Joanne F Rovet

SickKids · Program in Neurosciences and Mental Health (NMH)

Despite the long-held belief that growth hormone supplementation provides psychosocial benefits to patients with Turner syndrome (TS), this assumption has never been rigorously tested in a randomized control trial. As a sub-study of the Canadian growth-hormone trial, parent-, and patient-completed standardized questionnaires were used to compare 70...

Purpose: To investigate whether significant differences exist in everyday memory between youth with Fetal Alcohol Spectrum (FASD) compared with a nonexposed (NE) control group, while controlling for socioeconomic status and other comorbidities. Methods: Caregiver ratings using the Everyday Memory Questionnaire were obtained for 105 youth (9–17 year...

Children with fetal alcohol spectrum disorder (FASD) exhibit behavioral dysregulation, executive dysfunction, and atypical function in associated brain regions. Previous research shows early intervention mitigates these outcomes but corresponding brain changes were not studied. Given the Alert® Program for Self-Regulation improves behavioral regula...

Background: In an effort to improve the screening and diagnosis of individuals with Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorder (FASD), research has focused on the identification of a unique neurodevelopmental profile characteristic of this population. The objective of this review was to identify any existing neurodevelopmental profiles of FASD and review thei...

Although the profile of social cognitive difficulties is well recognized in children with certain neurodevelopmental disorders such as autism spectrum disorder (ASD) and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), this profile is not as well established in other clinical pediatric populations. The objective of the present study is to examine p...

The literature on visuospatial processing describes two distinct pathways within the brain: a dorsal route extending from the visual cortex into the parietal lobes that is critical for spatial processing and a ventral route extending from the visual cortex into the temporal lobes that is critical for form perception. These visual streams appear to...

In rodents, insufficient thyroid hormone (TH) gestationally has adverse effects on cerebral cortex development. Comparable studies of humans examining how TH insufficiency affects cortical morphology are limited to children with congenital hypothyroidism or offspring of hypothyroxinemic women; effects on cortex of children born to women with clinic...

A new study shows that low and high maternal levels of free T4 during pregnancy are associated with reduced IQ and cortex and grey matter volumes in offspring. Do these findings herald change for the clinical management of pregnant women with borderline low or high normal levels of T4?

Thyroid hormone (TH) is essential for normal development of the hippocampus, which is critical for memory and particularly for learning and recalling associations between visual and verbal stimuli. Adolescents with congenital hypothyroidism (CH), who lack TH in late gestation and early life, demonstrate weak verbal recall abilities, reduced hippoca...

Children with fetal alcohol spectrum disorders (FASD) show sociobehavioral impairments; however, the social cognitive profile contributing to these impairments is poorly understood. This study compared social perspective taking and empathy in children with FASD versus typically developing controls (TDC). Thirty-seven children with FASD and 21 TDC p...

The reproductive safety of selective reuptake inhibitor (SRI) antidepressants needs to be established to provide optimal control of maternal depression while protecting the fetus. To define a child's neurodevelopment following prenatal exposure to SRIs and to account for genetic and environmental confounders in a sibling design using the Toronto Mo...

Given thyroid hormone (TH)'s essential role in multiple aspects of early brain development, children with congenital hypothyroidism (CH) detected and treated early may still display subtle cognitive and behavioral impairments as well as brain abnormalities. However, effects on their cortical development are not yet known. We used an automated neuro...

Thyroid hormone (TH) is essential for the developing brain and because the fetal thyroid develops relatively late in gestation, the maternal TH supply is critical for fetal brain development. However if the mother has hypothyroidism during pregnancy, fetal brain and neuropsychological development may be compromised. Rodents experiencing maternal TH...

Children with fetal alcohol spectrum disorder show executive function (EF) deficits, particularly in self-regulation skills, and abnormalities in brain regions critical for these skills. None of the validated EF interventions for these children has been evaluated with regards to impacts on brain structure. Twenty-nine children with FASD were assign...

The Multiple Courses of Antenatal Corticosteroids for Preterm Birth Study (MACS) showed no benefit in the reduction of major neonatal mortality/morbidity or neurodevelopment at 2 and 5 years of age. Using the data from the randomized controlled trial and its follow-up, the aim of this study was to evaluate the association between gestational ages a...

Through its actions on regulatory genes that form, grow and sculpt the brain, thyroid hormone (TH) is essential for human brain development. Although much of what we know about these effects is based on research with rodents, recent studies of children exposed to TH insufficiencies during critical stages of early development provide preliminary evi...

An extensive body of literature has documented executive function (EF) impairments in children with fetal alcohol spectrum disorders (FASD); however, few studies have aimed specifically at improving EF. One treatment program that shows promise for children with FASD is the Alert Program for Self-Regulation®, which is a 12-week treatment specificall...

It is well established that individuals exposed to alcohol in utero have reduced cortical grey matter volumes. However, the candidate determinants of these reductions, cortical thickness (CT) and surface area (SA), have not been investigated exclusively in alcohol-related neurodevelopmental disorder (ARND), the most prevalent fetal alcohol spectrum...

