Health & WellnessS


Health

Getting Lost: A Newly Discovered Developmental Brain Disorder


Science Daily
Mon, 29 Sep 2008 21:28 UTC
Feeling lost every time you leave your home? You may not be as alone as you think.
Researchers at the University of British Columbia and Vancouver Coastal Health Research Institute recently documented the first case of a patient who, without apparent brain damage or cognitive impairment, is unable to orient within any environment. Researchers also believe that there are many others in the general population who may be affected by this developmental topographical disorder.

The study, published in the journal Neuropsychologia, and led by Giuseppe Iaria, a UBC Faculty of Medicine and VCH postdoctoral fellow, used functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) together with behavioural studies to assess and characterize the navigational deficiencies of the patient, who is completely unable to orient within the environment, getting lost even within the neighborhood where the patient lived for many years.
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Family

Loneliness 'makes you cold'


BBC News
Mon, 29 Sep 2008 14:39 UTC
Loneliness and coldness are often associated in everyday language, but psychologists have found that social isolation does make people feel cold. The University of Toronto team found people feeling excluded said a room was colder than those feeling included.

And people who felt left out also chose comforting hot soup, rather than an apple or soft drink. A UK psychologist said the findings could help people feeling isolated, particularly in the winter months.
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Padlock

EU bans children food imports from China


The Press Association
Sun, 28 Sep 2008 02:23 UTC
A Europe-wide ban on all food for children coming from China has come into force.

The European Commission's ban comes amid growing concern over contaminated milk powder which has already caused infant deaths in China and affected thousands more children.

A Commission spokeswoman said some EU countries - and some sectors of the food industry - had already announced their own bans, but now Brussels was activating an explicit total ban on all products from China aimed at infants and young children and which could pose a threat of contamination.
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Syringe

Autism Doc's claims led to witch hunt

Phil Doherty
Sunday Sun
Mon, 29 Sep 2008 02:14 UTC
The man at the centre of the triple jab controversy has accused the Government of conducting a witch hunt against him.

Dr Andrew Wakefield has been pilloried by the medical establishment after he voiced fears 10 yeas ago the Measles Mumps and Rubella inoculation could cause autism in some kids it was given to.
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Health

Pistachio Nuts May Improve Heart Health


Science Daily
Mon, 29 Sep 2008 01:47 UTC
Going green may be heart healthy if the green you choose is pistachio nuts, according to researchers at Penn State who conducted the first study to investigate the way pistachios lower cholesterol.

"We investigated mechanisms of action to explain the cholesterol-lowering effects of the pistachio diets," says Sarah K. Gebauer, recent Penn State Ph.D. recipient, currently a post-doctoral research associate, USDA Beltsville Human Nutrition Research Center.

The researchers conducted a randomized, crossover design, controlled feeding experiment to test the effects of pistachios added to a heart healthy moderate-fat diet on cardiovascular disease risk factors. Controlled feeding experiments provide all the food eaten by study subjects for the duration of the study segment.
Pistachio nuts.
© iStockphotoPistachio nuts.
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Mail

New research finds workers more prone to lie in E-mail


Lehigh University
Thu, 25 Sep 2008 02:46 UTC
A pair of recent studies suggest that e-mail is the most deceptive form of communications in the workplace - even more so than more traditional kinds of written communications, like pen-and-paper.

More surprising is that people actually feel justified when lying using e-mail, the studies show.

"There is a growing concern in the workplace over e-mail communications, and it comes down to trust," says Liuba Belkin, co-author of the studies and an assistant professor of management at Lehigh University. "You're not afforded the luxury of seeing non-verbal and behavioral cues over e-mail. And in an organizational context, that leaves a lot of room for misinterpretation and, as we saw in our study, intentional deception."
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Bulb

Toddlers' focus on mouths rather than on eyes is a predictor of autism severity


Yale University
Fri, 26 Sep 2008 21:57 UTC
autism
© Yale University Two-year-olds with autism look less at others' eyes and more at their mouths.
Scientists at Yale School of Medicine have found that two-year-olds with autism looked significantly more at the mouths of others, and less at their eyes, than typically developing toddlers. This abnormality predicts the level of disability, according to study results published in the Archives of General Psychiatry.

Lead author Warren Jones and colleagues Ami Klin and Katelin Carr used eye-tracking technology to quantify the visual fixations of two-year-olds who watched caregivers approach them and engage in typical mother-child interactions, such as playing games like peek-a-boo.

After the first few weeks of life, infants look in the eyes of others, setting processes of socialization in motion. In infancy and throughout life, the act of looking at the eyes of others is a window into people's feelings and thoughts and a powerful facilitator in shaping the formation of the social mind and brain.
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Bell

Africa: Cholera Outbreak Claims 18 Lives in Zamfara

Imam Imam
This Day Online
Fri, 26 Sep 2008 20:15 UTC
No fewer than 18 people have been confirmed dead following an outbreak of cholera disease at Asako village in Bungudu Local Council of Zamfara state.

Similarly, about 100 persons have been hospitalised in relation to the outbreak of the disease believed to have been caused by the contamination of the only open dug well used by the community to access water.
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People

US: Potential Reversal Of Autism ?

Richard Owl Mirror
Gather
Mon, 22 Sep 2008 21:06 UTC
Scientific researchers can spend years in the lab on obscure topics, like how a sea slug remembers or how a fruit fly sees color. But every now and then, a basic scientist makes a discovery that changes human lives.

Mark Bear, who directs the Picower Institute for Learning and Memory at MIT, is one of those basic scientists. He's discovered a system in the brain that could change the lives of thousands of people with the genetic disorder known as Fragile X Syndrome.
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People

UK: Autistic women: a life more ordinary


UK Telegraph
Sun, 21 Sep 2008 20:33 UTC
Why do women make up only one in four of those diagnosed as autistic? Could it be that they are simply better at pretending not to be? Charlotte Moore meets a group of women for whom 'normal' is an alien language that they battle to learn

Autistic women
©Unknown
Lauren, Selina, Cara and Kelly (left to right) are all women on the autistic spectrum

I am in Godalming, Surrey, sitting with a group of pleasant, personable women who have come together, as they do each month for an all-women's night, to share news, views and experiences. You'd imagine that the room would be alive with a babble of voices, but it's not. The gossipy, reciprocal flow of normal female conversation is absent, and so far not one of them has asked me, a stranger, a single question about myself or what I am doing here. The stilted atmosphere would strike outsiders as disconcertingly weird, but these women are oblivious to the awkwardness. They are autistic, and for them this is normality.
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