8 Facts You Might Not Know About Medical Marijuana

Marijuana as medicine is nothing new, despite the current groundswell of laws making pot legal for medical uses. Here's a quick fact file on cannabis and its medical history, makeup, and legality.

1. "Marijuana" is a Mexican term that originally was applied to low-quality tobacco.


2. The plant was cultivated in China for therapy (and recreation) over 4,700 years ago.


3. More than 20 prescription medicines containing marijuana were sold in U.S. pharmacies at the turn of the 20th century. Pot-based medications were commonly available until 1942, when cannabis was stricken from the U.S. Pharmacopeia, the official compendium of drugs considered effective. From 1937 to 1942 the federal government collected a tax of $1 per ounce for such drugs.


4. More than 20,000 studies on marijuana and its components have been published, according to the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws, an advocacy group. Of these, around 100 have looked into therapeutic value on human subjects.


5. The federal government is in the pot-growing business. Under a federal contract, the University of Mississippi in Oxford cultivates marijuana for use by researchers, who have to be cleared by the National Institute on Drug Abuse.


6. The plant has nearly 500 chemical compounds, more than 60 of which are called cannabinoids.


7. Fourteen states and the District of Columbia have legalized medical marijuana: Alaska, California, Colorado, Hawaii, Maine, Michigan, Montana, Nevada, New Jersey, New Mexico, Oregon, Rhode Island, Vermont, and Washington. But patients in these states face federal prosecution for using it—or for growing or possessing pot for medical purposes.


8. Federal law prohibits physicians from prescribing or otherwise actively supplying patients with the drug. But in 2002 the U.S. Supreme Court backed an appellate court ruling that physicians who discuss it with patients, or provide oral or written recommendations, are protected.

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Teen Marijuana Use Might Have Lasting Effects on Mood, Anxiety

Marijuana use among teens may trigger neurological changes in the developing brain that lead to increased anxiety and stress levels that could persist into adulthood, new animal research suggests.
Although the finding stems solely from work conducted with adolescent and adult lab rats—not yet replicated among humans—the work suggests that certain troublesome changes in levels of the key brain chemicals serotonin and norepinephrine may linger long after marijuana use ceases.
"Here, the goal was simply to understand the neurological mechanism that could be underlying the specific phenomenon of depression and anxiety observed in previous studies among adolescents chronically exposed to cannabis," explained study author Dr. Gabriella Gobbi, a psychiatric researcher at the Research Institute of the McGill University Health Centre in Montreal.
"And what we found with the animals we worked with is that when those that were exposed to cannabis as adolescents became adults they had low serotonin activity, which is related to depressive behavior, and high norepinephrine levels, which is related to an increase in anxiety and stress," Gobbi continued.
"This means," she cautioned, "that cannabis exposure when young seems to cause changes in the adult brain. And these changes could perhaps be irreversible, even if you stop consuming cannabis."
The study findings were released online Dec. 5 in advance of publication in an upcoming print issue of Neurobiology of Disease.
The authors note that the main ingredient in marijuana—delta-9-tetrahydrocannabinol (THC)—has previously been identified as having an impact on receptors in the brain that regulate cognition and emotion.
In addition, they point out that the adolescent brain is perhaps particularly sensitive to both drug use and related stress, given that this is the pre-adult period during which the brain and its neurochemical composition undergoes extensive reshaping and reorganizing.
To assess the role cannabis may play on adolescent brain development, for 20 days—a period characterized as "prolonged exposure"—adolescent rats were given daily injections of either a low-dose (0.2 milligrams/kilograms) or high-dose (1.0 milligrams/kilograms) of cannabis. For comparison, a group of adult rats underwent a similar regimen.
Following cannabis exposure, both the adolescent and adult groups went 20 days drug-free to allow the effects of drug withdrawal to dissipate, as well as to allow for a wide range of cognitive testing to gauge the long-term effects of cannabis exposure on task execution and mood.
The authors noted that by the conclusion of the 20-day waiting period, the previously adolescent rats were effectively adults.
The team found that chronic exposure to cannabis during adolescence does appear to provoke abnormal emotional activity into adulthood, typified by the onset of depression, poorer social interaction, heightened anxiety and increased stress.
What's more, Gobbi and her colleagues also found a drop in serotonin levels in the adult brain following either low- or high-dose adolescent ingestion and an increase in norepinephrine levels following high-dose exposure.
Rats who had already reached adulthood when chronically exposed to cannabis, however, appeared to experience far less of the detrimental emotional reactions found among adolescent rats. Indeed, adult rats, they observed, seemed to be able to readily cope with, and even overcome, most of the neurological impairments that arose as a result of cannabis exposure.
"We were a little bit surprised by our findings because we didn't expect to see such a strong effect on the adult brain from adolescent usage. It was a very significant effect," said Gobbi.
"So, in general, I think that what people should take away from this work," she advised, "is that just because it's a plant it doesn't mean that marijuana is harmless. It's a pharmacologically active drug, and it must be used with awareness."
For his part, however, Dr. Adam Bisaga, an addiction psychiatrist at New York State Psychiatric Institute, minimized the relevance of the findings.

"I think the translational value of this research is very limited insofar as what the clinical relevance to humans might be," Bisaga cautioned. "It's always very difficult to translate from animal models to humans. Yes, there is some indication that this may be of importance to humans. But most of the data with patients that I am familiar with suggests that most of these cannabis-exposure deficits are reversible. So, for the time being I'm not that impressed, although it's certainly something to further study in humans," he added.
"This is not new," he noted. "Clinicians know well that exposure to large amounts of cannabis in adolescence may produce enduring changes in emotional functioning and reactivity in vulnerable individuals, such as difficult-to-treat anxiety and depressive symptoms. What this paper does is to try to characterize more precisely the components of this syndrome using animal models of emotional reactivity."

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Kids Poisoned by Medical Marijuana, Study Finds

Legalizing marijuana may have unintended consequences. Since medical marijuana was legalized in Colorado, more than a dozen young children have been unintentionally poisoned with the drug, researchers report.
About half the cases resulted from kids eating marijuana-laced cookies, brownies, sodas or candy. In many cases, the marijuana came from their grandparents' stash, the investigators said.

"We are seeing increases in exposure to marijuana in young pediatric patients, and they have more severe symptoms than we typically associate with marijuana," said lead researcher Dr. George Sam Wang, a medical toxicology fellow at the Rocky Mountain Poison and Drug Center in Denver.
But doctors aren't familiar with marijuana poisoning in children, so unless the parents are forthcoming it can take time and tests to diagnose the problem, Wang said. Symptoms of marijuana poisoning in children include sleepiness and balance problems while walking.
"We hadn't seen these exposures before the big boom of the medical marijuana industry," Wang said.
The active chemical in marijuana, tetrahydrocannabinol, is in higher than normal concentrations in medical marijuana, and often is sold in baked goods, soft drinks and candies, the researchers said in the study, which was published online May 27 in the journal JAMA Pediatrics.