Individuals diagnosed with alcohol-related neurodevelopmental disorder (ARND) exhibit difficulty on hippocampally mediated memory tasks and show reduced hippocampal size. However inconsistencies exist regarding the affected memory functions and where within the hippocampi effects occur. Given recent studies showing anterior and posterior segments s...

Autobiographical memory (AM) is a highly constructive cognitive process that often contains memory errors. No study has specifically examined AM accuracy in children with abnormal development of the hippocampus, a crucial brain region for AM retrieval. Thus, the present study investigated AM accuracy in 68 typically and atypically developing childr...

Objective: The aim was to formulate practice guidelines for the diagnosis and management of congenital hypothyroidism (CH). Evidence: A systematic literature search was conducted to identify key articles relating to the screening, diagnosis, and management of CH. The evidence-based guidelines were developed with the Grading of Recommendations, Asse...

Children with Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorder (FASD) often demonstrate deficits in everyday memory (EM), which negatively impacts their recollection of recent experiences and the development of appropriate social skills. There is currently a lack of interventions focused on improving EM for these youth. Here we describe a study that will empiricall...

Individuals with congenital hypothyroidism (CH), even those diagnosed and treated early, experience selective cognitive deficits, the most striking of which involves the visuocognitive domain. However, the range and nature of their visuocognitive disturbances is not fully understood. We assessed a range of higher-order visuocognitive abilities in 1...

Importance A single course of antenatal corticosteroid therapy is recommended for pregnant women at risk of preterm birth between 24 and 33 weeks’ gestational age. However, 50% of women remain pregnant 7 to 14 days later, leading to the question of whether additional courses should be given to women remaining at risk for preterm birth. The Multipl...

Objective: To assess the neuroradiological findings of children with congenital hypothyroidism (CHT) compared to healthy controls (HC). Patients and methods: Thirty children with CHT, mean age 12.5 ± 1.6 years, 14 (44.8%) males, were compared with 38 HC mean age 11.7 ± 1.7 years, 16 (45.7%) males. Clinical data were collected from medical charts...

Children with congenital hypothyroidism (CH) who experience a neonatal thyroid hormone deficiency have reduced hippocampal volumes compared with healthy controls. Interestingly, evidence suggests that musical training can contribute to structural plasticity in a number of brain areas, including the hippocampus. Therefore, we investigated whether ta...

Background: Rodents with gestational thyroid-hormone (TH) deficiencies and children with congenital hypothyroidism show abnormal hippocampal development. Given that the human hippocampus starts to develop early in gestation, we asked if children born to women with hypothyroidism during pregnancy also show hippocampal abnormalities and if this is r...

Objective Children with FASD display a heterogeneous profile and may have deficits in physical, behavioural, emotional, and social functioning, as the result of prenatal alcohol exposure. The major objective of the current study was to identify if a specific pattern of neuropsychological functioning exists among children prenatally exposed to alcoh...

Objectives This study compares the behavioral profile of children with fetal alcohol spectrum disorder (FASD) who were diagnosed using the Canadian Guidelines with children with prenatal alcohol exposure who did not meet criteria for a FASD diagnosis.Methods and ProceduresTo accomplish this, we used caregiver and teacher questionnaires evaluating d...

Memory deficits and hippocampal abnormalities have been described in individuals with thyroid hormone (TH) insufficiencies; however, no study has yet examined their autobiographical memory (AM) abilities, which are known to be compromised by hippocampal damage. Investigations in adults have shown that AM consists of both episodic and semantic compo...

Objective: Effects on child neurodevelopment of neurotransmitter reuptake inhibitors used as antidepressants during pregnancy have not been adequately studied. The authors compared the effects of prenatal exposure to venlafaxine (serotonin-norepinephrine reuptake inhibitor), selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs), and maternal depression....

Background: Children with fetal alcohol spectrum disorders (FASD) exhibit difficulties in many cognitive and behavioral domains and also have high comorbidity with other disorders such as attention deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) and conduct disorder as well as autism. Although the FASD profile is shown to be distinct from ADHD and conduct d...

The aim was to update the guidelines for the management of thyroid dysfunction during pregnancy and postpartum published previously in 2007. A summary of changes between the 2007 and 2012 version is identified in the Supplemental Data (published on The Endocrine Society's Journals Online web site at http://jcem.endojournals.org). This evidence-base...

Few studies have examined both episodic and semantic autobiographical memory (AM) performance during late childhood and early adolescence. Using the newly developed Children’s Autobiographical Interview (CAI), the present study examined the effects of age and sex on episodic and semantic AM and everyday memory in 182 children and adolescents. Resul...

Children with fetal alcohol spectrum disorders (FASD) show impairments in social functioning. However, the factors underlying these impairments are poorly understood. Recent evidence has shown that social problem solving is a critical component of effective social functioning. The present study sought to examine social information processing as one...

Congenital hypothyroidism is a pediatric endocrine disorder caused by insufficient endogenous thyroid hormone production. Children with congenital hypothyroidism have difficulties with episodic memory and abnormalities in hippocampal structure, suggesting deficient hippocampal functioning. To assess hippocampal activation in adolescents with congen...

