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And the winner is ...
In case you haven’t been following the news about Notre Dame linebacker Manti Te’o’s non-relationship with his imaginary not-really-dead girlfriend Lennay Kekua, it turns out the Heisman contender now says the whole thing was a hoax perpetrated by Ronaiah Tuiasosopo using a pilfered profile photo of Diane O’Meara. I’m still skeptical about this story. I mean, what kind of name is “Diane”?
Bearable lightness of being
Is someone close to you an optimist? The one who sees you slaving over your 1040 Long Form and says, “You always did enjoy Sudoku!” Don't you just hate that person? And yet, optimists sometimes get it right, as shown by a new report on childhood obesity trends in New York and Los Angeles. It turns out that either a comprehensive, culturally sensitive government approach to improving childhood obesity really is capable of reversing the trend, or we’ve just reached the natural limits of humans’ ability to eat cheese doodles.
New York City started its obesity battle early, in the 1990s, when the concept of encouraging children to drink low-fat milk was considered “innovative.” The successful program was named “Eat Well Play Hard,” after organizers rejected such culturally relevant names as “Ah, What Do Youse Care,” and “Fugeddaboutit.” Other innovations in the program included promoting fruit and vegetable consumption and exercise, supporting breast-feeding, and limiting television viewing by young children. By 2004, childhood obesity rates in New York had peaked, and they’ve been falling since. Skeptics might point out that since 2004, the only people who could afford living in New York have been either hedge fund managers or the panelists on "The View."
The Los Angeles experience bolsters the argument that such programs actually work, since L.A. County started its program later than New York and saw its childhood obesity rates level off and decline later as well. Of course, planners in Los Angeles had to take into account the unique aspects of the city’s culture, so their program relies more on personal trainers, gourmet food trucks, and Cool Sculpting. Building on the program’s success, LA officials soon hope to have every poor child in the county adopted by Angelina Jolie.
If it ain’t broken
I love how much money there is to be made in fixing things that were never problems in the first place. My favorite new product is Himalayan Salt Foot D-Tox Patches, designed to suck toxins out of your bloodstream through the soles of your feet while you sleep, as only Nepalese flavorings can do (be sure and remove them before walking). Researchers in the Netherlands, however, suggest adenoidectomy might be about as useful, at least when used to treat recurrent colds and sinus infections.
Technically, the research team already proved this in 2011, when they randomized 111 children with recurrent upper respiratory infections to either immediate adenoidectomy or watchful waiting and found that outcomes for both groups were the same. Anyone who knows that kids tend to get fewer colds and sinus infections as they age or that adenoids shrink and disappear with time was less surprised at these results than that Hugh Jackman was nominated for Best Actor. The new study just demonstrated that not performing surgery is less expensive than performing surgery, even in a country with universal health care. These findings may not apply to children who lose their adenoids because of recurrent ear infections or airway obstruction, but I’d love to see those indications come under more scrutiny as well. I may apply for a grant myself, as soon as I’m done perfecting my recipe for Himalayan salted caramels; they still taste a little ... funky.
Buzz kill
Speaking of not being surprised, more evidence suggests that so-called Energy Beverages may not be safe, news about as shocking as a Best Actor nomination for Daniel Day-Lewis. A new report from the Substance Abuse & Mental Health Services Administration cites a doubling of emergency department visits associated with energy beverage use between 2007 and 2011. Coming on the heels of an investigation of 18 deaths possibly attributed to the drinks, the report has some people questioning whether taking up to 500 milligrams of caffeine combined with other stimulants may not be so healthy.
My favorite part of this story is how the American Beverage Association is responding to 21,000 annual ED visits for complaints ranging from insomnia, nervousness, and headaches to palpitations and seizures. In a statement on their website, the ABA suggested that since many people abuse alcohol and drugs when they’re sipping such beverages as Venom, Monster Hit Man, and Xience Xenergy (the only thing better than science is xience), perhaps the entire increase in ED visits is really attributable to unreported substance abuse! I’m disappointed that the authors of this statement are not eligible for an Academy Award. Perhaps they at least could get a Heisman?
David L. Hill, M.D, FAAP, is vice president of Cape Fear Pediatrics in Wilmington, NC and is an adjunct assistant professor of pediatrics at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. He is Program Director for the AAP Council on Communications and Media and an executive committee member of the North Carolina Pediatric Society. He has recorded commentaries for NPR's All Things Considered and provided content for various print, television and Internet outlets. Dr. Hill is the author of Dad to Dad: Parenting Like A Pro (AAP Publishing 2012).
In case you haven’t been following the news about Notre Dame linebacker Manti Te’o’s non-relationship with his imaginary not-really-dead girlfriend Lennay Kekua, it turns out the Heisman contender now says the whole thing was a hoax perpetrated by Ronaiah Tuiasosopo using a pilfered profile photo of Diane O’Meara. I’m still skeptical about this story. I mean, what kind of name is “Diane”?
Bearable lightness of being
Is someone close to you an optimist? The one who sees you slaving over your 1040 Long Form and says, “You always did enjoy Sudoku!” Don't you just hate that person? And yet, optimists sometimes get it right, as shown by a new report on childhood obesity trends in New York and Los Angeles. It turns out that either a comprehensive, culturally sensitive government approach to improving childhood obesity really is capable of reversing the trend, or we’ve just reached the natural limits of humans’ ability to eat cheese doodles.
New York City started its obesity battle early, in the 1990s, when the concept of encouraging children to drink low-fat milk was considered “innovative.” The successful program was named “Eat Well Play Hard,” after organizers rejected such culturally relevant names as “Ah, What Do Youse Care,” and “Fugeddaboutit.” Other innovations in the program included promoting fruit and vegetable consumption and exercise, supporting breast-feeding, and limiting television viewing by young children. By 2004, childhood obesity rates in New York had peaked, and they’ve been falling since. Skeptics might point out that since 2004, the only people who could afford living in New York have been either hedge fund managers or the panelists on "The View."
The Los Angeles experience bolsters the argument that such programs actually work, since L.A. County started its program later than New York and saw its childhood obesity rates level off and decline later as well. Of course, planners in Los Angeles had to take into account the unique aspects of the city’s culture, so their program relies more on personal trainers, gourmet food trucks, and Cool Sculpting. Building on the program’s success, LA officials soon hope to have every poor child in the county adopted by Angelina Jolie.