"We are seeing more symptoms because some of these products have very high amounts of marijuana in them," Wang said. "You get such a high dose on such a small child, the symptoms are more severe."
As with many similar poisonings, treatment is limited to supportive care and waiting until the marijuana clears the system, he said.
Children recover quickly in most cases, Wang said. "They don't need more than a day or two of hospitalization," he said. "There were no deaths or lasting side effects."
This report stems from one Denver hospital, and Wang said he doesn't know how extensive the problem is elsewhere. Colorado adults are allowed to possess up to 1 ounce of marijuana or six marijuana plants, according to the study. And Denver issued more than 300 sales tax licenses for marijuana dispensaries in 2010.

For the study, Wang's team compared the number of children treated in the emergency room for marijuana poisoning before and after the law was enacted in October 2009.
In all, almost 1,400 children under 12 were evaluated for accidental poisonings in this one hospital -- 790 before Sept. 30, 2009, and 588 after that.
After decriminalization, 14 children -- mostly boys and some as young as 8 months -- were found to have ingested marijuana. Eight had consumed medical marijuana, and seven ate marijuana in foods. Two were admitted to the intensive care unit.
Before Sept. 30, 2009, none of those possible poisonings was attributed to marijuana, the researchers found.

There may be more unreported cases, the study authors said. "Because of a perceived stigma associated with medical marijuana, families may be reluctant to report its use to health care providers," they wrote in the study.

"Similar to many accidental medicinal pediatric exposures, the source of the marijuana in most cases was the grandparents, who may not have been available during data collection," the researchers added.
Eighteen states and Washington, D.C., have legalized medical marijuana. Colorado and Washington also have legalized the recreational use of marijuana.

In late 2009, the U.S. Justice Department instructed federal prosecutors not to arrest medical marijuana users and suppliers if they complied with state laws, the researchers said.
To prevent harm to children, Wang advises treating marijuana like any other drug and keeping it out of their reach, particularly if it's in a tempting form like cookies.

Some poison-control experts also are pushing for marijuana to come in tamper-proof packages as a way of keeping children away from it.

The ongoing debate about legalizing marijuana should include discussion of the potential consequences to children, said the researchers and other medical experts.

"There is a lot of information that may not be entirely accurate about how benign marijuana is," said Dr. Sharon Levy, an assistant professor of pediatrics at Harvard Medical School, who wrote an accompanying journal editorial.

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In Children With 22q11.2 Deletion Syndrome, Higher Anxiety Associated With Poorer Functioning

UC Davis researchers have found that for children with the genetic disorder known as chromosome 22q11.2 deletion syndrome anxiety - but not intelligence - is linked to poorer adaptive behaviors, such as self-care and communication skills, that affect daily life. The developmental syndrome, which is associated with a constellation of physical, cognitive and psychiatric problems, usually is apparent at birth or early childhood, and leads to lifelong challenges.

The study findings suggest that helping children cope with fear-based symptoms may be the best strategy for increasing independence and protecting against psychiatric problems later in life. The article, titled, "An examination of the relationship of anxiety and intelligence to adaptive functioning in children with chromosome 22q11.2 deletion syndrome," is published online in the Journal of Developmental and Behavioral Pediatrics. It will appear in the December 2012 print issue of the journal.

"Our study confirmed our impressions from seeing patients with 22q deletion syndrome that those with more severe anxiety symptoms tend to be most impaired in their everyday functioning," said Kathleen Angkustsiri, lead study author and assistant professor of developmental and behavioral pediatrics with the UC Davis MIND Institute. "It highlights the critical importance of recognizing and treating anxiety in these very vulnerable children."

The disorder also is known as velocardiofacial syndrome, referring to some of the common physical anomalies associated with the disorder, as well as DiGeorge syndrome, after one of the first physicians to describe it. The currently preferred name of chromosome 22q11.2 deletion syndrome identifies the location on the twenty-second chromosome where a small piece of DNA is missing. It is inherited in an autosomal dominant fashion, meaning that the child of a parent with the syndrome has a 50 percent chance of developing the syndrome; however, in 90 to 95 percent of cases, no family history of the syndrome is known, and the mutation arises for the first time in the affected person. The syndrome is estimated to affect about 1 in 2,000-4,000 people, making it the second most common condition after Down syndrome, another genetically based developmental disorder.

Manifestations of the syndrome vary among affected individuals. It may be diagnosed soon after birth because of symptoms related to heart defects as well as anomalies of the mouth, palate and throat, affecting feeding, speech and facial structure. Children with 22q11.2 deletion syndrome have a high prevalence of mental-health disorders such as anxiety and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), and IQs usually are in the borderline-to-low range. In early adulthood, about 30 percent may develop a psychiatric disorder such as schizophrenia.


The study evaluated 78 children with the syndrome, ages seven to 15 years, with a battery of standardized tests related to behavior, anxiety, adaptive functioning and intelligence. Thirty-six typically developing children with no known genetic syndromes were also evaluated for comparison. Assessment involved neuropsychological testing and developmental-behavioral pediatric evaluation of the children as well as parent questionnaires about their child's symptoms.

Mean anxiety scores were found to be significantly higher in children with 22q11.2 deletion syndrome than in typically developing children. Fifty-eight percent of children with the syndrome were found to have at least one elevated anxiety score, although only 19 percent had previously been diagnosed with an anxiety disorder.

In addition, higher anxiety scores correlated with lower adaptive function among children with the syndrome. Adaptive functioning is a measure of age-appropriate everyday living skills surrounding self-care, home and school living, communication and other factors. Specific anxiety subscales that were associated with poorer adaptive behavior included panic-agoraphobia (anxiety associated with unfamiliar environments), physical injury and obsessive-compulsive disorder.

"Anxiety appears to be under-identified by health-care professionals despite known elevated risk in this population," Angkustsiri said. "It is possible that more aggressively recognizing and treating anxiety in these children will prevent more severe problems as they enter adulthood."

For reasons that are not well understood, children with 22q11.2 deletion syndrome have a high risk of developing schizophrenia as they reach adulthood. In the general population, anxiety disorders also are associated with schizophrenia.

No relationship was found in the study between IQ and adaptive skills in children with 22q11.2 deletion syndrome, although an association was found in typically developing children and has been found in other studies of children with developmental disorders. The study authors postulate that the lack of correlation in 22q11.2 deletion syndrome could be explained by anxiety, so that because of fearfulness, children do not attain the maximal adaptive functional skills one might expect given their intellectual potential. In addition, children may not be reaching their optimal learning potential because of being distracted by worries or compulsions during learning opportunities.

The good news is that we have many good interventions to treat anxiety, such as medications and counseling, while cognitive impairments are not as amenable to treatment," said Angkustsiri. "We are hopeful that targeting anxiety can make a difference for children with this disorder, as well as in other vulnerable children."

The researchers are further studying factors that contribute to children with 22q11.2 deletion syndrome either being a "struggler" (characterized by high anxiety and low adaptive functioning) or someone who is coping -- a "coper" -- as well as interventions that may help the strugglers to become copers.

"This study provides an important key to significantly helping children with 22q deletion syndrome cope better with everyday life and improve their outcomes," said Tony J. Simon, principal investigator of the study and professor of psychiatry and behavioral sciences at UC Davis and the MIND Institute.

"The effects of anxiety should not be underestimated, and physicians caring for children with special needs should be proactive in diagnosing and treating it."

