Invertebrates have long been an important tool for assessing water pollution due to their characteristics as intermediate consumers in aquatic ecosystem food chains. Most of the time, the effects of contaminants are measured by their effect on oxidative status or by mortality, although there already exists an easier tool—hemocytes. Hemocytes are circulating cells with a very important role in the immune system of invertebrates, which can be found within the hemolymph, analogous to the blood in vertebrates. The collection of hemolymph samples is easy, fast, minimally invasive, and poses no danger to the life of invertebrates. The purpose of this review was to highlight the advantages of using hemolymph for toxicity assays of various substances, including heavy metals, micro- and nano-plastics, pesticides, hydrocarbons, and oil spills. A literature search was conducted for this purpose using the most common and most often used databases, with a focus on the most recent and relevant studies. Bivalve mollusks, crustaceans, and gastropods were chosen for this investigation. This review found a growing number of studies choosing to use hemolymph as the standard methodology for toxicology assays, confirming their qualities as reliable tools.

Congenital heart defects are known causes of malnutrition. Optimal nutritional management is paramount in improving short and long-term prognosis for neonates and infants with congenital heart malformations, as current strategies target preoperative and postoperative feeding requirements. Standardized enteral and/or parenteral feeding protocols, depending on the systemic implications of the cardiac defect, include the following common practices: diagnosing and managing feeding intolerance, choosing the right formula, and implementing a monitoring protocol. The latest guidelines from the American Society for Parenteral and Enteral Nutrition and the European Society of Paediatric and Neonatal Intensive Care, as well as a significant number of recent scientific studies, offer precious indications for establishing the best feeding parameters for neonates and infants with heart defects.

Foreign body aspiration (FBA) is a frequent diagnosis in children. In the absence of other lung conditions, such as asthma or chronic pulmonary infections, this manifests as a sudden onset of cough, dyspnea, and wheezing. The differential diagnosis is based on a scoring system which takes into account the clinical picture as well as the radiologic aspects. The treatment that is considered the gold-standard for FBA in children remains to be rigid fibronchoscopy, however it comes with several potentially crucial local complications such as airway edema, bleeding, and bronchospasm, along inherent issues due to general anesthesia. Material and methods: Our study is a retrospective study analyzing the medical files of the cases from our hospital over the span of 9 years. The study group consisted of 242 patients aged 0–16 years diagnosed with foreign body aspiration in the Emergency Clinical Hospital for Children “Sfânta Maria” Iași, between January 2010–January 2018. Clinical and imaging data were extracted from the patients’ observation sheets. Results: In our cohort, the distribution of children with foreign body aspiration was uneven, with the highest incidence being reported in children from rural areas (70% of cases), whereas the most affected age group was 1–3 years, amounting to 79% of all cases. The main symptoms which led to emergency admittance were coughing (33%) and dyspnea (22%). The most important factors that determined the unequal distribution were socio-economic status, which relates to a lack of adequate supervision by parents, as well as the consumption of food inappropriate for their age. Conclusions: Foreign body aspiration is a major medical emergency that may be associated with dramatic clinical manifestations. Several scoring algorithms designed to establish the need for bronchoscopy have been proposed, taking into account both the clinical and radiological results. The issue with asymptomatic or mild symptomatic cases, as well as difficulties managing cases with radiolucent foreign bodies, remains a challenge.

The effects of exposure to environmental pollutants on neurological processes are of increasing concern due to their potential to induce oxidative stress and neurotoxicity. Considering that many industries are currently using different types of plastics as raw materials, packaging, or distribution pipes, microplastics (MPs) have become one of the biggest threats to the environment and human health. These consequences have led to the need to raise the awareness regarding MPs negative neurological effects and implication in neuropsychiatric pathologies, such as schizophrenia. The study aims to use three zebrafish models of schizophrenia obtained by exposure to ketamine (Ket), methionine (Met), and their combination to investigate the effects of MP exposure on various nervous system structures and the possible interactions with oxidative stress. The results showed that MPs can interact with ketamine and methionine, increasing the severity and frequency of optic tectum lesions, while co-exposure (MP+Met+Ket) resulted in attenuated effects. Regarding oxidative status, we found that all exposure formulations led to oxidative stress, changes in antioxidant defense mechanisms, or compensatory responses to oxidative damage. Met exposure induced structural changes such as necrosis and edema, while paradoxically activating periventricular cell proliferation. Taken together, these findings highlight the complex interplay between environmental pollutants and neurotoxicants in modulating neurotoxicity.

Neurodevelopmental disorders are a category of diseases that is not yet fully understood. Due to their common traits and pathways, often it is difficult to differentiate between them based on their symptoms only. A series of hypotheses are trying to define their etiology, such as neuroinflammation, neurodegeneration, and immunology, but none have managed to explain their multifactorial manifestation. One feature that may link all theories is that of oxidative stress, with a redox imbalance as well as several other markers of oxidative damage (on lipids, proteins, and nucleic acids) being observed in both postmortem samples of the brain of patients with schizophrenia and autism spectrum disorders. However, the implication of oxidative stress in pathology is still distrustfully looked upon. For this purpose, in the current paper, we were interested in reviewing the implications of oxidative stress in these disorders as well as the impact of N‐acetylcysteine on the oxidative status with a focus on the glutathione level and N‐methyl‐D‐aspartate receptor. We were also interested in finding papers targeting the use of antioxidant properties of different plant extracts.

Wolf–Hirschhorn syndrome (WHS), a rare disorder determined by distal 4p deletion, is characterized by a pre and postnatal growth retardation, hypotonia, intellectual disability, epilepsy, craniofacial dysmorphism, and congenital fusion anomalies. The clinical aspects are dependent on the deletion’ size. Our aim was to identify rare specific characteristics in a cohort of seven cases with 4p deletion and to assess the utility of Multiplex ligation-dependent probe amplification (MLPA) (cheap and sensitive test)—combined kits—as a diagnostic test and selection tool for cases that require other investigations (chromosomal microarray analysis—CMA, karyotype). For all cases we conducted a clinical examination with the main features identified: facial dysmorphism, intellectual disability, postnatal development delay, cardiac defects and hypotonia. In some cases, we observed seizures, structural brain abnormalities, immunodeficiencies, and renal anomalies. Prenatal growth retardation was detected in a relatively small number of cases, but postnatal growth failure was a constant feature. In all cases, the clinical diagnosis was confirmed by genetic analyses: karyotype and/or MLPA. In conclusion, renal and brain defects, as well as immunodeficiency are rare manifestations and should be looked for. Although CMA is the standard test, in our experience, MLPA is also a reliable screening method as the identified cases were either confirmed by MLPA or selected for further investigations.