If it ain’t broken
I love how much money there is to be made in fixing things that were never problems in the first place. My favorite new product is Himalayan Salt Foot D-Tox Patches, designed to suck toxins out of your bloodstream through the soles of your feet while you sleep, as only Nepalese flavorings can do (be sure and remove them before walking). Researchers in the Netherlands, however, suggest adenoidectomy might be about as useful, at least when used to treat recurrent colds and sinus infections.
Technically, the research team already proved this in 2011, when they randomized 111 children with recurrent upper respiratory infections to either immediate adenoidectomy or watchful waiting and found that outcomes for both groups were the same. Anyone who knows that kids tend to get fewer colds and sinus infections as they age or that adenoids shrink and disappear with time was less surprised at these results than that Hugh Jackman was nominated for Best Actor. The new study just demonstrated that not performing surgery is less expensive than performing surgery, even in a country with universal health care. These findings may not apply to children who lose their adenoids because of recurrent ear infections or airway obstruction, but I’d love to see those indications come under more scrutiny as well. I may apply for a grant myself, as soon as I’m done perfecting my recipe for Himalayan salted caramels; they still taste a little ... funky.
Buzz kill
Speaking of not being surprised, more evidence suggests that so-called Energy Beverages may not be safe, news about as shocking as a Best Actor nomination for Daniel Day-Lewis. A new report from the Substance Abuse & Mental Health Services Administration cites a doubling of emergency department visits associated with energy beverage use between 2007 and 2011. Coming on the heels of an investigation of 18 deaths possibly attributed to the drinks, the report has some people questioning whether taking up to 500 milligrams of caffeine combined with other stimulants may not be so healthy.
My favorite part of this story is how the American Beverage Association is responding to 21,000 annual ED visits for complaints ranging from insomnia, nervousness, and headaches to palpitations and seizures. In a statement on their website, the ABA suggested that since many people abuse alcohol and drugs when they’re sipping such beverages as Venom, Monster Hit Man, and Xience Xenergy (the only thing better than science is xience), perhaps the entire increase in ED visits is really attributable to unreported substance abuse! I’m disappointed that the authors of this statement are not eligible for an Academy Award. Perhaps they at least could get a Heisman?
David L. Hill, M.D, FAAP, is vice president of Cape Fear Pediatrics in Wilmington, NC and is an adjunct assistant professor of pediatrics at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. He is Program Director for the AAP Council on Communications and Media and an executive committee member of the North Carolina Pediatric Society. He has recorded commentaries for NPR's All Things Considered and provided content for various print, television and Internet outlets. Dr. Hill is the author of Dad to Dad: Parenting Like A Pro (AAP Publishing 2012).
In case you haven’t been following the news about Notre Dame linebacker Manti Te’o’s non-relationship with his imaginary not-really-dead girlfriend Lennay Kekua, it turns out the Heisman contender now says the whole thing was a hoax perpetrated by Ronaiah Tuiasosopo using a pilfered profile photo of Diane O’Meara. I’m still skeptical about this story. I mean, what kind of name is “Diane”?
Bearable lightness of being
Is someone close to you an optimist? The one who sees you slaving over your 1040 Long Form and says, “You always did enjoy Sudoku!” Don't you just hate that person? And yet, optimists sometimes get it right, as shown by a new report on childhood obesity trends in New York and Los Angeles. It turns out that either a comprehensive, culturally sensitive government approach to improving childhood obesity really is capable of reversing the trend, or we’ve just reached the natural limits of humans’ ability to eat cheese doodles.
New York City started its obesity battle early, in the 1990s, when the concept of encouraging children to drink low-fat milk was considered “innovative.” The successful program was named “Eat Well Play Hard,” after organizers rejected such culturally relevant names as “Ah, What Do Youse Care,” and “Fugeddaboutit.” Other innovations in the program included promoting fruit and vegetable consumption and exercise, supporting breast-feeding, and limiting television viewing by young children. By 2004, childhood obesity rates in New York had peaked, and they’ve been falling since. Skeptics might point out that since 2004, the only people who could afford living in New York have been either hedge fund managers or the panelists on "The View."
The Los Angeles experience bolsters the argument that such programs actually work, since L.A. County started its program later than New York and saw its childhood obesity rates level off and decline later as well. Of course, planners in Los Angeles had to take into account the unique aspects of the city’s culture, so their program relies more on personal trainers, gourmet food trucks, and Cool Sculpting. Building on the program’s success, LA officials soon hope to have every poor child in the county adopted by Angelina Jolie.
If it ain’t broken
I love how much money there is to be made in fixing things that were never problems in the first place. My favorite new product is Himalayan Salt Foot D-Tox Patches, designed to suck toxins out of your bloodstream through the soles of your feet while you sleep, as only Nepalese flavorings can do (be sure and remove them before walking). Researchers in the Netherlands, however, suggest adenoidectomy might be about as useful, at least when used to treat recurrent colds and sinus infections.
Technically, the research team already proved this in 2011, when they randomized 111 children with recurrent upper respiratory infections to either immediate adenoidectomy or watchful waiting and found that outcomes for both groups were the same. Anyone who knows that kids tend to get fewer colds and sinus infections as they age or that adenoids shrink and disappear with time was less surprised at these results than that Hugh Jackman was nominated for Best Actor. The new study just demonstrated that not performing surgery is less expensive than performing surgery, even in a country with universal health care. These findings may not apply to children who lose their adenoids because of recurrent ear infections or airway obstruction, but I’d love to see those indications come under more scrutiny as well. I may apply for a grant myself, as soon as I’m done perfecting my recipe for Himalayan salted caramels; they still taste a little ... funky.
Buzz kill
Speaking of not being surprised, more evidence suggests that so-called Energy Beverages may not be safe, news about as shocking as a Best Actor nomination for Daniel Day-Lewis. A new report from the Substance Abuse & Mental Health Services Administration cites a doubling of emergency department visits associated with energy beverage use between 2007 and 2011. Coming on the heels of an investigation of 18 deaths possibly attributed to the drinks, the report has some people questioning whether taking up to 500 milligrams of caffeine combined with other stimulants may not be so healthy.