The team recently has started the "22q Healthy Minds Clinic" in order to put this research into practice. A team including a developmental-behavioral pediatrician or child psychiatrist, child psychologist, and cognitive neuroscientist evalutes children with 22q11.2 deletion syndrome and provides recommentations for intervention.

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Popular Kids Smoke More

A new study shows heart disease, lung cancer, and emphysema may be more prevalent in popular youths. The University of California and the University of Texas collaborated on a study which found that popular students in seven different California high schools were more likely to smoke cigarettes than unpopular students.

This research, published online in the Journal of Adolescent Health, supports previous USC-led studies of pupils in the sixth through twelfth grades throughout Mexico and the United States.

"That we're still seeing this association more than 10 years later, despite marginal declines in smoking, suggests that popularity is a strong predictor of smoking behavior," said Thomas W. Valente, Ph.D., professor of preventive medicine at the Keck School of Medicine of USC and lead author of three prior studies on the subject.

In the most recent study, Valente and his team surveyed 1,950 students in the ninth and tenth grades in October of 2006 and 2007. Students were asked if they had ever smoked, how many students their age they believed to be smokers, how often in the last 30 days they had smoked, how they believed their close friends felt about smoking, and who their five best friends were. Popularity was calculated by how often participants mentioned a student as a friend.

Results found that pupils who believed their friends smoked were more likely to smoke, even if this assumption was incorrect. Popular students started to smoke earlier than non-popular students. Kids that became smokers between ninth and tenth grade were more likely to befriend other smokers. To the researchers surprise, student perception of the norm, (how often and how many of their peers smoked) was less likely to encourage smoking than the perceived behavior of their close friends.

In a separate study in 2012, published in a journal called Salud Publica de Mexico, Valente and a team of researchers surveyed 399 teens at a high school in Jalisco. In 2005, 1,486 youths in the sixth and seventh grades in Southern California were measured and in 2001, 2,525 high school students across the United States were also surveyed. Both studies appeared in the Journal of Adolescent Health.

Valente concluded that consistent samples have come from four different areas, and therefore, it is easy to see adolescents turn to their close friends when choosing what is important in their lives.

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Childhood Sexual Abuse Linked To Later Heart Attacks In Men

Men who experienced childhood sexual abuse are three times more likely to have a heart attack than men who were not sexually abused as children, according to a new study from researchers at the University of Toronto. The researchers found no association between childhood sexual abuse and heart attacks among women.

In a paper published online this week in the journal Child Abuse & Neglect, investigators examined gender-specific differences in a representative sample of 5095 men and 7768 women aged 18 and over, drawn from the Center for Disease Control's 2010 Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance Survey. A total of 57 men and 154 women reported being sexually abused by someone close to them before they turned 18 and 377 men and 285 women said that a doctor, nurse or other health professional had diagnosed them with a heart attack or myocardial infarction. The study was co-authored by four graduate students at the University of Toronto, Raluca Bejan, John Hunter, Tamara Grundland and Sarah Brennenstuhl.

"Men who reported they were sexually abused during childhood were particularly vulnerable to having a heart attack later in life," says lead author Esme Fuller-Thomson, Professor and Sandra Rotman Chair at University of Toronto's Factor-Inwentash Faculty of Social Work. "We had expected that the abuse-heart attack link would be due to unhealthy behaviors in sexual abuse survivors, such as higher rates of alcohol use or smoking, or increased levels of general stress and poverty in adulthood when compared to non-abused males. However, we adjusted statistically for 15 potential risk factors for heart attack, including age, race, obesity, smoking, physical inactivity, diabetes mellitus, education level and household income, and still found a three-fold risk of heart attack."

Co-author and PhD candidate Sarah Brennenstuhl notes that, "It is unclear why sexually abused men, but not women, experienced higher odds of heart attack; however, the results suggest that the pathways linking childhood sexual abuse to physical health outcomes in later life may be gender-specific. For example, it is possible that females adopt different coping strategies than males as women are more likely to get the support and counselling needed to deal with their sexual abuse."

"These findings need to be replicated in future scientific studies before we can say anything definitive about this link," cautions Fuller-Thomson. "But if other researchers find a similar association, one possible explanation is that adverse child experiences become biologically embedded in the way individuals react to stress throughout their life, particularly with respect to the production of cortisol, the hormone associated with the "fight-or-flight" response. Cortisol is also implicated in the development of cardiovascular diseases.

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Toddlers Choking On Liquid Detergent Capsules

A growing number of toddlers are inadvertently swallowing liquid detergent capsules, known as Liquitabs, doctors from the Royal Hospital for Sick Children, Glasgow, UK, Scotland reported in Archives of Childhood Diseases. In what the authors describe as a "significant public health issue", they urge detergent makers and packagers to review their packaging and safety warnings.

Laundry and dishwasher detergent Liquitabs should have childproof packaging and better safety warnings, after several reports have come in of young children swallowing contents of the capsules, the authors explained.

Over a period of 18 months, five children had to be treated for swallowing the liquitab capsule contents in one hospital in Glasgow alone; they ranged in age from 10 months to 24 months. When they were hospitalized they had a high pitched wheeze (stridor), which is usually a sign of some airway blockage.

Liquitabs contain alkaline cleaning agents which have a strong solvent action that can damage tissue, cause inflammation and painful swelling.

In severe cases the airways can become completely blocked; there is also the risk of lung damage as tissue in the esophagus is eroded - a potentially fatal complication.

The oldest patient, a 24-month old child, was treated with steroids and antibiotics. The other four younger ones needed to be intubated for several days to treat ulceration and swelling. One of them required surgery because the swelling and ulceration was so extensive.

Although all the patients in Glasgow made full recoveries, the authors wrote that the incidents had "a catastrophic impact on the child and family", as well as using up valuable intensive care resources.

In 2011, in the United Kingdom alone, 647 phone calls were received at the National Poisoning Information Service regarding the swallowing or eating of liquid detergent capsules. The Service also received 4,000 website visits on this theme.

The authors explained that over the last five years, the number of inquiries regarding children swallowing washing machine or dishwasher Liquitabs has more than doubled.

Detergent capsules are not childproof

Liquitabs do not currently come in childproof containers. At the moment, manufacturers and packaging companies are encouraged to comply to safety standards, but the whole scheme is voluntary, there is nothing legally binding them to adhere to any strict national standards. The doctors said that the contents of these capsules also place young children at risk of severe eye injury.

The authors, who have written to manufacturers alerting them to the current problems, said:

"To help prevent future potentially life threatening injuries, improved safety warnings and childproof packaging are urgently required."

It is not only the manufacturers' responsibility to keep these products out of children's reach, parents should also be extremely careful.

They wrote "Dishwasher and washing machine Liquitabs are now a common finding in most homes, but unfortunately, seem very attractive to young children due to their bright colouring and soft sweetie-like texture. We feel that the increasing trend in liquid detergent capsule ingestion poses a significant public health issue."

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New Height Predictor to Estimate Children's Adult Height

Olympic gymnast or NBA basketball star? BabyCenter, the leading online resource for pregnancy and parenting information, has upgraded the most popular interactive tool on ParentCenter.com to give curious parents a clearer vision of their child's future. With an expanded age range, now parents of children as young as 2 can use the ParentCenter.com Height Predictor to determine if planning for a basketball scholarship is a reasonable college funding scheme.

