This section will provide a synopsis of the main processes and phases of brain development. The course materials will develop your understanding of the mechanisms involved in gene expression and subsequent neuronal migration. We will look at the part intercellular signalling and gene expression play in the movement and targeting of neurones during migration; and how inter-neural signalling and apoptosis shapes brain structure and ultimately function.

This section will enable you to understand the mechanisms of embryonic brain injury, cerebral and cerebellar malformation and dysplasias.

If you have previously attended the BPNA NeoNATE face-to-face course, you will have some understanding of the antenatal approach to fetal neurodevelopmental abnormalities, and here we will expand upon these in detail.

By the end of this section you will have acquired an understanding of what families want to hear during antenatal counselling, the benefit of antenatal MRI scans, and the possible outcomes of a number of commonly seen neurological abnormalities.

You will develop an approach to understand common malformations of cortical development (MCD) and posterior fossa abnormalities, to understand the aetiologies, and be able to understand the basis underlying the clinical features of these conditions and their neurodevelopment prognoses. We also aim to expand your knowledge of the commonest known genetic conditions leading to these malformations.

We acknowledge that this section has been developed in a high resourced health care system and practices vary across countries with differing resources and cultural practices.

In this section we shall study an over view of the development of cerebral vasculature. We shall see how developing blood vessels relate to glial cells and introduce ourselves to the concept of the neurovascular unit. We will study the role of glial cells and the part they play in immunity and myelination. We shall then study some disorders of myelination including PVL.

This section will enable you to review the current understanding of the mechanisms and epidemiology of cranial haemorrhage, sino-venous thrombosis and foetal stroke, with their pathological and clinical consequences in term infants.

This section will familiarise you with the obstetric antecedents and clinical features of HIE, along with the principles of investigation and management, including an overview on therapeutic hypothermia. We will discuss how to assess prognosis based on severity of injury deduced from clinical observation and principles of investigations including neurophysiology and neuroimaging. Consider the differential diagnoses of neonatal encephalopathy to include neonatal hypoglycaemia and hyperbilirubinaemia, as neurological injuries.

By the end of this section you will have acquired a good working knowledge of the clinical presentation of neonatal seizures and epilepsy syndromes, as well as their causes, differential diagnosis and management. You should be able to understand the principals of neonatal EEG and CFM and their role in the diagnosis and management of neonatal seizures.

This section will enable you to understand the anatomical sites and aetiologies of conditions that affect tone in a newborn infant. We discuss pathologies that may lead to neonatal hypotonia and hypertonia, as well as the investigative approach.

In this section we aim to look at the role of a standardised neurological examination as one of the basic steps in the work-up of neurological problems in the newborn, including the differentiation between central nervous system and peripheral nervous system disorders. We will also explore the scope of the neonatal neurological examination in predicting future neurodevelopmental outcome.

This section will enable you to understand the pathogens and clinical features of congenital and neonatal CNS infection. We will discuss bacterial, viral, fungal and protozoal congenital and postnatal infections.