My favorite part of this story is how the American Beverage Association is responding to 21,000 annual ED visits for complaints ranging from insomnia, nervousness, and headaches to palpitations and seizures. In a statement on their website, the ABA suggested that since many people abuse alcohol and drugs when they’re sipping such beverages as Venom, Monster Hit Man, and Xience Xenergy (the only thing better than science is xience), perhaps the entire increase in ED visits is really attributable to unreported substance abuse! I’m disappointed that the authors of this statement are not eligible for an Academy Award. Perhaps they at least could get a Heisman?
David L. Hill, M.D, FAAP, is vice president of Cape Fear Pediatrics in Wilmington, NC and is an adjunct assistant professor of pediatrics at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. He is Program Director for the AAP Council on Communications and Media and an executive committee member of the North Carolina Pediatric Society. He has recorded commentaries for NPR's All Things Considered and provided content for various print, television and Internet outlets. Dr. Hill is the author of Dad to Dad: Parenting Like A Pro (AAP Publishing 2012).
Tour de Grants
Can I just say on behalf of all of us in our forties, thank you Lance Armstrong for coming clean! How many of us have gone biking only to think, “If Lance Armstrong were here, he would have passed me, circled back, and passed me again just to make sure I hadn’t suffered a heart attack.” But now we know he was doping! This absolves us of everything in life we have failed to accomplish: “Sure, I’d be a star athlete with millions of dollars in endorsements...if I weren’t drug free. Yeah, I could have made it to my son’s piano recital Tuesday, if I were doping!” Next time my wife asks me to take out the trash, I’m gonna say, “Who do I look like, Lance Armstrong? I am 100% clean, Honey. I’ll just put away the dishes.”
The flu bug
Don’t you hate it when you find out your back-up plan isn’t as solid as you thought? Like how, if my practice floundered, I was going to get a full-time job with the Livestrong Foundation? A new evaluation of the effectiveness of oseltamivir (Tamiflu) suggests that it may not be such a great safety net for people who fail to vaccinate their children against influenza.
The meta-analysis from the Cochrane Acute Respiratory Infections Group looked to see how effective drugs like Tamiflu are both in treating and preventing influenza infections in children up to age 12. The good news is that for kids with laboratory-confirmed influenza, oseltamivir cut the median duration of illness by 36 hours, or 26%. The less-good news is that when oseltamivir was used to prevent household contacts of flu patients from getting the flu themselves, it worked only 8% of the time. Sure that’s better than, say, LMFAO’s odds of ever releasing another hit, but it still means that over 12 kids have to take Tamiflu for just one not to get sick.
That’s not to say that this year’s flu vaccine is perfect, but its estimated efficacy rate of 62% is more in line with the chances that a new chart-topper will be coming from Nicki Minaj, although I might enjoy the flu more. Looked at in the same way as Tamiflu, you only have to vaccinate 1.6 children for each case of flu prevented. I’m hoping that future research will reveal what it will take for my kids to stop playing Nicki Minaj within my earshot, but if not, I have a back-up plan: donate their iPhones to the Livestrong Foundation.
A Capitol idea
Remember when Congress used to do stuff? Like back in 2005, when they authorized $612 million over four years for state departments of transportation to build sidewalks, bicycle lanes and safe crossings, to improve signage, and to undertake “traffic calming” so kids could walk and bike to school without getting hit by cars? They even stayed up late thinking of a cool acronym: the Safe, Accountable, Flexible, Efficient Transportation Equity Act (Get it? Like “safety,” but with more caffeine?) A research team in New York had the bright idea to evaluate the results of this nanny-state, pork-barrel waste of taxpayer money and see if the citizens of the United States got anything in return for being robbed of their freedom to speed in school zones.
To do so, the researchers compared pedestrian injury rates among children in parts of New York that implemented the improvements to those in parts that didn’t fleece hard-working Americans just to stifle drivers’ liberty. And what did we get for squandering people’s tax dollars? Only a 44% reduction in child pedestrian injuries during the hours of travel to and from school. The authors estimate that expanding the program to other school districts could prevent an additional 210 children from being injured by cars each year in New York alone. They do not comment on what sorts of interventions might bring back the 2005 Congress.
Mouths of babes
Perhaps wisdom is to be found among the young. A study performed right here in North Carolina, the tobacco capital of the world, found that more than 80% of middle-schoolers would support a ban on indoor tobacco smoking that would include private homes and cars. High school students were more libertarian in their responses, but still nearly 80% supported smoking bans in homes and workplaces, and 54% wouldn’t even allow smoking in public outdoor spaces like parks! When asked to justify these beliefs, students demonstrated profound insight into the tension between individual liberties and public health. In the words of one interviewee, “IDK, like, IMHO DTRT, UKNWIM?” If only such advice had been available to Lance Armstrong...
David L. Hill, M.D, FAAP, is vice president of Cape Fear Pediatrics in Wilmington, NC and is an adjunct assistant professor of pediatrics at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. He is Program Director for the AAP Council on Communications and Media and an executive committee member of the North Carolina Pediatric Society. He has recorded commentaries for NPR's All Things Considered and provided content for various print, television and Internet outlets. Dr. Hill is the author of Dad to Dad: Parenting Like A Pro (AAP Publishing 2012).
Can I just say on behalf of all of us in our forties, thank you Lance Armstrong for coming clean! How many of us have gone biking only to think, “If Lance Armstrong were here, he would have passed me, circled back, and passed me again just to make sure I hadn’t suffered a heart attack.” But now we know he was doping! This absolves us of everything in life we have failed to accomplish: “Sure, I’d be a star athlete with millions of dollars in endorsements...if I weren’t drug free. Yeah, I could have made it to my son’s piano recital Tuesday, if I were doping!” Next time my wife asks me to take out the trash, I’m gonna say, “Who do I look like, Lance Armstrong? I am 100% clean, Honey. I’ll just put away the dishes.”
The flu bug
Don’t you hate it when you find out your back-up plan isn’t as solid as you thought? Like how, if my practice floundered, I was going to get a full-time job with the Livestrong Foundation? A new evaluation of the effectiveness of oseltamivir (Tamiflu) suggests that it may not be such a great safety net for people who fail to vaccinate their children against influenza.
The meta-analysis from the Cochrane Acute Respiratory Infections Group looked to see how effective drugs like Tamiflu are both in treating and preventing influenza infections in children up to age 12. The good news is that for kids with laboratory-confirmed influenza, oseltamivir cut the median duration of illness by 36 hours, or 26%. The less-good news is that when oseltamivir was used to prevent household contacts of flu patients from getting the flu themselves, it worked only 8% of the time. Sure that’s better than, say, LMFAO’s odds of ever releasing another hit, but it still means that over 12 kids have to take Tamiflu for just one not to get sick.