For children under age 4, the improved tool uses the new "Multiplier Method," outlined in the October 2004 issue of The Journal of Pediatric Orthopedics, in which height forecasts are based on average height multipliers calculated from Centers for Disease Control data. For children ages 4 and older, the ParentCenter.com Height Predictor uses the widely accepted Khamis and Roche method that relies on height measurements of each parent for its predictions. ParentCenter.com is the first Web site to integrate the two leading methods into one easy-to-use tool.

"Parents often hope that they have passed along favorite traits to their child," said Katie Motta, the BabyCenter Associate Editor who oversaw development of the improved tool. "Even when their child's still a newborn, they usually can identify that 'he has his dad's eyes, and mom's chin.' But one thing parents want to know is how tall their child will be. The Height Predictor is based on the latest science, but it's really just a fun way to help parents imagine their child as an adult."

In addition to the expanded Height Predictor, ParentCenter.com offers an array of useful interactive tools including the Family Entertainment Finder, Behavior Problem Solver, Learning Styles Calculator, and Activity Planner designed to help parents raise great kids. The site also offers more than a thousand original articles, covering children's health and nutrition, fun and activities, learning and development, along with other topics for families with young children. Information is organized by age so parents easily can find the most relevant expert advice, along with ideas and tips from thousands of other moms and dads who've shared their experiences.

About BabyCenter(R)

Founded in 1997, BabyCenter operates http://www.babycenter.com, the most visited online resource for new and expectant parents, http://www.parentcenter.com, the leading online resource for parents of children ages 2 to 8, and http://www.babycentre.co.uk , the leading U.K. resource for new and expectant parents. Offering extensive, medical advisory board-approved content, BabyCenter's Web sites attract over 3.5 million visitors each month, as measured by comScore Media Metrix, and have been honored with numerous awards, including the 2005 People's Voice Webby Award for Best Family/Parenting Web site. In addition, the BabyCenter sites offer an array of interactive tools, a supportive online community, a premium subscription service, and an online store featuring thousands of products for parents and children.

Source:
BabyCenter

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Noise From Earphones Can Damage Your Ears

Although many people like to turn their headphones up as loud as they can after having a bad day or to get their mind off things bothering them, experts from the University of Leicester have shown evidence for the first time that turning the volume on your headphones up too high can damage the coating of nerve cells, eventually causing temporary deafness.

According to the researchers, the noise levels similar to those of jet levels can be heard on earphones or headphones on personal music players if they are turned up loud enough.

Scientists have known that temporary deafness and tinnitus (a condition that presents itself as a noise such as ringing or buzzing in the ears) can be caused by noises louder than 110 decibels. This study, published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, is the first to examine how those noises cause underlying cell damage.

Dr. Martine Hamann, of the Department of Cell Physiologu and Pharmacology, lead author and researcher at the University of Leicester, explained:

"The research allows us to understand the pathway from exposure to loud noises to hearing loss. Dissecting the cellular mechanisms underlying this condition is likely to bring a very significant healthcare benefit to a wide population. The work will help prevention as well as progression into finding appropriate cures for hearing loss."

The myelin sheath is a coating found on nerve cells that carry electrical signals from the ears to the brain, which helps the electrical signals travel along the cell.

The cells become stripped of this coating with exposure to loud noises (noise over 100 decibels), which stops the electrical signals and no longer allows information to be successfully transmitted from the ears to the brain.

Fortunately, full hearing can return when the coating surrounding the nerve cells reform and allows the cells to function normally again. This means that hearing loss is sometimes only temporary.

The study is important, according to Dr. Hamann, because it explains why in certain cases, hearing loss can be reversible. He continued:

"We showed that the sheath around the auditory nerve is lost in about half of the cells we looked at, a bit like stripping the electrical cable linking an amplifier to the loudspeaker. The effect is reversible and after three months, hearing has recovered and so has the sheath around the auditory nerve."

Research is still being conducted on the effects of loud noises on a part of the brain referred to as the dorsal cochlear nucleus, the relay that carries signals from nerve cells in the ear to the parts of the brain that decode and make sense of sounds.

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You Can Learn While You Sleep, Says Study

New research from Weizmann Institute, published in Nature Neuroscience has discovered that people can actually learn during sleep, which can unconsciously modify their behavior while awake.

The study suggests that while people sleep, if certain odors are presented after hearing tones, people start sniffing even if there is no odor presented when they hear the same tones. This happens during sleep and even when people wake up.

There have been several past studies explaining the importance of sleep for learning and memory consolidation. However, none of them have been able to show the human brain actually learning new information during sleep.

Professor Noam Sobel, research student Anat Arzi, Sobel's team from the Institute's Neurobiology Department, and experts from Loewenstein Hospital and the Academic College of Tel Aviv- Jaffa, decided to try an experiment with a type of conditioning that exposes participants to a tone followed by an odor, so that they soon experience a similar response to the tone as they would to the odor.

The researchers found many advantages from pairing tones and odors, for example, neither wakes the subject, yet the brain processes them and even reacts during sleep. Certain odors actually even help the participants to have a sound sleep. On the other hand, sleep-learning studies are extremely difficult to conduct, so the experts had to make sure the participants were really asleep during the "lessons."

Associations made whilst sleeping appear to be retained after waking up.

The sense of smell, or sniffing, holds a unique non-verbal measure that can be examined. Results showed that the brain acts just as it does when it is awake when dealing with smells. When we smell a pleasant aroma we inhale deeply, and when we smell something bad we cut our inhalation short.

It didn't matter if participants were asleep or awake, this variation in sniffing could be recorded either way. This type of conditioning, while appearing so simple, is also associated with some higher brain areas, like the hippocampus (involved in memory formation).

In order to continuously monitor the subjects' sleep state, the subjects slept in a special lab during the experiments. Even if a participant woke up for a second, the results had to be disqualified.

During sleep time, the subjects heard a tone that was followed by either a pleasant or an unpleasant odor. Then another tone was heard, followed by an odor (at the opposite end of the pleasantness scale from what they previously smelt).

The associations were partially reinforced throughout the night, in order to expose the subjects to the tones alone. The volunteers sniffed deeply or took shallow breaths when they heard the tones without the odor, reacting the same way as if the associated odors were still present.

After volunteers awoke the next day, they heard the tones again with no odor following. Since they were asleep the night before, they had no conscious memory of ever listening to them, but their breathing patterns were showing something different. When the tones that were paired with bad smells were played for the subjects, they produced short, shallow sniffs; and when they heard the tones that were associated with nice odors, they sniffed deeply.

The team conducted a second experiment to find out if this type of learning was tied to a particular phase of sleep. In order to do so, they divided the sleep cycles into rapid eye movement (REM) and non-REM sleep where they induced the conditioning in only one phase or the other.

Researchers were surprised to see that the REM phase showed a more pronounced learning response. However, being able to transfer the learned association from sleep to waking was only found when the learning happened in the non-REM phase.

