Health & WellnessS


Heart - Black

US: Shaken baby cases on the increase

Carey Goldberg
Boston.com
Fri, 20 Mar 2009 02:30 UTC
Specialists link rise to economic stress

Cases of the potentially devastating brain injury known as shaken baby syndrome have at least doubled in the last few months, a jump that Massachusetts child abuse specialists say is apparently influenced by families' economic stress.

Child protection teams at Children's Hospital Boston and Massachusetts General Hospital, which consult on many of the state's cases of maltreatment, have seen nine infants with shaken baby syndrome in the last three months, compared with four in the same period last year.

The number of cases of brain trauma has increased statewide, officials say, amid an overall rise in child abuse and neglect reports of 8 percent in the 2008 fiscal year, compared with the previous year.
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Syringe

Spinal Taps Carry Higher Risks For Infants And Elderly


ScienceDaily
Fri, 20 Mar 2009 02:24 UTC
An X-ray-guided spinal tap procedure fails more than half of the time in young infants and should be used sparingly, if at all, for those patients, according to a new study done by researchers at Wake Forest University School of Medicine.

The study also shows that the X-ray-guided form of spinal tap, called fluoroscopy-guided lumbar puncture, causes a doubling in risk of bleeding for patients older than 80 compared to younger patients and that the risk of bleeding caused by the procedure can be reduced by doing the puncture at the middle of the lower back rather than at the lowest levels of the spine.
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Pills

US study: Provigil, a narcoleptic drug, may be addictive

Julie Steenhuysen
Reuters
Fri, 20 Mar 2009 02:17 UTC
Provigil, a narcolepsy drug increasingly used by healthy people to boost brain performance, may be addictive in vulnerable people and should be monitored, U.S. drug abuse experts said on Tuesday.

A pilot study on 10 healthy men found that at normal doses, the Cephalon Inc (CEPH.O) drug known generically as modafinil increases levels of the reward chemical dopamine in the same part of the brain that becomes active with other drugs of abuse.

"It has the signature that it could potentially be addictive," said Dr. Nora Volkow, director of the National Institute on Drug Abuse, whose study appears in the Journal of the American Medical Association.
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Pills

Drug Maker Told Studies Would Aid It, Papers Say

Roni Caryn Rabin
New York Times
Fri, 20 Mar 2009 02:10 UTC
An influential Harvard child psychiatrist told the drug giant Johnson & Johnson that planned studies of its medicines in children would yield results benefiting the company, according to court documents dating over several years that the psychiatrist wants sealed.
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Health

Spinal cord device helped mice with Parkinson's

Julie Steenhuysen
Reuters
Fri, 20 Mar 2009 02:06 UTC
Chicago - A spinal cord stimulator helped rodents with Parkinson's disease move more easily, offering the hope of a less-invasive way of treating the disease in humans, U.S. researchers said on Thursday.

"We see an almost immediate and dramatic change in the animal's ability to function when the device stimulates the spinal cord," said Dr. Miguel Nicolelis of Duke University in North Carolina, whose study appears in the journal Science.

If it works in humans, Nicolelis said, the device could be used to treat the disease early on, reaching far more patients than current stimulators, which are implanted deep in the brain, and can benefit only about one third of Parkinson's patients.
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Magnify

Frankincense may be used to treat bladder cancer


Agence France Press
Fri, 20 Mar 2009 02:06 UTC
Frankincense, an aromatic tree oil and in Christian tradition one of the three wise men's gifts to the baby Jesus, may be a helpful treatment for bladder cancer, according to a study published today.
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Black Cat

Rights group: 1,000 seized in Gambian witch hunt

Todd Pitman
Associated Press
Fri, 20 Mar 2009 00:09 UTC
Dakar, Senegal -- Authorities in Gambia have rounded up about 1,000 people and forced them to drink hallucinogens in a witch-hunting campaign that is terrorizing the tiny West African nation, an international rights group said Wednesday.

Amnesty International called on the government of President Yahya Jammeh, who seized power in a 1994 coup and has claimed he can cure AIDS, to halt the campaign and bring those responsible to justice.

Gambian officials could not immediately be reached for comment and the government has issued no statements in reaction to the report.

Authorities began inviting "witch doctors," who combat witches, to come from nearby Guinea soon after the death earlier this year of the president's aunt. Jammeh "reportedly believes that witchcraft was used in her death," the London-based rights group said.
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Chalkboard

Girls 'do better in single-sex schools'

Graeme Paton and Matthew Moore
The Telegraph
Wed, 18 Mar 2009 20:04 UTC
Same sex schools
© GettyPupils of all abilities are more likely to succeed if they go to single-sex state schools
Girls achieve better exam results when they are taught in single-sex schools, research has shown.

Analysis of Key Stage 2 and GCSE scores of more than 700,000 girls has revealed that those in all-female comprehensives make better progress than those who attend mixed secondaries.

The largest improvements came among those who did badly at primary school, although pupils of all abilities are more likely to succeed if they go to single-sex state schools, the study indicates.

The research by the Good Schools Guide confirms previous claims that girls benefit from being educated away from boys.

A Government-backed review in 2007 recommended that the sexes should be taught differently to maximise results, amid fears that girls tend to be pushed aside in mixed-sex classrooms.
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Sun

Flashback 12 Foods You Have to Buy Organic

Dr. Joseph Mercola
Healthier Talk
Fri, 31 Oct 2008 19:45 UTC
The biggest study ever into organic food - a four-year EU funded project called the Quality Low Input Food (QLIF) project - found that organic food is FAR more nutritious than ordinary produce, and can help improve your health and longevity. You're likely to hear more about this again, once they publish their findings in full, which is expected to occur by the end of this year. This study may have considerable impact, as its findings may even overturn government advice - at least in the U.K. - which currently states that eating organic food is no more than a lifestyle choice.

For example, this study found that:

* · Organic fruit and vegetables contain up to 40 percent more antioxidants
* · Organic produce had higher levels of beneficial minerals like iron and zinc
* · Milk from organic herds contained up to 90 percent more antioxidants
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Red Flag

Dallas High School records show 'cage fights were held

Emily Bradshaw & Tawnell D Hobbs
Dallas News
Thu, 19 Mar 2009 18:32 UTC
The principal and other staff members at South Oak Cliff High School were supposed to be breaking up fights. Instead, they sent troubled students into a steel utility cage in an athletic locker room to battle it out with bare fists and no head protection, records show.

Cage fighting allegations not the first against ex-principal

Documents obtained by The Dallas Morning News say the "cage fights" took place between 2003 and 2005. The records don't say how many fights may have taken place.

Donald Moten, who was principal at South Oak Cliff High at the time, denied any wrongdoing when contacted Wednesday.

District investigators learned of the fights as part of an investigation into grade-changing for student athletes that ultimately cost the school its 2006 boys state basketball championship.

Internal district reports obtained by The News describe a culture of sanctioned violence in which school employees and even the principal relied on "the cage" to settle disputes and bring unruly students under control.
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