That’s not to say that this year’s flu vaccine is perfect, but its estimated efficacy rate of 62% is more in line with the chances that a new chart-topper will be coming from Nicki Minaj, although I might enjoy the flu more. Looked at in the same way as Tamiflu, you only have to vaccinate 1.6 children for each case of flu prevented. I’m hoping that future research will reveal what it will take for my kids to stop playing Nicki Minaj within my earshot, but if not, I have a back-up plan: donate their iPhones to the Livestrong Foundation.
A Capitol idea
Remember when Congress used to do stuff? Like back in 2005, when they authorized $612 million over four years for state departments of transportation to build sidewalks, bicycle lanes and safe crossings, to improve signage, and to undertake “traffic calming” so kids could walk and bike to school without getting hit by cars? They even stayed up late thinking of a cool acronym: the Safe, Accountable, Flexible, Efficient Transportation Equity Act (Get it? Like “safety,” but with more caffeine?) A research team in New York had the bright idea to evaluate the results of this nanny-state, pork-barrel waste of taxpayer money and see if the citizens of the United States got anything in return for being robbed of their freedom to speed in school zones.
To do so, the researchers compared pedestrian injury rates among children in parts of New York that implemented the improvements to those in parts that didn’t fleece hard-working Americans just to stifle drivers’ liberty. And what did we get for squandering people’s tax dollars? Only a 44% reduction in child pedestrian injuries during the hours of travel to and from school. The authors estimate that expanding the program to other school districts could prevent an additional 210 children from being injured by cars each year in New York alone. They do not comment on what sorts of interventions might bring back the 2005 Congress.
Mouths of babes
Perhaps wisdom is to be found among the young. A study performed right here in North Carolina, the tobacco capital of the world, found that more than 80% of middle-schoolers would support a ban on indoor tobacco smoking that would include private homes and cars. High school students were more libertarian in their responses, but still nearly 80% supported smoking bans in homes and workplaces, and 54% wouldn’t even allow smoking in public outdoor spaces like parks! When asked to justify these beliefs, students demonstrated profound insight into the tension between individual liberties and public health. In the words of one interviewee, “IDK, like, IMHO DTRT, UKNWIM?” If only such advice had been available to Lance Armstrong...
David L. Hill, M.D, FAAP, is vice president of Cape Fear Pediatrics in Wilmington, NC and is an adjunct assistant professor of pediatrics at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. He is Program Director for the AAP Council on Communications and Media and an executive committee member of the North Carolina Pediatric Society. He has recorded commentaries for NPR's All Things Considered and provided content for various print, television and Internet outlets. Dr. Hill is the author of Dad to Dad: Parenting Like A Pro (AAP Publishing 2012).
Can I just say on behalf of all of us in our forties, thank you Lance Armstrong for coming clean! How many of us have gone biking only to think, “If Lance Armstrong were here, he would have passed me, circled back, and passed me again just to make sure I hadn’t suffered a heart attack.” But now we know he was doping! This absolves us of everything in life we have failed to accomplish: “Sure, I’d be a star athlete with millions of dollars in endorsements...if I weren’t drug free. Yeah, I could have made it to my son’s piano recital Tuesday, if I were doping!” Next time my wife asks me to take out the trash, I’m gonna say, “Who do I look like, Lance Armstrong? I am 100% clean, Honey. I’ll just put away the dishes.”
The flu bug
Don’t you hate it when you find out your back-up plan isn’t as solid as you thought? Like how, if my practice floundered, I was going to get a full-time job with the Livestrong Foundation? A new evaluation of the effectiveness of oseltamivir (Tamiflu) suggests that it may not be such a great safety net for people who fail to vaccinate their children against influenza.
The meta-analysis from the Cochrane Acute Respiratory Infections Group looked to see how effective drugs like Tamiflu are both in treating and preventing influenza infections in children up to age 12. The good news is that for kids with laboratory-confirmed influenza, oseltamivir cut the median duration of illness by 36 hours, or 26%. The less-good news is that when oseltamivir was used to prevent household contacts of flu patients from getting the flu themselves, it worked only 8% of the time. Sure that’s better than, say, LMFAO’s odds of ever releasing another hit, but it still means that over 12 kids have to take Tamiflu for just one not to get sick.
That’s not to say that this year’s flu vaccine is perfect, but its estimated efficacy rate of 62% is more in line with the chances that a new chart-topper will be coming from Nicki Minaj, although I might enjoy the flu more. Looked at in the same way as Tamiflu, you only have to vaccinate 1.6 children for each case of flu prevented. I’m hoping that future research will reveal what it will take for my kids to stop playing Nicki Minaj within my earshot, but if not, I have a back-up plan: donate their iPhones to the Livestrong Foundation.
A Capitol idea
Remember when Congress used to do stuff? Like back in 2005, when they authorized $612 million over four years for state departments of transportation to build sidewalks, bicycle lanes and safe crossings, to improve signage, and to undertake “traffic calming” so kids could walk and bike to school without getting hit by cars? They even stayed up late thinking of a cool acronym: the Safe, Accountable, Flexible, Efficient Transportation Equity Act (Get it? Like “safety,” but with more caffeine?) A research team in New York had the bright idea to evaluate the results of this nanny-state, pork-barrel waste of taxpayer money and see if the citizens of the United States got anything in return for being robbed of their freedom to speed in school zones.
To do so, the researchers compared pedestrian injury rates among children in parts of New York that implemented the improvements to those in parts that didn’t fleece hard-working Americans just to stifle drivers’ liberty. And what did we get for squandering people’s tax dollars? Only a 44% reduction in child pedestrian injuries during the hours of travel to and from school. The authors estimate that expanding the program to other school districts could prevent an additional 210 children from being injured by cars each year in New York alone. They do not comment on what sorts of interventions might bring back the 2005 Congress.
Mouths of babes
Perhaps wisdom is to be found among the young. A study performed right here in North Carolina, the tobacco capital of the world, found that more than 80% of middle-schoolers would support a ban on indoor tobacco smoking that would include private homes and cars. High school students were more libertarian in their responses, but still nearly 80% supported smoking bans in homes and workplaces, and 54% wouldn’t even allow smoking in public outdoor spaces like parks! When asked to justify these beliefs, students demonstrated profound insight into the tension between individual liberties and public health. In the words of one interviewee, “IDK, like, IMHO DTRT, UKNWIM?” If only such advice had been available to Lance Armstrong...