REM sleep may make us more open to stimuli in the environment, according to Sobel and Arzi, but "dream amnesia" (which makes people forget their dreams) may operate on any conditioning during that stage. Non-REM sleep, they explained, is important for consolidating memory, so it could also be playing a role in this form of sleep-learning.

Since Sobel's lab focuses on the sense of smell, Arzi hopes to further investigate brain processing in altered states of consciousness such as sleep and coma.

Arzi said:

"Now that we know that some kind of sleep learning is possible, we want to find where the limits lie- what information can be learned during sleep and what information cannot."

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Embryonic Parasitic Twin Removed From 9-Year-Old Girl's Stomach

Doctors at the General Hospital in the Greek city of Larissa said yesterday, Thursday, that they had successfully removed an embryonic parasitic twin from the stomach of a 9-year-old girl.

The girl, whose family asked that she not be named, was suffering from stomach pains, which the doctors established were due to a tumour growing on the right side of her belly. She has since made a full recovery, said the hospital authorities.

Larissa General Hospital's director, Lakovos Brouskelis told the press:

"They could see on the right side that her belly was swollen, but they couldn't suspect that this tumor would hide an embryo."

On closer examination the doctors found that the growth concealed an embryo six centimeters (about two inches) long, fully formed with a head, hair and eyes but no brain and no umbilical cord, reported the Associated Press.

A parasitic twin results from the same biological process that produces conjoined twins and vanishing twins (where one twin "disappears" early in the pregnancy). The twin embryo grows in the uterus but it does not fully separate into two individuals: one stops developing and becomes "vestigial" inside the other fully formed and usually quite healthy twin.

The chance of developing a parasitic twin is very rare, and occurs in around one in 500,000 births. There have only been about 90 such recorded cases in the world.

Last year, Filipino television aired a programme about a Eljie Millapes, a baby girl whose parents were alarmed at how big her stomach was growing when she was two months old. Doctors later found she had a "fetus in fetu" lodged inside, which is a special type of parasitic twin that contiues to grow like a tumor, but it is still parasitic in that it is fully dependent on the "host" twin for its blood supply.

Perhaps the most famous case of fetus in fetu is that of 7-year-old Alamjan Nematilaev in Kazakhstan in 2003. A school doctor noticed the boy's enlarged stomach was showing movement inside, and referred him to a hospital where they removed what they thought was a cyst only to find a highly developed identical twin brother with hair, fingers, nails, genitals, limbs, head and almost a face.

Click here for more information on "parasitic twins" (wikipedia).

For a fuller layman's account of the genetics and biology of embryo development read "The Boy Who Gave Birth to His Twin", by Dr Martin Brookes, (channel4.com, Dec 03)

Source: Associated Press, GMA News, Agence France-Presse, wikipedia.

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Academic Achievement Higher Among Most Active Kids - Vigorous Physical Activity Linked To Better Grades

Children who participate in vigorous physical activity, such as sports, perform better in school, according to a new study released today by the American College of Sports Medicine (ACSM). The examination of activity and physical education (PE) compared to academic achievement shows the most active kids more often have better grades. The study is published in the August issue of Medicine & Science in Sports & Exercise �, the official journal of ACSM.

The study was conducted to determine the effect of physical education class enrollment and overall physical activity on academic achievement. The link between activity and academic performance was most significant when kids met Healthy People 2010 (HP2010) guidelines for vigorous activity 20 minutes a day, at least three days a week. Grades were not affected among kids who were moderately active for 30 minutes at least five days a week.

Two hundred fourteen middle school-aged students participated, all of whom were randomly assigned to a PE course for either the first (August to mid-January) or second (mid-January to June) semester of the academic year. The research team measured students' physical activity in and outside school in 30-minute blocks, and compared their individual grades in core subjects, such as English, world studies, science and mathematics.

"Physical education and activity during the school day may reduce boredom and help keep kids attention in the classroom," said Dawn Podulka Coe, Ph.D., the study's lead author. "We were expecting to find that students enrolled in PE would have better grades because of the opportunity to be active during the school day. But, enrollment in PE alone did not influence grades. The students who performed better academically in this study were the most active, meaning those who participated in a sport or other vigorous activity at least three times a week."

Most of the vigorous activity was achieved outside the classroom, in sports such as soccer, football, basketball and baseball/softball. Since academic performance was favorably influenced by this level of activity, the researchers suggest incorporating vigorous activity in PE classes.

"This is a good tool for all of us-parents, teachers and researchers alike-to understand what motivates students and possibly coordinate their activity and academic needs," said Coe.

The American College of Sports Medicine is the largest sports medicine and exercise science organization in the world. More than 20,000 international, national, and regional members are dedicated to advancing and integrating scientific research to provide educational and practical applications of exercise science and sports medicine.

Medicine & Science in Sports & Exercise � is the official journal of the American College of Sports Medicine , and is available from Lippincott Williams & Wilkins at 1-800-638-6423. Visit ACSM online at http://www.acsm.org. The conclusions outlined in this news release are those of the researchers only, and should not be construed as an official statement of the American College of Sports Medicine.

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Brain Images Show Individual Dyslexic Children Respond To Spelling Treatment

Brain images of children with dyslexia taken before they received spelling instruction show that they have different patterns of neural activity than do good spellers when doing language tasks related to spelling. But after specialized treatment emphasizing the letters in words, they showed similar patterns of brain activity. These findings are important because they show the human brain can change and normalize in response to spelling instruction, even in dyslexia, the most common learning disability.

The research is unique in that it looks at images of individual brains rather than the composite group images, or maps, that are typically produced to show which areas of the brain are activated when people are engaged in specific tasks. Being able to study how individual brains differ between good and poor spellers and how they normalize after receiving one of two treatments is an important advance, according to University of Washington neuroimaging scientist Todd Richards and neuropsychologist Virginia Berninger, who headed the research team.

The new findings were published in the January issue of the journal Neurolinguistics.

"Most people think dyslexia is a reading disorder, but it is also a spelling and writing problem," said Berninger, who directs the UW's Learning Disabilities Center. "Our results show that all dyslexics in the 9- to 12-year-old range have spelling problems and children who cannot spell cannot express their ideas in writing."

Earlier research by the UW team and others has shown that dyslexic children exhibit a different pattern of brain activity while reading compared to youngsters who are good readers, but that the brain is malleable and this pattern can normalize with specialized instruction. However, even after receiving reading instruction, many dyslexic children still have persistent spelling problems, according to Berninger. Even so, she said, parents report that their children with dyslexia are typically dismissed from special education once they learn to read but before their spelling and writing problems are adequately treated.

Researchers have found that humans code words in three forms while learning how to read and spell. These codes draw on common and unique brain circuits. The brain codes words by their sound (or phonology), by the parts of words that signal meaning and grammar (morphology), and by their visual or written form (orthography).

In the new study, researchers used functional magnetic resonance imaging, or fMRI, to examine the brain activity of 18 dyslexic children (5 girls and 13 boys) who had problems with spelling and 21 children (8 girls and 13 boys) who were good readers and spellers. All of the children were of normal intelligence and were in the fourth through sixth grades.

