👤 Ayça Aykut

Familial hypercholesterolemia (FH) is an inherited metabolic disorder that increases cardiovascular risk from childhood. Despite its frequency, pediatric diagnosis and treatment remain limited, particularly in developing countries. Retrospective analysis of pediatric patients with genetically confirmed heterozygous FH (HeFH). Genetic testing included sequencing of the genes Among the cohort of 124 patients only 28.2% of patients were diagnosed via routine lipid screening, though 90.3% had a positive family history. After diagnosis, 16.1% declined treatment and 41.1% were lost to follow-up. Most genetic diagnoses involved pathogenic This is the first large pediatric HeFH cohort study from Türkiye and provides data on both genetic background and treatment outcome. Despite genetic confirmation, significant gaps remain in early diagnosis, treatment acceptance, and long-term follow-up. Both atorvastatin and pitavastatin proved to be safe and effective. These results suggest a need for national screening programmes, family education, dietary counselling, and consistent follow-up. Show less

Melanocortin 4 receptor gene plays an important role in food intake, energy balance, and weight control. The autosomal dominantly inherited MC4R variants cause obesity by causing hyperphagia and decreased sense of satiety. Homozygous variants are rarely reported, and they cause earlier/severe obesity. Our objective is to determine the MC4R gene variant frequency in children and adolescents with familial early-onset obesity. One hundred thirty-nine children and adolescents (57 girls/82 boys) whose weight increase started before the age of 5 years and who had early-onset obesity in at least one of their first-degree relatives were included in the study. Obesity is defined as body mass index (BMI) of ≥ 95th percentile, and as extreme obesity is defined if the BMI ≥ 120% of the 95th percentile or ≥ 35 kg/m Show less

Bardet-Biedl Syndrome (BBS) is a rare, autosomal-recessive ciliopathy characterized by obesity, rod-cone dystrophy, postaxial polydactyly, renal abnormalities, genital abnormalities and learning difficulties. To date, mutations in 21 different genes have been described as being responsible for BBS. Recently sequential gene sequencing has been replaced by next generation sequencing (NGS) applications. In this study, 15 patients with clinically diagnosed BBS were investigated using a next generation sequencing panel which included 17 known BBS causing genes (BBS1, BBS2, ARL6, BBS4, BBS5, MKKS, BBS7, TTC8, BBS9, BBS10, TRIM32, BBS12, MKS1, NPHP6, WDPCP, SDCCAG8, NPHP1). A genetic diagnosis was achieved in 13 patients (86.6%) and involved 9 novel and 3 previously described pathogenic variants in 6 of 17 BBS causing genes. BBS10 and BBS1 were the most commonly involved genes with frequencies of 31% and 23% respectively. Three of the 13 patients had an affected sibling. All affected siblings were found to be homozygous for the mutation detected in the proband. No evidence of triallelic inheritance was detected. Although limited association between certain genes and phenotypic features has been observed in this study, it is considered that additional studies are needed to better characterize the genotype-phenotype correlation of BBS. Our results demonstrate that NGS panels are feasible and effective method for providing high diagnostic yields in the diseases caused by multiple genes such as BBS. Show less