David L. Hill, M.D, FAAP, is vice president of Cape Fear Pediatrics in Wilmington, NC and is an adjunct assistant professor of pediatrics at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. He is Program Director for the AAP Council on Communications and Media and an executive committee member of the North Carolina Pediatric Society. He has recorded commentaries for NPR's All Things Considered and provided content for various print, television and Internet outlets. Dr. Hill is the author of Dad to Dad: Parenting Like A Pro (AAP Publishing 2012).
Joint task force
Many of Justin Bieber’s fans (and their parents) were alarmed this week when celebrity gossip web site TMZ published photographs that appeared to show the young superstar smoking marijuana. Fortunately for those of us whose daughters own the singing Justin Bieber doll (ahem), he immediately took to Twitter and cleared up the whole thing in 140 characters or less: "I see all of u. I hear all of u. I never want to let any of you down. I love u." Then he forgot what he was doing and ate two pizzas while staring at his left hand.
La Vida Loca
In your forties you spend a lot of time thinking, “If only I knew then what I know now.” Like, if a girl doesn’t return your first six messages, the chances that the seventh time is the charm are reasonably low. Like, if there’s one thing better than having a formal living room, it’s having an affordable mortgage. Like, if your infant cries when you put her in her crib to sleep you don’t have to dance with her through an entire Ricky Martin CD. Twice. Don’t judge.
That’s right, sleep-deprived parents who feel guilty letting their infants cry at night can now read this month’s Developmental Psychology and feel better (also, long words and the academic passive voice are known to help babies sleep). In the issue, Temple University psychologist Marsha Weinraub explains how she and her colleagues tracked the sleep patterns of over 1,200 infants up until age 3. What they found was shocking: cyclical awakenings are normal, and they get better over time.
That wasn’t all they discovered. For example, the team found that breast-fed babies really do awaken more frequently at night, at first because breast milk is digested more quickly than formula, later because they may have grown used to falling asleep at the breast, and even later just to gloat at how insanely healthy they are. Weinraub also reports that infants of depressed mothers had a harder time sleeping, but she couldn’t say whether maternal depression interferes with infants’ sleep or fatigued mothers were more likely to experience depression. My personal theory is that depression results from dancing to too much Ricky Martin.
Schoolhouse Doc
The American Academy of Pediatrics Council On School Health released a policy statement this week that everyone agrees is a good idea and that will likely be implemented right after the universal tax on carbon emissions and just before the stringent ban on private sales of assault weapons. Their common-sense suggestion, presented in Pediatrics, is that every school district in the country should have its own pediatric consultant to help oversee the creation and implementation of policies that affect student health. School boards responded with enthusiasm then asked how many pediatricians are also certified in teaching and marksmanship.
To be fair, the Council had already anticipated questions about how strapped school districts might find the money to pay these pediatricians. Answers included increased state funding based on the improved attendance rates schools could expect from healthier children. The council also noted that by having a physician supervise schools’ responses to concussions, seizures, and anaphylaxis, districts might avoid costly litigation, adding under their breath, “if you know what I mean.” Personally, I would do the job for free just so I can finally learn what really happens in the Teachers' Lounge.
Punks’ Music
As a teenager, I always wondered if the kids who listened to heavy metal really were more likely to be delinquents than kids like me, who gravitated more to Lawrence Welk. Now a Dutch research team has answered that question with a definitive “yes.” Using questionnaires and some pretty awesome statistics they determined that kids who preferred more rebellious genres of music at age 12 were more likely to engage in delinquent behavior and drug use at age 16. Implicated genres included rock, heavy metal, gothic, punk, hip-hop, rhythm and blues, trance, and techno/hardhouse. Twelve-year-olds who preferred classical music, jazz, or mainstream pop were less likely to wind up in trouble but more likely to have their lunch money taken, again.
As a parent, I’m left with questions. For one thing, what if my kids prefer genres not represented in the survey? What about country? Adult contemporary? Aquacrunk, brostep, chillwave, dubstep, electrofunk, freakbeat, gamewave, happy hardcore, incidental, jangle pop, k-pop, lounge, merengue, neurofunk, oi, psychobilly, queercore, riot grrrl, skweee, trip-hop, urban folk, volksmusic, worldbeat, xote, yo-pop, or zydeco? Clearly more research is needed. I do take comfort, however, in knowing that my daughter is probably not a delinquent as long as she continues to love Justin Bieber. But there’s no way I’m letting them hang out.
David L. Hill, M.D, FAAP, is vice president of Cape Fear Pediatrics in Wilmington, NC and is an adjunct assistant professor of pediatrics at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. He is Program Director for the AAP Council on Communications and Media and an executive committee member of the North Carolina Pediatric Society. He has recorded commentaries for NPR's All Things Considered and provided content for various print, television and Internet outlets. Dr. Hill is the author of Dad to Dad: Parenting Like A Pro (AAP Publishing 2012).
Many of Justin Bieber’s fans (and their parents) were alarmed this week when celebrity gossip web site TMZ published photographs that appeared to show the young superstar smoking marijuana. Fortunately for those of us whose daughters own the singing Justin Bieber doll (ahem), he immediately took to Twitter and cleared up the whole thing in 140 characters or less: "I see all of u. I hear all of u. I never want to let any of you down. I love u." Then he forgot what he was doing and ate two pizzas while staring at his left hand.
La Vida Loca
In your forties you spend a lot of time thinking, “If only I knew then what I know now.” Like, if a girl doesn’t return your first six messages, the chances that the seventh time is the charm are reasonably low. Like, if there’s one thing better than having a formal living room, it’s having an affordable mortgage. Like, if your infant cries when you put her in her crib to sleep you don’t have to dance with her through an entire Ricky Martin CD. Twice. Don’t judge.
That’s right, sleep-deprived parents who feel guilty letting their infants cry at night can now read this month’s Developmental Psychology and feel better (also, long words and the academic passive voice are known to help babies sleep). In the issue, Temple University psychologist Marsha Weinraub explains how she and her colleagues tracked the sleep patterns of over 1,200 infants up until age 3. What they found was shocking: cyclical awakenings are normal, and they get better over time.