Both groups of children had their brains scanned twice while doing a series of language tasks. The good spellers were scanned to provide a picture of normal brain activity while doing the tasks. The brains of the dyslexic children were imaged both before and after receiving 14 hours of one of two kinds of specialized spelling instruction over a three-week period. The dyslexic children were randomly assigned to either of two spelling treatments. One emphasized the letters in the written forms of words while the other focused on the parts of words that signal meaning and grammar.

Earlier research has shown that spelling development progresses through three stages - phonological, orthographic and morphological. The treatment that was developmentally appropriate for children in grades four through six - orthographic - was the one associated with normalization of brain activation. After receiving the orthographic instruction that emphasized strategies for focusing on and remembering the letters in written words, the brain activity of the dyslexic children changed to more closely resemble that of the good spellers. The children's spelling on a standardized test also improved. Dyslexic children who received the other treatment, a morphological one that was more developmentally advanced, did not show normalized brain activation.

Prior to receiving either kind of instruction, the dyslexic children exhibited different patterns of brain activity than did the good spellers when performing each of the language tasks related to spelling. The dyslexics showed both absence of activity in a number of brain regions exhibited by the good spellers as well as activity in other brain areas that were not activated in the good spellers.

Richards said that significant differences between the dyslexics and good spellers occurred in a small number of regions, suggesting that a few brain regions may have abnormal function during spelling development.

Berninger noted that three word codes involved in spelling during middle childhood - phonology, morphology and orthography - activate common and unique brain regions, but the specific activated brain regions associated with each word code may change during the course of a child's development in learning how to spell. For example, beginning readers create orthographic codes from the relationship of letters and phonology. Morphology plays a greater role in the longer, more complex words in middle school and high school curriculum.

"Our research is telling us good spellers are taught, not born, as is often assumed," she said. "Unfortunately, what happens in most schools is dyslexic children learn how to read and then get dismissed from special education classes even though they still need specialized instruction until they learn to spell. Moreover, spelling is not systematically and explicitly taught in many classrooms in the United States.

###

The National Institute of Child Health and Human Development funded the research. Co-authors of the paper are Elizabeth Aylward, a UW neuroimaging scientist; William Nagy, a Seattle Pacific University educational linguist; and former UW graduate students Katherine Field, Amie Grimme and Anne Richards.

For more information about dyslexia, contact Berninger at (206) 616-6372 or vwb@u.washington.edu. For more information about the imaging used in this study, contact Richards at (206) 221-6894 or toddr@u.washington.edu

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Video Games Fun But Pose Social, Health Risks

Move over Tickle Me Elmo. The recently released Nintendo Wii and Playstation 3 video game systems are rivaling the giggling red monster as the gifts children beg their parents for most this holiday season.

As coveted as these new video game systems and other models are, some parents may want to think twice before buying them for their children and teens, a University of Florida child psychologist says.

With more educational games hitting store shelves and one system, the Nintendo Wii, actually requiring players to peel themselves off the couch to use it, video game makers seem to be addressing concerns about how playing affects children. But too much gaming still puts children more at-risk for behavioral and health problems, which is why parents should consider how they will control children's playing before they buy a system, said Eric Storch, Ph.D., a UF assistant professor of pediatrics and psychiatry.

"If you're concerned it is going to be difficult to control how much your child is playing, then one recommendation would be not to tempt them," Storch said. "Don't purchase one of these systems."

Video games can be a good outlet for children who like them, but they shouldn't consume their lives, Storch added. Setting limits on playing time may help prevent casual gaming from spiraling into hours spent in front of a television screen with a controller.

Children and teens who play excessively often do so at the expense of homework, and playing solo can isolate children from their peers, potentially causing problems for them later in life, Storch said.

"Social interactions teach you how to deal with other people as well as what's appropriate and what's not," he said. "You learn how to handle situations. Social interaction is also one way of coping with stress and receiving emotional support."

Serious gamers who spend hours sitting in front of a TV also risk becoming obese and developing associated health problems, such as cardiovascular disease and type 2 diabetes, Storch said. The American Academy of Pediatrics advises parents to limit children's total TV, video game and computer time to two hours each day.

Unlike typical gaming systems, the new Nintendo Wii uses a wandlike controller that requires players to physically perform the action they want to see on-screen. The system gets users off the couch, but it's still not like playing soccer or jogging, Storch said.

On the other hand, research has shown that Dance Dance Revolution, a game that requires players to dance on a mat to mimic moves they see on their TV, elicits the same level of motion in children as other forms of exercise. But the game is a solo activity, Storch said. Dancing with friends or playing sports would get kids moving and give them a chance to spend time with peers, he said.

Although gamers lose time to participate in sports and other physical activities, video games aren't the sole reason many aren't more active, said Elizabeth Vandewater, Ph.D., an assistant professor of human development and family sciences and director of the Center for Research on Interactive Technology, Television and Children at the University of Texas. If the video games weren't there, many children would simply find something else to do inside, in part because crime and traffic increasingly hamper their ability to play outside, she said.

"Children in America are definitely less active," Vandewater said. "The question is whether (TV, computers and video games) are to blame."

Most parents know to watch out for violent and graphic video games, but even educational games may not be as beneficial as they seem in commercials. Many games that claim to be educational aren't evaluated to find out if children are actually learning from them, Vandewater said.

"Parents need to know they are being marketed to," she said.

Each family is different, so deciding whether to game is best left up to parents, Storch said. The key: Parents who do allow video games should establish limits and rules and stick with them. Those concerned about their children abiding by the limits can remove controllers or install a new swipe-card system that only allows them to play for a programmed amount of time, automatically shutting off the system when it lapses.

Another good strategy - have children do homework and play outside first, Storch said.

"There are certainly some positives to (video game playing)," Storch said. "For many kids it's really enjoyable. But moderation is the key."

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Parents Who Fight May Harm Children's Future Emotional Development

How parents handle everyday marital conflicts has a significant effect on how secure their children feel, which, in turn, significantly affects their future emotional adjustment. This finding, from researchers at the universities of Notre Dame, Rochester (NY) and Catholic University of America in Washington, D.C., was published in the January/February 2006 issue of the journal Child Development. It provides powerful new evidence regarding the impact of parental behavior on children's future behavior.

"A useful analogy is to think about emotional security as a bridge between the child and the world," explained lead researcher Mark Cummings, Ph.D., professor and Notre Dame Chair in Psychology of the Psychology Department of the University of Notre Dame in Indiana. "When the marital relationship is functioning well, it serves as a secure base, a structurally sound bridge to support the child's exploration and relationships with others."

"When destructive marital conflict erodes the bridge, children may lack confidence and become hesitant to move forward, or may move forward in a dysregulated way, unable to find appropriate footing within themselves or in interaction with others." The researchers based their report on two separate long-term studies of marital conflict and children.

The first study involved 226 parents and their 9- to-18-year-old children. The researchers examined the effect of marital conflict over three years, finding that forms of destructive marital conflict, such as personal insults, defensiveness, marital withdrawal, sadness or fear, set in motion events that led to later emotional insecurity and maladjustment in children, including depression, anxiety, and behavior problems. This occurred even when the researchers controlled for any initial adjustment problems.

