Strokes come in many shapes and sizes. In children and adults, strokes often present sudden limb or facial numbness, confusion and dizziness. But some strokes that cause clots to develop in the small blood vessels of the brain don’t exhibit any symptoms at all. Studies have shown that hundreds to thousands of these small, asymptomatic […]
Earlier this year, Nicole D’Ambrosio found herself in front of a room full of scientists that were gathered in part to discuss their progress on a novel cell therapy that has the potential to one day save her son’s life. She had been asked to present her family’s story as part of a company-wide meeting […]
When Madeline Boese was 14, she had visions of pointe shoes, tutus and sugar plums dancing in her head. She dreamed of becoming a professional ballerina, and hoped for a future in the spotlight doing what she loved. Unfortunately, her body had different plans. One day in ballet class in December 2006, she noticed an […]
Scientists at Seattle Children’s Research Institute are paving the way to use gene-edited B cells – a type of white blood cell in the immune system – to treat a wide range of potential diseases that affect children, including hemophilia and other protein deficiency disorders, autoimmune diseases, and infectious diseases. If successful, their research would […]
Growing up in Ghana, a sub-Saharan country on the west coast of Africa, Dr. Nana Minkah, a scientist at the Kappe Lab, endured the unenviable “rite of passage” contracting malaria multiple times as a child. While he doesn’t remember the early years when the associated high fever caused hallucinations, he has distinct memories of later […]
At 5 months old, Tyler Cassinelli, now 3, was battling both liver cancer and intractable epilepsy. When he was at Seattle Children’s preparing to undergo cancer treatment, Tyler had a seizure that stopped his breathing. “It was one of the scariest moments of my life,” said Jane Cassinelli, Tyler’s mother. “We could see his stats […]
Wanting to do something different to address the alarmingly high number of newborn deaths in low income countries, Dr. Rachel Umoren, a neonatologist at Seattle Children’s, turned to virtual reality (VR). As mobile phone-based VR programs became increasingly accessible, Umoren thought the emerging technology could offer a better way to equip health care providers with […]
Every year, over 1.2 million people continue to be infected by HIV. Of these, about 160,000 are infants that contract the virus from their mother. Without treatment, a third of these infants die by their first birthday, and half of them do not make it to age 2. Thanks to programs that identify and treat […]
The first findings to result from a collaboration between Seattle Children’s Research Institute and Microsoft data scientists provides expecting mothers new information about how smoking before and during pregnancy contributes to the risk of an infant dying suddenly and unexpectedly before their first birthday. According to the study published in Pediatrics, any amount of smoking […]
For the first time in his life, Shanahan “Shanny” Dameral, 19, has a girlfriend. Soon, he’ll be graduating with a high school diploma and looking for his first job on the Kitsap Peninsula. What seems routine for many is a big deal for Shanahan and other children living with treatment-resistant or intractable epilepsy. For reasons […]