We report 4 children with encephalitis associated with human bocavirus (HBoV) 1 or 2. All children were severely underweight, and 2 died; 1 of them had a matching HBoV2 nucleotide sequence isolated from serum and bocavirus like particles in the cerebrospinal fluid that were observed with electron microscopy. No further pathogens were detected in the cerebrospinal fluid of these patients.

Encephalitis causes significant global morbidity and mortality. A large number of viruses cause encephalitis, and their geographic and temporal distributions vary. In many encephalitis cases, the virus cannot be detected, even after extensive testing. This is one challenge in management of the encephalitis patient. Since cytokines are pivotal in any form of inflammation and vary according to the nature of the inflammation, we hypothesized cytokine levels would allow us to discriminate between encephalitis caused by viruses and other aetiologies. This pilot study was conducted in a tertiary care hospital in Dhaka, Bangladesh. Viral detection was performed by polymerase chain reaction using patient cerebrospinal fluid. Acute phase reactants and cytokines were detected in patient serum. Of the 29 biomarkers assessed using the Wilcoxon rank-sum test, only vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF) was significantly higher (P = 0.0015) in viral-positive compared with virus–negative encephalitis patients. The area under the curve (AUC) for VEGF was 0.82 (95% confidence interval: 0.66–0.98). Serum VEGF may discriminate between virus-positive and virus-negative encephalitis. Further study will be needed to confirm these findings.

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Introduction: Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) is a neurodevelopmental disorder. Due to long term impairment, high genetic component (heritability> 90%), lack of effective prevention and treatment, ASD has been prioritized for genetic studies. Studies on Copy Number Variations (CNV) at chromosome 16p11.2 locus have mostly been conducted in population of pure or predominant European ancestry. It is not known whether this is also prevalent among the ASD affected individuals in population of other ancestries such as Bangladeshi population. The aim of this research work is to detect CNV of SEZ6L2 gene at 16p11.2 locus and to describe the associated clinical characteristics in Bangladeshi cohort with clinically diagnosed ASD. Methods: The known SEZ6L2 gene was interrogated for copy number variation (CNV) in twenty five autistic patients with SYBR Green I assay using the real time qPCR. Probands were interrogated using relative standard curve (efficiency correction) method. Epilepsy with speech disorder and postnatal infection might be more common among autistic patients with CNV at this SEZ6L2 gene. Results: The two cases with characteristics CNV was detected who had clinically manifestation of convulsion at different ages, partial developmental delay in multiple domains including delay in walking, speech delay and mental age not corresponding with the chronological age. This work describes the frequency of CNV is 8.3 %. This rate is skewed due to small sample size and do not reflect the true frequency of 16p11.2 duplication impacting SEZ6L2 gene. Conclusion: Epilepsy with speech disorder and postnatal infection might be more common among autistic patients with CNV at this SEZ6L2 gene. Bangladesh J Medicine Jan 2019; 30(1) : 24-29

Heart failure in children is a serious condition, causes substantial morbidity and mortality. Sufficient data regarding various aspects of heart failure in children is not available in our country. This cross sectional study was conducted on 101 patients admitted with the diagnosis of heart failure at ICMH, and NICVD from July 2014 to March 2015 with the aim to identify the co-morbidities and hospital outcome of heart failure in infants and children. In this study most of the patients (53.46%) were infants. Congenital structural heart lesions were found in 67(76.2%) cases. VSD was most common found in 42.5% cases, followed by ASD (31.6%) and PDA (24.7%). Cardiomyopathy (DCM) was diagnosed in 11 (10.9%) cases and 10 patients (9.9%) had valvular defect due to rheumatic recurrence. Anaemia was most common (78.2%) co-morbidity in all age group. Pneumonia was more common (74%) in infants. Total 14 patients (13.9%) died in hospital though getting adequate medical support. This study recommends that diagnosis and treatment of co-morbidities along with appropriate management of acute heart failure is crucial to reduce the mortality and morbidity. Bangladesh Med J. 2018 Jan; 47 (1): 6-10