The second study again examined the connection between marital conflict and emotional problems over a three-year period, this time in a different group of 232 parents and much younger children (kindergarteners). Researchers again found that marital conflict sets in motion events that led to later emotional insecurity and maladjustment. Again, researchers controlled for any initial adjustment problems, further supporting the conclusion that marital conflict was related with children's emotional insecurity and adjustment problems. Both studies involved representative community samples and everyday conflict behaviors (for example, verbal hostility) about everyday sources of conflict between parents, such as childcare and household responsibilities. Because of this, the findings can likely be generalized to most American families.

Parents and even mental health professionals are likely unaware of the significance of marital conflict for the well-being of children, said Dr. Cumming, and few may know that children's security is so closely tied to the quality of parental relationships. At the same time, however, other work from Dr. Cummings and his peers find that constructive marital conflict, in which parents express or engage in physical affection, problem solving, compromise or positive feelings, may increase children's security. "Thus," Dr. Cummings noted, "this study is a warning to strongly encourage parents to learn how to handle conflicts constructively for the sake of both their children and themselves."

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Violent Video Games Fire Up Kids' Brains

Teenagers' brains are fired up by violent video games, while at the same time areas of the brain associated with self control become subdued, say researchers from the Indiana University School of Medicine.

Dr. Vincent Mathews, head researcher, explained that this study shows, for the first time, that violent video games affect the physiology of the brain and the way it functions. He said the teenagers had increased activity in the amygdala, an area of the brain involved in emotional arousal. "At the same time, they had decreases in activity in parts of the brain which are involved in self-control," he said.

Video games are big business - in the USA alone sales hit over $10 billion in 2005.

44 teenagers were randomly asked to either play a violent video game or a non-violent one, for half-an-hour, after which they underwent an fMRI (functional magnetic resonance imaging). An fMRI measures changes that take place in the active brain in real time. The teenagers of either group did not differ in age, IQ or gender.

They found that those who had played the violent games had more activity going on in the amygdala, as opposed to the teenagers who played the non-violent games (who did not have more activity there). Those playing the violent games also had lower activity in prefrontal areas of the brain - these areas are associated with self control, inhibition and focus (concentration), compared to the non-violent game players (who did not have lower activity there).

The researchers said further studies are needed to determine whether these physiological changes make individuals behave more violently.

Dr. Mathews presented the findings at the Annual Meeting of the Radiological Society of North America.

"Short-term Effects of Violent Video Game Playing: An fMRI Study"
Vincent Mathews, M.D., Yang Wang, M.D., Andrew J. Kalnin, M.D., Kristine M. Mosier, D.M.D., Ph.D., David W. Dunn, M.D., and William G. Kronenberger, Ph.D
Click here to view abstract online

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Autism Rates Drop After Mercury Removed From Childhood Vaccines

Journal of American Physicians and Surgeons shows that since mercury was removed from childhood vaccines, the alarming increase in reported rates of autism and other neurological disorders (NDs) in children not only stopped, but actually dropped sharply - by as much as 35%.

Using the government's own databases, independent researchers analyzed reports of childhood NDs, including autism, before and after removal of mercury-based preservatives. Authors David A. Geier, B.A. and Mark R. Geier, M.D., Ph.D. analyze data from the CDC's Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System (VAERS) and the California Department of Developmental Services (CDDS) in "Early Downward Trends in Neurodevelopmental Disorders Following Removal of Thimerosal-Containing Vaccines."

The numbers from California show that reported autism rates hit a high of 800 in May 2003. If that trend had continued, the reports would have skyrocketed to more than 1000 by the beginning of 2006. But in fact, the Geiers report that the number actually went down to only 620, a real decrease of 22%, and a decrease from the projections of 35%.

This analysis directly contradicts 2004 recommendations of the Institute of Medicine which examined vaccine safety data from the National Immunization Program (NIP) of the CDC. While not willing to either rule out or to corroborate a relationship between mercury and autism, the IOM soft-pedaled its findings, and decided no more studies were needed. The authors write: "The IOM stated that the evidence favored rejection of a causal relationship between thimerosal and autism, that such a relationship was not biologically plausible, and that no further studies should be conducted to evaluate it."

As more and more vaccines were added to the mandatory schedule of vaccines for children, the dose of the mercury-based preservative thimerosal rose, so that the cumulative dose injected into babies exceeded the toxic threshold set by many government agencies. Mercury is known to damage nerve cells in very low concentrations.

The concern about vaccines may actually be underrated, as it is generally acknowledged that the voluntary reporting of such disorders has resulted in vast underreporting of new cases. For example, the Iowa state legislature banned thimerosal from all vaccines administered there after it documented a 700-fold increase in that state alone. California followed suit, and 32 states are considering doing so.

Up until about 1989 pre-school children got only 3 vaccines (polio, DPT, MMR). By 1999 the CDC recommended a total of 22 vaccines to be given before children reach the 1st grade, including Hepatitis B, which is given to newborns within the first 24 hours of birth. Many of these vaccines contained mercury. In the 1990s approximately 40 million children were injected with mercury-containing vaccines.

The cumulative amount of mercury being given to children in this number of vaccines would be an amount 187 times the EPA daily exposure limit.

Between 1989 and 2003, there has been an explosion of autism. The incidence of autism (and other related disorders) went from about 1 in 2,500 children to 1 in every 166. Currently there are more than a half million children in the U.S. that have autism. This disorder has devastated families.

In 1999, on the recommendation of the American Academy of Pediatrics and U.S. Public Health Service, thimerosal was removed from most childhood vaccines as a "precautionary" measure - i.e. without admitting to any causal link between thimerosal and autism.

The Geiers conclude that mercury continues to be a concern, as it is still added to some of the most commonly-used vaccines, such as those for flu:

"Despite its removal from many childhood vaccines, thimerosal is still routinely added to some formulations of influenza vaccine administered to U.S. infants, as well as to several other vaccines (e.g. tetanus-diphtheria and monovalent tetanus) administered to older children and adults. In 2004, the Institute of Medicine (IOM) of the U.S. National Academy of Sciences (NAS) retreated from the stated 1999 goal of the AAP and the PHS to remove thimerosal from U.S. vaccines as soon as possible.As a result, assessing the safety of TCVs [thimerosal-containing vaccines] is a matter of significant importance."

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College Kids Choose Adderall Over Ritalin For Illicit Use

More than 75% of college students who reported using prescription stimulants illicitly last year chose amphetamine-dextroamphetamine products, like Adderall, over methylphenidate products, like Ritalin. The study, first-authored by Northeastern University Pharmacy Professor Christian Teter, also found that the primary motives for illicit use were to enhance academic performance, while less than a third of illicit users intended to get high or experiment with these stimulants. However, alarmingly, approximately 40% of these students had snorted prescription stimulants.

Titled, "Illicit Use of Specific Prescription Stimulants among College Students: Prevalence, Motives, and Routes of Administration," the study randomly sampled 4580 undergraduate college students from a large, midwestern university. Using a self-administered Web survey, the authors assessed lifetime and past-year prevalence to find out what prescription drugs students use illicitly, for what purpose, and how they administered these pills.

