An insightful and in-depth presentation of the most up-to-date clinical and research findings and historical perspectives on pediatric interstitial lung disease (ILD) is presented in a special issue published online ahead of print in Pediatric Allergy, Immunology, and Pulmonology (PED), a peer-reviewed journal published by Mary Ann Liebert, Inc. (www.liebertpub.com). The entire issue is available free online. (www.liebertpub.com/ped)
This special focus issue includes a series of compelling roundtable discussions, interviews, clinical studies, and research articles that describe the scope and evolution of ILD in infants and children organized by Guest Editor Robin R. Deterding, MD. In the article entitled "Genetic Basis of Children's Interstitial Lung Disease," Lawrence M. Nogee, MD, from Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine (Baltimore, MD) details the specific genetic causes of chILD discovered over the past decade that have allowed for the development of noninvasive diagnostic tests and are helping to identify new targets for therapeutic drug discovery.
Stephan W. Glasser, MD and William D. Hardie, MD, from Cincinnati Children's Hospital Medical Center in Ohio, together with James S. Hagood, MD, from the University of California, San Diego, coauthored the article "Pathogenesis of Interstitial Lung Disease in Children and Adults," in which they explore the mechanisms by which the same genetic abnormalities can give rise to different clinical presentations of ILD among infants, older children, and adults.
Julie McDougal, RRT, MAE, University of Alabama at Birmingham, Ann Gettys, MS, Children's Interstitial Lung Disease Foundation, Norman, OK, and James S. Hagood, MD, describe the collaborative effort to produce the chILD-specific family educational resource "Get Up and Go With chILD!" and emphasize the need for providing families caring for a child with chILD with accurate, understandable, and useful information in their article, "chILD Family Education."
The issue is dedicated to Dr. Bettina Hilman, a pioneer in the field of chILD and Editor-in-Chief of the Journal from 1999-2009 under its former title, Pediatric Asthma, Allergy & Immunology. Dr. Hilman encouraged and challenged her colleagues to pursue a greater understanding and recognition of diffuse lung diseases in pediatric patients and was an early leader of the multidisciplinary effort to characterize the distinctions between ILD in adults and chILD and to develop strategies for diagnosing and treating these complex disorders.
"The recent discoveries about children's interstitial lung diseases illustrate the maxim that children are not just little adults. We have found completely different disease processes in the developing lung than have been previously described in adults. It is exciting to be able to summarize all of this knowledge in one place, with excellent contributions from key individuals who lead these discoveries," says Harold Farber, MD, MSPH, Editor of Pediatric Allergy, Immunology and Pulmonology, and Associate Professor of Pediatrics, Section of Pulmonology, Baylor College of Medicine, Houston, TX.
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