In spring 2016, a new phase in the Elfe Child Cohort Study will take place in French nursery schools, with participation by middle-year teaching staff. Its objective: to collect information on early learning by children of approximately 5 years of age. It will hence be possible to analyse the manner in which children enter the various areas of learning provided by nursery schools, taking living conditions, family structures, and the child’s health and development into account.

This “School” component of the Elfe study calls for participation by teachers via playful exercises in the areas of reading and numbers, prepared by the researchers.

(c) Fotolia

The place of the School survey in monitoring the Elfe child cohort

Elfe is the first French study devoted to monitoring children from birth to adult age, which addresses the many aspects of their development and socialisation from the social sciences, health and environment perspective. When it was launched at national level in 2011, over 18,000 children were enrolled in the cohort.

The Elfe study is an innovative source of data for the large-scale analysis of the relationship, at every age, between parent biography, family life, socioeconomic characteristics, and child-minding arrangements and the development of children’s cognitive and social abilities.

The most important data are collected by conducting regular surveys with parents. Direct input is also sought from the children at age three and a half during a home visit, where they do a drawing and play various visual and picture-matching games. By continuing to monitor children at approximately 5 years of age, the School survey will be invaluable in offering a comprehensive and multifactorial approach to the world of early childhood and nursery school.

More information at:

www.elfe-france.fr/enseignant

The Sentinelles network, developed by Inserm and Pierre and Marie Curie University (UPMC), is a national surveillance system made up of 1,300 general practitioners and about a hundred private paediatricians, which allows the creation of large databases for several diseases, for purposes of health monitoring and research.

The Sentinelles physicians collect information from their patients on 8 health indicators, and submit it via the Internet. Analysis of these data allows estimation of the weekly incidence rate for each indicator, so that changes in these indicators can be monitored on the territory in real time.

According to the Sentinelles network’s weekly bulletin of 16 December, cases of gastroenteritis are up slightly in metropolitan France. 110,500 new cases were seen during visits to general practitioners last week. The incidence rate, estimated at 171 cases per 100,000 inhabitants, is, however, below the epidemic threshold. At regional level, Limousin, Aquitaine and Auvergne observed the highest incidence rates.

Spread of chickenpox remains moderate on the territory, with 22 cases per 100,000 inhabitants, with the most severely affected foci to be found in Picardy, Upper Normandy and Poitou-Charentes. For influenza, the incidence rate is well below the epidemic threshold.

In 2012, the Île-de-France Regional Health Agency initiated a regional project aimed at Reducing Infant and Perinatal Mortality (RéMI). This initiative was primarily focused on Seine-Saint-Denis, a district characterised by excess infant mortality (death before one year of age) and perinatal mortality (foetal deaths and deaths in the first week of life). The 2 research reports ordered by the Agency under this initiative—including one prepared by Inserm, and officially submitted to its Director General yesterday—bring new clarity to the situation in the department.

The audit has made it possible to identify risk factors associated with the women’s personal situations: 50% of them were overweight or obese. 7% did not have access to Social Security at the start of pregnancy, and 9% were in receipt of State Medical Aid (AME), or were in a scheme for access to urgent care.

The expert reports on the deaths also underline that for three-quarters of them, deviations from good practice were observed in the care of the pregnant women.

33% of the deaths were judged potentially or probably avoidable, by acting on one or more of these deviations from good practice

Given this observation, ARS is launching 3 workshops bringing together professionals and those involved in perinatal care in Seine-Saint-Denis, which will run from November 2015 until March 2016, based on these areas of reflection.

Monday 12 October saw the start of the annual vaccination campaign, which will continue until the end of January 2016. Last winter recalled the potential seriousness of influenza, which severely affected the most vulnerable populations (mainly people over the age of 65).

To better control the influenza epidemic, Inserm has created the Sentinelles network, an information system based on a network of 1,300 general practitioners distributed throughout metropolitan France. These “sentinel physicians” report cases of influenza, diarrhoea or chicken pox on a weekly basis.

In this way, the Sentinelles network and Inserm monitor the progression of influenza throughout the year, and are in a position to anticipate peaks at national level. The health authorities thus receive the maximum amount of information, which allows them to adapt their resources for the better protection and care of citizens.

From Tuesday 30th June, France will enter into an exceptional heatwave for this time of year.[1]. These remarkably high temperatures (around 40 °C) can have particularly harmful consequences on the health: tiredness, dehydration, heat stroke, respiratory, heart, metabolic problems, etc. If, for the most part, these inconveniences are minor, they are lethal in certain cases, particularly for the at-risk populations such as young children or the elderly.

France has already experienced an exceptional heatwave in 2003, responsible for a high death rate. The Inserm researchers at the Epidemiology Centre on the medical causes of death (CépiDc) have produced an estimate of the high death rate linked to this heatwave on a national and regional level.

[1] France weather (Météo France) website « Vague de chaleur: vers des températures exceptionnelles pour un début juillet (Heatwave: exceptional temperatures for the start of July)»

Starting on Wednesday 17 June, nearly 700,000 candidates, from 13 to 93 years of age[1], will be taking the baccalauréat state examination.

These exam periods, often synonymous with stress and fatigue, are a tough ordeal for our mind and body. On the eve of the written examinations, your notification to attend, bag and piece of identification are all ready, but what about your memory? How do you boost it, and look after it? Is there still time to revise? Is there a specific diet that should be followed? How many hours’ sleep does the future graduate need to be in full possession of his/her faculties?

Joëlle Adrien, Inserm Research Director at Unit 1127, “Brain and Spinal Cord Institute (ICM)”, and Francis Eustache, Director of Inserm Unit – EPHE – UCBN 1077, “Neuropsychology and Functional Neuroanatomy of the Human Memory,” specialists in sleep and human memory, respectively, answer your questions.

[1] To find out more, visit the French National Ministry of Education website