Human milk (HM) is the optimal way to nourish preterm low birth weight (LBW) infants after hospital discharge. However, there are few data on which to assess whether HM alone is sufficient to address hospital-acquired nutrition deficits, and no adequately powered studies have examined this question using neurodevelopment as an outcome. The purpose...

Thyroid hormones (TH) are critical for growth and development and particularly brain development. There are numerous environmental agents that lead to marginal reductions of circulating TH. Although it is clear that severe developmental hypothyroidism is profoundly detrimental to neurodevelopment, there is less information regarding the consequence...

Prenatal exposure to alcohol may lead to a range of neurobehavioral effects, including impaired learning and memory. Although children with fetal alcohol spectrum disorders (FASD) exhibit both verbal and nonverbal memory impairments, their memory for faces has not been as thoroughly investigated and the extent literature provides inconsistent resul...

A single course of antenatal corticosteroids (ACS) is associated with a reduction in respiratory distress syndrome and neonatal death. Multiple Courses of Antenatal Corticosteroids Study (MACS), a study involving 1858 women, was a multicentre randomized placebo-controlled trial of multiple courses of ACS, given every 14 days until 33+6 weeks or bir...

Despite early diagnosis and treatment of congenital hypothyroidism (CH) after newborn screening, selective and persistent neurocognitive weaknesses may be seen. One area of particular weakness is memory, especially on tasks known to be mediated by the hippocampus. However, the hippocampus has not been directly studied in this population. Our object...

In 2006, Nash and colleagues published results suggesting that individual items from the Child Behavior Checklist (CBCL) could be used as a screening tool that was highly sensitive in differentiating children with FASD from controls and children with Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD). Since many of the items referred to features of Op...

During pregnancy, numerous hormonal changes and increased metabolic demands lead to complex changes in maternal thyroid physiology and fetal health. Findings from both animal and human research convincingly show that thyroid hormone (TH) is essential for normal brain development and is important for the regulation of a number of critical neurobiolo...

Background: Research with adults has established that higher-order visual information is processed along two functionally specialized pathways: a ventral stream and a dorsal stream. Surprisingly, however, less is known about how this dissociation emerges and matures during development. The present study (1) investigated typical development of highe...

Preterm birth is associated with an increased risk of visual impairment. However, not all visual deficits can be fully explained by the typical prematurity morbidity factors. In addition, children born preterm often exhibit transient hypothroxinemia of prematurity (THOP) due to premature severing of the maternal supply of thyroid hormones. Because...

Preterm infants are at risk for neonatal morbidity, transiently reduced thyroid hormone (TH) levels, and impaired visual abilities. To determine the interrelationship between these factors, we measured TH levels in the period ex utero and compared their visual abilities with those of term infants at 6 months (corrected) of age. The preterm group co...

Congenital hypothyroidism (CH) is a disease of newborns caused by lack of thyroid hormone (TH) which is essential for normal brain development. This study used voxel-based morphometry to determine whether CH have reductions in grey matter that can be attributed to timing of TH loss and later cognitive problems. Methods: Studied were 15 CH and 21 ty...

Children with Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorders have impairments in social and cognitive executive functions, which are believed to be related to frontal and caudate damage. It is not known, however, which specific frontal regions and deep grey matter structures are affected. Therefore, the present study examined grey matter differences in FASDs usi...

Although children with Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorders (FASDs) are at high risk of attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), direct comparisons show distinct cognitive phenotypes in the 2 diagnoses. However, these groups have not been directly compared for social problems or social cognition, nor has social cognition been directly examined...

Neural communication between the temporal and frontal cortex underlies mature declarative memory skills. The integrity of white matter pathways connecting these regions is likely critical in supporting this communication. Little is known about the relationship between white matter and declarative memory in older children and adolescents, an age per...

Human milk (HM) is the optimal source of nutrition for premature infants; however, it is unclear whether HM alone is sufficient to meet their elevated nutritional requirements early after hospital discharge. We previously reported that premature infants (750-1800 g birth weight) fed HM containing extra nutrients for 12 weeks after discharge had die...

Infants born preterm are at risk of both transiently reduced thyroid hormone levels and impaired neurocognitive development, including attention deficits. The objective of this study was to examine the effects of reduced thyroid hormone levels on general neurodevelopment and attention at 3 months corrected age. Sixty-four infants born 24 to 35 week...

To determine the effects of nausea and vomiting of pregnancy (NVP) and its treatment with diclectin on child neurodevelopment. An observational cohort study of mother-child pairs ascertained via a pregnancy call-in center was conducted. Three groups of children were studied: 45 with NVP and diclectin, 47 with NVP no diclectin, and 29 with no NVP. P...

Preterm birth is associated with an increased risk of visual impairment. However, not all visual deficits can be fully explained by the typical prematurity morbidity factors. In addition, children born preterm often exhibit transient hypothroxinemia of prematurity (THOP) due to premature severing of the maternal supply of thyroid hormones. Because...

Children with prenatal alcohol exposure (PAE) show deficits in verbal learning and spatial memory, as well as abnormal hippocampal development. The relationship between their memory and neuroanatomic impairments, however, has not been directly explored. Given that the hippocampus is integral for the synthesis and retrieval of learned information an...