Childhood epidemiology. Gastro-intestinal tract.
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Beta-Galactosidase was partially restored by protease inhibitors, leupeptin, chymostatin and E-64 in cultured fibroblasts from three patients with beta-galactosidase-neuraminidase deficiency. Pepstatin did not activate this enzyme. Neuraminidase was not affected by any of these compounds in the culture medium. It was concluded that the activating effect was produced by a specific inhibition of thiol proteases.
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All neonates are born with intestinal lactase activity. In most of them the intestinal lactase activity is lost during childhood (lactase restriction phenotype). In a minority of children normal intestinal lactase activity is retained (lactase persistence phenotype). In this study the progression of the lactase restriction phenotypes has been studied in 94 Sri Lankan children by oral lactose loads and 162 British children by intestinal lactase estimation (adult Sri Lankans and British predominantly belong to the lactase restriction and lactase persistence phenotypes, respectively). Lactase was present in infancy at birth in all Sri Lankan children and declined around the age of eight years, the majority (59 per cent) of the 10-15-year-olds belonging to the lactase restriction phenotype. In contrast the majority of the British children (95 per cent of all the British children studied) demonstrated the lactase persistence phenotype. The low prevalence rate of the restriction phenotype found among British children was largely contributed by children of African and Asian origin.
Recurrent abdominal pain of childhood affects 10 to 15% of school-aged children and leads to disability and learning difficulties. Lactose maldigestion may be a causative or contributory factor that when identified may lead to improvement. Thus, formal diagnostic testing using breath hydrogen lactose challenge methods is encouraged. This review focuses on this important condition and management options.
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Recurrent abdominal pain of childhood is a frequent complaint that is often difficult for the physician to manage. This paper outlines the various psychological and physiological factors that have been implicated in causing recurrent abdominal pain and in difficulties in coping with the disorder. Guidelines for diagnosis and management are offered.
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Patients who met International Congress of Gastroenterology criteria for irritable bowel syndrome (IBS) and had breath hydrogen lactose testing were interviewed to determine whether detection of lactose maldigestion (LM) had an impact on their symptoms. Of 199 patients initially evaluated, 161 (81%) were contacted and asked to rate their symptoms. At baseline, 47 (29%) of the IBS group had LM. Before testing, 23 (49%) were aware that ingestion of lactose-containing food was associated with their gastrointestinal symptoms. Lactose-maldigesting IBS subjects (IBSLM, n = 47) and those who had IBS and no LM (n = 114) were similar in terms of age, sex, and ethnic background. Interviews performed 41 +/- 1.1 (SEM) months after baseline evaluation revealed no significant differences in abdominal pain, altered bowel habits, bloating/distension, mucus, and relief with defecation among those with IBS or LMIBS. Overall symptoms resolved, improved, did not change, or worsened in a manner not statistically different between IBS and IBSLM groups. IBSLM subjects (a) felt that identifying LM helped them gain awareness of food-symptom relationships (78.7%), (b) experienced some improvement in symptoms (83%), (c) were avoiding lactose foods (87.2%), or (d) used lactase enzyme supplements (38.3%). Identifying LM did not significantly affect rated variables.
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A morphometric study of intraepithelial (IE) lymphocytes per 100 epithelial cells, villous heights (VH), crypt depths (CrD), and epithelial cell heights (ECH) was made on jejunal specimens of 17 patients with cow's-milk allergy (CMA), 52 with celiac disease (CD), seven with congenital lactase deficiency (CLD), four with acrodermatitis enteropathica (AE), four with giardiasis, and four with dermatitis herpetiformis (DH). The aim of this study was to investigate how the morphometric parameters correlate with each other. All cases with CMA, CD, and DH had villous atrophy with hyperplasia of the crypts, both signs being more severe in cases with CD and DH than with CMA. IE lymphocyte infiltration was more intense in specimens of patients with CD and DH (mean 76.0), than those with CMA (mean 62.5). The ECH were equally reduced in patients with CD and CMA. In a follow-up specimen at 1 year and 10 months for CD patients and 11 months for CMA patients the inflammation was reduced, and the VH were increased but still differed from the controls. In CLD cases the morphology of the villi and crypts of the jejunum was quite normal, with no IE lymphocyte infiltration; ECH were reduced. Minor morphological changes were seen in the specimens of patients with AE and giardiasis. In the whole study group there was a significant linear correlation, either positive or negative, between all variables measured (IE lymphocytes, VH, CrD, and ECH).
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Colonic fermentation of unabsorbed lactose was evaluated by measuring breath hydrogen (BH2) after a regular feeding in 17 white, normal, exclusively breast-fed infants 4-5 weeks of age. Interval breath samples were collected with a specially modified face mask and analyzed by gas chromatography for H2 and CO2 concentrations. Five infants (29%) produced 20 ppm or more of H2, four of whom underwent repeated testing. Three infants stopped producing over 20 ppm of H2 as they grew older. On a repeat evaluation, one of these three infants had levels over 20 ppm when other foods were introduced into his diet. The other continued to have elevated BH2 when weaned. Stools of infants with elevated BH2 levels had no detectable glucose, and pH was over 5.5. Weight-for-age of infants with elevated BH2 was at or above the 75th percentile. BH2 levels, normalized for the amount of breast milk ingested, fell significantly with age. These results show that complete small bowel absorption of lactose from breast milk does not occur in all white, normal, term, appropriate-for-gestational-age infants in the first months of life. The absence of glucose in the stool and the normal stool pH suggest that the unabsorbed lactose that produced H2 can be degraded in the colon.
Data from serial determinations of fecal volume, characteristics, pH, and reducing substances, and postprandial breath hydrogen (H2) concentrations in severely malnourished children receiving milk-based recovery diets were used to evaluate the quality of the correspondence among diagnostic indices for carbohydrate malabsorption, with specific emphasis on the comparison of breath H2 excretion and fecal reducing substances. Only postprandial breath H2 results for subjects with a proven capacity to mount an H2 response to the nonabsorbable disaccharide, lactulose, were included. There was a poor correlation between the diagnostic indication provided by the breath test and fecal reducing sugars. Biological considerations about the metabolism of unabsorbed carbohydrates in relation to colonic transit time and fecal flora may explain the poor degree of correlation. The two indices should not be considered interchangeable, but should be used selectively in accordance with the clinical situation.
Forty-eight children below 18 months of age suffering from acute gastroenteritis were given a glucose-electrolyte mixture (GEM) for the first 24 h following hospital admission. They were then allocated alternately to the study group which immediately went back to full-strength cow's milk feeds, or to the control group to which milk was reintroduced gradually over a 4-day period. The majority of infants in both groups had an uncomplicated recovery (70 and 96%, respectively). A complicated recovery, however, occurred more commonly in the study group. Seven patients in this group, compared with only one in the control group, had an immediate recurrence of symptoms of such severity that a return to intravenous fluids or the GEM was necessary. These complications were confined to those less than 9 months of age. It is concluded that children over 9 months of age with acute gastroenteritis may be given full-strength milk immediately after 24 h of treatment with a glucose-electrolyte solution, but for children under 9 months the conventional regrading over several days should be retained.