That wasn’t all they discovered. For example, the team found that breast-fed babies really do awaken more frequently at night, at first because breast milk is digested more quickly than formula, later because they may have grown used to falling asleep at the breast, and even later just to gloat at how insanely healthy they are. Weinraub also reports that infants of depressed mothers had a harder time sleeping, but she couldn’t say whether maternal depression interferes with infants’ sleep or fatigued mothers were more likely to experience depression. My personal theory is that depression results from dancing to too much Ricky Martin.
Schoolhouse Doc
The American Academy of Pediatrics Council On School Health released a policy statement this week that everyone agrees is a good idea and that will likely be implemented right after the universal tax on carbon emissions and just before the stringent ban on private sales of assault weapons. Their common-sense suggestion, presented in Pediatrics, is that every school district in the country should have its own pediatric consultant to help oversee the creation and implementation of policies that affect student health. School boards responded with enthusiasm then asked how many pediatricians are also certified in teaching and marksmanship.
To be fair, the Council had already anticipated questions about how strapped school districts might find the money to pay these pediatricians. Answers included increased state funding based on the improved attendance rates schools could expect from healthier children. The council also noted that by having a physician supervise schools’ responses to concussions, seizures, and anaphylaxis, districts might avoid costly litigation, adding under their breath, “if you know what I mean.” Personally, I would do the job for free just so I can finally learn what really happens in the Teachers' Lounge.
Punks’ Music
As a teenager, I always wondered if the kids who listened to heavy metal really were more likely to be delinquents than kids like me, who gravitated more to Lawrence Welk. Now a Dutch research team has answered that question with a definitive “yes.” Using questionnaires and some pretty awesome statistics they determined that kids who preferred more rebellious genres of music at age 12 were more likely to engage in delinquent behavior and drug use at age 16. Implicated genres included rock, heavy metal, gothic, punk, hip-hop, rhythm and blues, trance, and techno/hardhouse. Twelve-year-olds who preferred classical music, jazz, or mainstream pop were less likely to wind up in trouble but more likely to have their lunch money taken, again.
As a parent, I’m left with questions. For one thing, what if my kids prefer genres not represented in the survey? What about country? Adult contemporary? Aquacrunk, brostep, chillwave, dubstep, electrofunk, freakbeat, gamewave, happy hardcore, incidental, jangle pop, k-pop, lounge, merengue, neurofunk, oi, psychobilly, queercore, riot grrrl, skweee, trip-hop, urban folk, volksmusic, worldbeat, xote, yo-pop, or zydeco? Clearly more research is needed. I do take comfort, however, in knowing that my daughter is probably not a delinquent as long as she continues to love Justin Bieber. But there’s no way I’m letting them hang out.
David L. Hill, M.D, FAAP, is vice president of Cape Fear Pediatrics in Wilmington, NC and is an adjunct assistant professor of pediatrics at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. He is Program Director for the AAP Council on Communications and Media and an executive committee member of the North Carolina Pediatric Society. He has recorded commentaries for NPR's All Things Considered and provided content for various print, television and Internet outlets. Dr. Hill is the author of Dad to Dad: Parenting Like A Pro (AAP Publishing 2012).
Many of Justin Bieber’s fans (and their parents) were alarmed this week when celebrity gossip web site TMZ published photographs that appeared to show the young superstar smoking marijuana. Fortunately for those of us whose daughters own the singing Justin Bieber doll (ahem), he immediately took to Twitter and cleared up the whole thing in 140 characters or less: "I see all of u. I hear all of u. I never want to let any of you down. I love u." Then he forgot what he was doing and ate two pizzas while staring at his left hand.
La Vida Loca
In your forties you spend a lot of time thinking, “If only I knew then what I know now.” Like, if a girl doesn’t return your first six messages, the chances that the seventh time is the charm are reasonably low. Like, if there’s one thing better than having a formal living room, it’s having an affordable mortgage. Like, if your infant cries when you put her in her crib to sleep you don’t have to dance with her through an entire Ricky Martin CD. Twice. Don’t judge.
That’s right, sleep-deprived parents who feel guilty letting their infants cry at night can now read this month’s Developmental Psychology and feel better (also, long words and the academic passive voice are known to help babies sleep). In the issue, Temple University psychologist Marsha Weinraub explains how she and her colleagues tracked the sleep patterns of over 1,200 infants up until age 3. What they found was shocking: cyclical awakenings are normal, and they get better over time.
That wasn’t all they discovered. For example, the team found that breast-fed babies really do awaken more frequently at night, at first because breast milk is digested more quickly than formula, later because they may have grown used to falling asleep at the breast, and even later just to gloat at how insanely healthy they are. Weinraub also reports that infants of depressed mothers had a harder time sleeping, but she couldn’t say whether maternal depression interferes with infants’ sleep or fatigued mothers were more likely to experience depression. My personal theory is that depression results from dancing to too much Ricky Martin.
Schoolhouse Doc
The American Academy of Pediatrics Council On School Health released a policy statement this week that everyone agrees is a good idea and that will likely be implemented right after the universal tax on carbon emissions and just before the stringent ban on private sales of assault weapons. Their common-sense suggestion, presented in Pediatrics, is that every school district in the country should have its own pediatric consultant to help oversee the creation and implementation of policies that affect student health. School boards responded with enthusiasm then asked how many pediatricians are also certified in teaching and marksmanship.
To be fair, the Council had already anticipated questions about how strapped school districts might find the money to pay these pediatricians. Answers included increased state funding based on the improved attendance rates schools could expect from healthier children. The council also noted that by having a physician supervise schools’ responses to concussions, seizures, and anaphylaxis, districts might avoid costly litigation, adding under their breath, “if you know what I mean.” Personally, I would do the job for free just so I can finally learn what really happens in the Teachers' Lounge.
Punks’ Music
As a teenager, I always wondered if the kids who listened to heavy metal really were more likely to be delinquents than kids like me, who gravitated more to Lawrence Welk. Now a Dutch research team has answered that question with a definitive “yes.” Using questionnaires and some pretty awesome statistics they determined that kids who preferred more rebellious genres of music at age 12 were more likely to engage in delinquent behavior and drug use at age 16. Implicated genres included rock, heavy metal, gothic, punk, hip-hop, rhythm and blues, trance, and techno/hardhouse. Twelve-year-olds who preferred classical music, jazz, or mainstream pop were less likely to wind up in trouble but more likely to have their lunch money taken, again.
