclassified where necessary. The relative frequencies were then determined. Results: One hundred and eighty one solid tumours of children were diagnosed within the study period. Ninety-four (51%) were benign and 87 (49%) malignant. Male: Female ratio was 1.3:1. The commonest malignant tumour diagnosed was rhabdomyosarcoma which accounted for 27 (31%), comprising of 15 (55.6%), 11 (40.7%) and 1 (3.7%) embryonal, alveolar and pleomorphic rhabdomyosarcomas, respectively. Non Hodgkin lymphoma and Burkitt lymphoma accounted for 17 (19.5%) and 12 (13.8%), respectively. Conclusion: Based on the result of our study, we conclude that the commonest solid malignancy of childhood in Jos, Nigeria is rhabdomyosarcoma. This has implications for diagnosis, management and prognosis of theses soft tissue sarcomas in our paediatric population.

Complete diagnostic autopsy (CDA) remains the gold standard and a valuable technique for determining cause of death. It is a source of health statistics that can be used to measure health care services’ quality, unraveling important information on disease processes, particularly in emerging and unknown diseases. It can also be a vital tool for medical education and biomedical research. However, autopsy rates have been declining globally. There is an urgent need to develop and validate alternative methods in different settings to provide reliable information on cause of death. In this study, we aimed to determine cause of death (KazCoDe) in neonates and infants using minimally invasive tissue sampling (MITS), and to compare these results with those of CDA. We conducted MITS and CDA sequentially on 24 deceased children at the Pathological Bureau of the Akimat of the city of Nur-Sultan. Clinical data of the study subjects were extracted from their clinical records. During both procedures, brain, liver and lung tissues were collected for pathological diagnosis. Fifteen (62.5%) and nine (37.5%) were stillbirths and neonates, respectively. Eight (33.3%) were females and 16 (66.7%) were males. MITS diagnosis of cause of death was concordant with CDA diagnosis in 83.3% out of the 24 cases when considering the immediate and underlying causes of death and reviewing all the clinical and laboratory test results as part of the diagnostic evaluation to arrive at a cause of death (ICD-PM). We concluded that MITS is a valuable and reliable method for cause of death diagnosis in stillbirths and neonates, which can contribute vital mortality statistics in children in the absence of CDA.

Background. Abnormal uterine bleeding (AUB) is a common gynecologic condition, and proper management is based on the histological evaluation of an adequate endometrial sample obtained via biopsy. The aims of this study were to evaluate factors influencing the reliability and success rate of Pipelle endometrial sampling for histopathological diagnosis. Methods. One hundred and eighty patients with AUB underwent endometrial sampling using both Pipelle and dilatation and curettage (D&C) procedures at the Clinical Academic Department of Women’s Health, University Medical Center between January 2019 and April 2021. We analyzed the effects of age, menopausal status, ethnicity, body mass index (BMI), provider experience, and procedure indication on the success and reliability of each procedure. Results. Pipelle sampling was successful in 144 (80.56%) women, while D&C was successful in 164 (91.11%) women. Analysis using Fisher’s exact test showed that age, menopausal status, and biopsy indication were factors affecting the success rate of both methods, while ethnicity, BMI, and physician experience had no influence. Overall concordance in the histopathological results between Pipelle and D&C was 91.72%. Conclusion. Pipelle sampling was found to be reliable for the detection of endometrial carcinoma and endometrial hyperplasia, while its reliability was low in cases of endometrial polyps. The endometrial sampling approach should be personalized in daily clinical practice for women with AUB, and Pipelle sampling is not suitable for all patients. If an endometrial polyp is suspected, the physician should consider other diagnostic tools, bearing in mind all of the factors influencing endometrial sampling success and reliability rates.

Epidemiology of gastric cancer in jos university teaching hospital jos a 20 year review of cases

In Kazakhstan, there is insufficient data on genetic epilepsy, which has its own clinical and management implications. Thus, this study aimed to use whole genome sequencing to identify and evaluate genetic variants and genetic structure of early onset epilepsy in the Kazakhstani pediatric population. In this study, for the first time in Kazakhstan, whole genome sequencing was carried out among epilepsy diagnosed children. The study involved 20 pediatric patients with early onset epilepsy and no established cause of the disease during the July–December, 2021. The average age at enrolment was 34.5 months, with a mean age at seizure onset of 6 months. Six patients (30%) were male, and 7 were familial cases. We identified pathogenic and likely pathogenic variants in 14 (70%) cases, among them, 6 novel disease gene variants (KCNQ2, CASK, WWOX, MT-CO3, GRIN2D, and SLC12A5). Other genes associated with the disease were SCN1A (x2), SLC2A1, ARX, CACNA1B, PCDH19, KCNT1, and CHRNA2. Identification of the genetic causes in 70% of cases confirms the general structure of the etiology of early onset epilepsy and the necessity of using NGS in diagnostics. Moreover, the study describes new genotype-phenotypic correlations in genetic epilepsy. Despite certain limitations of the study, it can be concluded that the genetic etiology of pediatric epilepsy in Kazakhstan is very broad and requires further research.