Challenges for the future: improving children’s health and wellbeing Although it is partly dictated by their genes, children’s development is above all determined by their constant interaction with their immediate environment. This environment has changed considerably in recent decades, not least with the raising of the school-leaving age, new eating habits, reduced levels of physical activity and an increasingly sedentary lifestyle, ...
The Elfe cohort comprises more than 18.000 children (whose parents consented to their inclusion), all selected purely on the basis of their date and place of birth. In each of the 344 selected maternity units, midwives "targeted" babies born during four specific periods representing each of the four seasons in 2011: 1-4 April, 27 June - 4 July, 27 September - 4 October, and 28 ...
The bulk of the data will be collected via regular surveys of the children’s parents, in the form of telephone interviews and postal or Internet questionnaires. The different stages of the study are carried out either by expert interviewers or by professionals who come into contact with the children in the course of their work, be they healthcare staff conducting the ...
A pilot study was launched in 2007 to test the Elfe study’s feasibility and acceptability. Today, we continue to track around 300 families living in the following regions: Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes (Savoie, Isère, Loire, Ardèche), Bourgogne-Franche-Comté (Yonne, Nièvre, Côte-d’Or, Saône-et-Loire), Hauts-de-France (Somme, Oise, Aisne) and Île-de-France (Yvelines, Seine-Saint-Denis, Val-de-Marne). In 2018, new families are being invited to join the pilot study. Thanks to all the families involved in ...
International cooperation is fostered through regular contacts with the leaders of similar projects abroad, as well as through participation in international conferences and networks of teams working on specific topics. For example, teams regularly liaise under the aegis of European projects such as the European Child Cohort Network (Eucconet), which was funded by the European Science Foundation from 2008 to 2013, ...
Grâce aux données de l’étude Elfe, les chercheurs ont examiné l’impact de différentes caractéristiques de la fratrie sur le développement du langage chez les enfants de 2 ans. Les données de 12 296 enfants de l’étude Elfe ont ainsi été analysées. Les résultats confirment que les enfants ayant un frère ou une sœur plus âgé ont des scores de langage ...
Height and weight are key indicators of healthy growth. For children in the Elfe cohort, these indicators are monitored via information recorded in their personal health records. Given that diet plays such an important part in children’s health and development, eating habits ar also studied, focusing on the impact of nutrient intake and food socialization. The cohort approach provides an ...
Children may be exposed to a variety of chemicals, both while they are in the womb and after they have been born, through inhalation, ingestion or skin contact. Elfe provides a means of measuring exposure levels for a variety of substances and at the same time monitoring the onset of disorders, particularly those caused by neurotoxins and endocrine disruptors. Estimates ...
A number of pollutants are suspected of being responsible for the increasing prevalence of allergies that affect children’s health, although there are other causes, too. For instance, scientists are investigating the possible link between the early introduction of certain foods and the risk of food allergies – an issue which the study of infants’ diet should help to resolve. Elfe is ...
35 % des enfants sont quasi exclusivement gardés par leurs parents avant l’entrée à l’école maternelle. Et les autres ?