As a parent, I’m left with questions. For one thing, what if my kids prefer genres not represented in the survey? What about country? Adult contemporary? Aquacrunk, brostep, chillwave, dubstep, electrofunk, freakbeat, gamewave, happy hardcore, incidental, jangle pop, k-pop, lounge, merengue, neurofunk, oi, psychobilly, queercore, riot grrrl, skweee, trip-hop, urban folk, volksmusic, worldbeat, xote, yo-pop, or zydeco? Clearly more research is needed. I do take comfort, however, in knowing that my daughter is probably not a delinquent as long as she continues to love Justin Bieber. But there’s no way I’m letting them hang out.
David L. Hill, M.D, FAAP, is vice president of Cape Fear Pediatrics in Wilmington, NC and is an adjunct assistant professor of pediatrics at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. He is Program Director for the AAP Council on Communications and Media and an executive committee member of the North Carolina Pediatric Society. He has recorded commentaries for NPR's All Things Considered and provided content for various print, television and Internet outlets. Dr. Hill is the author of Dad to Dad: Parenting Like A Pro (AAP Publishing 2012).
A Week Economy
At this point we’ve all survived Black Friday, Small Business Saturday, Cyber-Monday, and Giving Tuesday (unless you didn’t survive, in which case, condolences). Since Thanksgiving already has dibs on Thursday, time is running out to name the two remaining days of the week. Before someone else gets to it, I’m proposing My-Gosh-I’m-Already-Broke Sunday and Can-We-All-Just-Get-Some-Work-Done-Wednesday. Oh, and don’t think of stealing those ideas. I made good use of Copyright-Registration Leap Day.
Void Where Prohibited
Don’t you hate it when you buy a product based on hype, and then it doesn’t do what you thought, like that time I shelled out $9.95 for a Smart Money Clip, and after a week my bills still couldn’t answer even the simplest question? Apparently the folks over at the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) hate it too, especially when the product claims to save lives but actually does the opposite. Last week, rather than asking for a full refund (the free gift is yours to keep), the CDC joined the Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) in publishing a study of 13 cases in which infant sleep positioners (ISP’s) contributed to infant suffocation. You might imagine that retailers rushed to stop selling the positioners after the last CDC warning two years ago. If you believe that, can I interest you in a Smart Money Clip?
This time around the CDC is calling in its big brother, the Food And Drug Administration (FDA). The FDA folks are also peeved; they have actually approved a handful of ISP’s for the management of specific conditions such as GERD and plagiocephaly. But many of the un-licensed ISP’s on the market carry claims about preventing Sudden Infant Death Syndrome, improving overall health, and enhancing sleep comfort. Before you get all up in the FDA’s face talking smack that you can’t back up, you’d better go ask the infant decongestant people how that went for them. I think I know how this showdown is going to turn out. If you don’t believe me, just ask my money. It’s brilliant.
Bébé Sans Vin
I admit it: I’m one of those Americans who think that if the French do something, it’s probably better. French fries, French braids, The French Laundry, I just wish we had that stuff here in the States! But now a new study out of, where else, England, casts doubt on the very French idea that moderate alcohol intake during pregnancy is harmless for babies. The British researchers figured out a clever way to control for the problem that moderate maternal drinkers are more likely to be better educated and from a higher social class (in other words, more French) than heavier drinkers or teetotalers: they used genetics.
I was taken aback by their definition of “moderate” drinking. At less than six glasses of wine a week, the investigators set the bar at what we here in the South call “just getting started.” Even at that low level, it turned out that mothers who metabolized alcohol faster had smarter babies than those whose sluggish livers exposed their fetuses to higher peak blood alcohol levels. My hope is that one of our brilliant alcohol-free American babies will one day invent a food that is superior to French Toast. I would totally drink to that.
The Girl Who Kicked Methylphenidate
A large Swedish study suggests that investing more money in treating adult ADHD could save a lot on expenditures for law enforcement and incarceration. Researchers at the Karolinska Institute, looking for a way to pass the long, sunless winter, decided to track the criminal behavior of over 25,000 Swedish adults who had been diagnosed with ADHD. Their task was complicated by the fact that all crime in Sweden is conducted by ultra-wealthy, secretive families living on isolated estates. Nevertheless, they found that men who continued taking stimulants for ADHD were 32% less likely to commit crimes than those who stopped their meds; for women the number was an even more astonishing 42%. Researchers failed to comment on how many of their female subjects were psychologically scarred, heavily tattooed vigilantes, but I can only assume it’s 100%, and, meds or none, I wouldn’t mess with her, and neither would my money.
David L. Hill, M.D, FAAP, is vice president of Cape Fear Pediatrics in Wilmington, NC and is an adjunct assistant professor of pediatrics at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. He is Program Director for the AAP Council on Communications and Media and an executive committee member of the North Carolina Pediatric Society. He has recorded commentaries for NPR's All Things Considered and provided content for various print, television and Internet outlets. Dr. Hill is the author of Dad to Dad: Parenting Like A Pro (AAP Publishing 2012).
At this point we’ve all survived Black Friday, Small Business Saturday, Cyber-Monday, and Giving Tuesday (unless you didn’t survive, in which case, condolences). Since Thanksgiving already has dibs on Thursday, time is running out to name the two remaining days of the week. Before someone else gets to it, I’m proposing My-Gosh-I’m-Already-Broke Sunday and Can-We-All-Just-Get-Some-Work-Done-Wednesday. Oh, and don’t think of stealing those ideas. I made good use of Copyright-Registration Leap Day.
Void Where Prohibited
Don’t you hate it when you buy a product based on hype, and then it doesn’t do what you thought, like that time I shelled out $9.95 for a Smart Money Clip, and after a week my bills still couldn’t answer even the simplest question? Apparently the folks over at the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) hate it too, especially when the product claims to save lives but actually does the opposite. Last week, rather than asking for a full refund (the free gift is yours to keep), the CDC joined the Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) in publishing a study of 13 cases in which infant sleep positioners (ISP’s) contributed to infant suffocation. You might imagine that retailers rushed to stop selling the positioners after the last CDC warning two years ago. If you believe that, can I interest you in a Smart Money Clip?