"We knew prescription stimulant abuse happened on college campuses, but until this study, data regarding the prevalence of individual drugs had been scarce," says Christian J. Teter, Assistant Professor of Pharmacy Practice at Northeastern University School of Pharmacy and Clinical Research Pharmacist at McLean Hospital. "The only way to effectively combat this problem is by assessing the prevalence and motives for illicit use of these potent psychostimulants."

While there were no differences in past-year illicit use between men and women, the study found significant ethnic-racial differences. While not one African-American student reported getting high as a motive, nearly thirty percent of Caucasians and nearly twenty percent of Asians, Hispanics and others did. These groups were also more likely to experiment with prescription stimulants than their African-American counterparts.

The study found that most lifetime users started while in college. Also, those students who began using pre-college were almost three times more likely to still use during the past year, than those who began while in college.

"We also found that students who started illicitly using prescription stimulants during college were motivated primarily by a desire to improve concentration, possibly due to academic competitiveness," adds Teter. "However, most pre-college initiators reported using it to get high, lose weight, and for experimentation."

The study also puts forth several hypotheses as to why amphetamine-dextroamphetamines, like Adderall, are three times more popular than other stimulants. Authors note that Adderall might be more appealing to a student because it is an extended-release drug with effects lasting 10-12 hours, whereas Ritalin and similar stimulants may produce a so-called roller coaster response with effects lasting no longer than 6 hours in many cases. Another possibility for the overwhelming prevalence of illicit Adderall use may be the fact that it is the most commonly prescribed brand-name stimulant in the U.S.

The study appeared in the October 2006 issue of the journal Pharmacotherapy, and is authored by Christian J. Teter, Pharm.D. (Northeastern University), Sean Esteban McCabe, Ph.D., M.S.W. (University of Michigan), Kristy LaGrange, Pharm.D. (Northeastern University), James A. Cranford, Ph.D. (University of Michigan), and Carol J. Boyd, Ph.D., R.N. (University of Michigan). The study was supported by a grant from the National Institute on Drug Abuse.

About Northeastern

Northeastern University, located in the heart of Boston, Massachusetts, is a world leader in practice-oriented education and recognized for its expert faculty and first-rate academic and research facilities. Northeastern integrates challenging liberal arts and professional studies with the nation's largest cooperative education program. Through co-op, Northeastern undergraduates alternate semesters of full-time study with semesters of paid work in fields relevant to their professional interests and major, giving them nearly two years of professional experience upon graduation. The majority of Northeastern graduates receive a job offer from a co-op employer. For more information, please visit http://www.northeastern.edu.

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Free Unstructured Play Is Essential For Children

In order to develop socially, emotionally and cognitively, children need plenty of free, unstructured play - in other words, lots of old-fashioned free playtime, says a report by the American Academy of Pediatrics, called "The Importance of Play in Promoting Healthy Child Development and Maintaining Strong Parent-Child Bonds."

The American Academy of Pediatrics believes pediatricians should check children's levels of stress, to make sure they are not being overloaded with activities and tasks that are designed to do them good, but could end up having the opposite effect.

Too many children in the USA have to give up free play time because their parents, in a bid to help them do well, send them to classes and encourage them to take part in "development activities". Several pediatricians, says the report, are finding that some children are becoming stressed - they are not getting enough 'downtime'.

The report says that not only does unstructured play give children time to adjust to a new school setting, but it also allows them to use their creativity, find out what they really like, acquire and practise their social skills, and solve problems. Children who can take part in unstructured free play tend to become more resilient.

The report urges parents to be guided by what their child is like, rather than how well other kids down the road are doing.

The report lists many factors which could contribute towards childhood stress:

-- changes in family structure
-- competitive college admissions process
-- federal education policies
-- fear a child may fall behind academically
-- less physical activity
-- a hurried lifestyle

If a child has to live a hurried lifestyle, while at the same time he/she has less free time, he/she can become more stressed and anxious. The report states that some children could even become depressed. Although excelling academically has its benefits, the reports stresses that parental love, role modeling and guidance are what really matter for success in life.

The Importance of Play in Promoting Healthy Child Development and Maintaining Strong Parent-Child Bonds (PDF)

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Warning Signs For Appendicitis In Children

A 5-year-old with abdominal pain, nausea and fever may have appendicitis or any of a number of other problems. But how does the child's doctor decide whether to schedule an emergency appendectomy to surgically remove a presumably inflamed appendix -- a procedure that carries its own risks like any surgery -- or wait and observe what could be a ticking time bomb that could rupture and kill the patient in a matter of hours" It's a classic physician's dilemma, but a new study led by the Johns Hopkins Children's Center may ease the pediatrician's problem-solving and parents' anxiety.

Reporting on their review of the frequency of the most common symptoms of actual appendicitis in children, the researchers concluded that beyond fever, the most telltale signs are 'rebound' tenderness or pain that occurs after pressure is removed abruptly from the lower right part of the abdomen; abdominal pain that starts around the belly button and migrates down and to the right; and an elevated white blood cell count (10,000 or more per microliter), which is a marker of infection in the body.

Notably, loss of appetite, nausea and vomiting, hallmark appendicitis symptoms in adults, were NOT predictive of appendicitis in children.

"These signs don't give you an absolute diagnosis, but they should prompt the doctor to refer the child to a surgeon for evaluation," said study lead author David Bundy, M.D., M.P.H., a pediatrician at the Johns Hopkins Children's Center.

Appendicitis is most common in teens and young adults in their early 20s. However, children younger than 4 years are at the highest risk for a rupture. Up to 80 percent of appendicitis cases in this age group end in rupture, partly because young children have fewer of the classic symptoms of nausea, vomiting and pain localized in the lower right portion of the abdomen than do teenagers and young adults, making the diagnosis easy to miss or delay. In the study report, published in the July 25 issue of the Journal of the American Medical Association, the researchers said ultrasound and CT scan images can be helpful, but are not always conclusive, even if they are available on an emergency basis. And CT scans in particular expose young children to radiation, which should be avoided if possible.

"In a very young child, the presentation of symptoms associated with appendicitis tends to be different from adults, so when trying to decide between fast-track surgery versus watchful observation, you're often damned if you do and damned if you don't," Bundy said. "In our analysis, we've identified some of the more powerful telltale signs that should help residents, general pediatricians and ER doctors narrow down what is seldom a clear-cut diagnosis."

The appendix is a small tube extending from the large intestine, and infections and inflammation of the organ can be dangerous. The only absolute way to diagnose the condition is surgery, and each year, appendicitis sends 77,000 American children to the hospital. An estimated one-third of them suffer a ruptured appendix, a life-threatening complication, before they reach the OR.

In their analysis of previous research, investigators searched hundreds of studies, weeding out weak from solid science. The 25 studies that made the final cut examined symptoms and outcomes in children who presented with abdominal pain and in whom appendicitis was considered a possible diagnosis. Abdominal pain in children is one of the most common and vaguest symptoms, and can suggest anything from innocent constipation to serious infections or blockages of the intestines. Doctors advise parents that any abdominal pain should be evaluated for appendicitis. "We really want parents to keep in mind that children with appendicitis don't always show up with the classic story that we see in adults," Bundy says. "There isn't a perfect formula, but we think the signs we've identified can help."

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