This time around the CDC is calling in its big brother, the Food And Drug Administration (FDA). The FDA folks are also peeved; they have actually approved a handful of ISP’s for the management of specific conditions such as GERD and plagiocephaly. But many of the un-licensed ISP’s on the market carry claims about preventing Sudden Infant Death Syndrome, improving overall health, and enhancing sleep comfort. Before you get all up in the FDA’s face talking smack that you can’t back up, you’d better go ask the infant decongestant people how that went for them. I think I know how this showdown is going to turn out. If you don’t believe me, just ask my money. It’s brilliant.
Bébé Sans Vin
I admit it: I’m one of those Americans who think that if the French do something, it’s probably better. French fries, French braids, The French Laundry, I just wish we had that stuff here in the States! But now a new study out of, where else, England, casts doubt on the very French idea that moderate alcohol intake during pregnancy is harmless for babies. The British researchers figured out a clever way to control for the problem that moderate maternal drinkers are more likely to be better educated and from a higher social class (in other words, more French) than heavier drinkers or teetotalers: they used genetics.
I was taken aback by their definition of “moderate” drinking. At less than six glasses of wine a week, the investigators set the bar at what we here in the South call “just getting started.” Even at that low level, it turned out that mothers who metabolized alcohol faster had smarter babies than those whose sluggish livers exposed their fetuses to higher peak blood alcohol levels. My hope is that one of our brilliant alcohol-free American babies will one day invent a food that is superior to French Toast. I would totally drink to that.
The Girl Who Kicked Methylphenidate
A large Swedish study suggests that investing more money in treating adult ADHD could save a lot on expenditures for law enforcement and incarceration. Researchers at the Karolinska Institute, looking for a way to pass the long, sunless winter, decided to track the criminal behavior of over 25,000 Swedish adults who had been diagnosed with ADHD. Their task was complicated by the fact that all crime in Sweden is conducted by ultra-wealthy, secretive families living on isolated estates. Nevertheless, they found that men who continued taking stimulants for ADHD were 32% less likely to commit crimes than those who stopped their meds; for women the number was an even more astonishing 42%. Researchers failed to comment on how many of their female subjects were psychologically scarred, heavily tattooed vigilantes, but I can only assume it’s 100%, and, meds or none, I wouldn’t mess with her, and neither would my money.
David L. Hill, M.D, FAAP, is vice president of Cape Fear Pediatrics in Wilmington, NC and is an adjunct assistant professor of pediatrics at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. He is Program Director for the AAP Council on Communications and Media and an executive committee member of the North Carolina Pediatric Society. He has recorded commentaries for NPR's All Things Considered and provided content for various print, television and Internet outlets. Dr. Hill is the author of Dad to Dad: Parenting Like A Pro (AAP Publishing 2012).
At this point we’ve all survived Black Friday, Small Business Saturday, Cyber-Monday, and Giving Tuesday (unless you didn’t survive, in which case, condolences). Since Thanksgiving already has dibs on Thursday, time is running out to name the two remaining days of the week. Before someone else gets to it, I’m proposing My-Gosh-I’m-Already-Broke Sunday and Can-We-All-Just-Get-Some-Work-Done-Wednesday. Oh, and don’t think of stealing those ideas. I made good use of Copyright-Registration Leap Day.
Void Where Prohibited
Don’t you hate it when you buy a product based on hype, and then it doesn’t do what you thought, like that time I shelled out $9.95 for a Smart Money Clip, and after a week my bills still couldn’t answer even the simplest question? Apparently the folks over at the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) hate it too, especially when the product claims to save lives but actually does the opposite. Last week, rather than asking for a full refund (the free gift is yours to keep), the CDC joined the Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) in publishing a study of 13 cases in which infant sleep positioners (ISP’s) contributed to infant suffocation. You might imagine that retailers rushed to stop selling the positioners after the last CDC warning two years ago. If you believe that, can I interest you in a Smart Money Clip?
This time around the CDC is calling in its big brother, the Food And Drug Administration (FDA). The FDA folks are also peeved; they have actually approved a handful of ISP’s for the management of specific conditions such as GERD and plagiocephaly. But many of the un-licensed ISP’s on the market carry claims about preventing Sudden Infant Death Syndrome, improving overall health, and enhancing sleep comfort. Before you get all up in the FDA’s face talking smack that you can’t back up, you’d better go ask the infant decongestant people how that went for them. I think I know how this showdown is going to turn out. If you don’t believe me, just ask my money. It’s brilliant.
Bébé Sans Vin
I admit it: I’m one of those Americans who think that if the French do something, it’s probably better. French fries, French braids, The French Laundry, I just wish we had that stuff here in the States! But now a new study out of, where else, England, casts doubt on the very French idea that moderate alcohol intake during pregnancy is harmless for babies. The British researchers figured out a clever way to control for the problem that moderate maternal drinkers are more likely to be better educated and from a higher social class (in other words, more French) than heavier drinkers or teetotalers: they used genetics.
I was taken aback by their definition of “moderate” drinking. At less than six glasses of wine a week, the investigators set the bar at what we here in the South call “just getting started.” Even at that low level, it turned out that mothers who metabolized alcohol faster had smarter babies than those whose sluggish livers exposed their fetuses to higher peak blood alcohol levels. My hope is that one of our brilliant alcohol-free American babies will one day invent a food that is superior to French Toast. I would totally drink to that.
The Girl Who Kicked Methylphenidate
A large Swedish study suggests that investing more money in treating adult ADHD could save a lot on expenditures for law enforcement and incarceration. Researchers at the Karolinska Institute, looking for a way to pass the long, sunless winter, decided to track the criminal behavior of over 25,000 Swedish adults who had been diagnosed with ADHD. Their task was complicated by the fact that all crime in Sweden is conducted by ultra-wealthy, secretive families living on isolated estates. Nevertheless, they found that men who continued taking stimulants for ADHD were 32% less likely to commit crimes than those who stopped their meds; for women the number was an even more astonishing 42%. Researchers failed to comment on how many of their female subjects were psychologically scarred, heavily tattooed vigilantes, but I can only assume it’s 100%, and, meds or none, I wouldn’t mess with her, and neither would my money.
David L. Hill, M.D, FAAP, is vice president of Cape Fear Pediatrics in Wilmington, NC and is an adjunct assistant professor of pediatrics at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. He is Program Director for the AAP Council on Communications and Media and an executive committee member of the North Carolina Pediatric Society. He has recorded commentaries for NPR's All Things Considered and provided content for various print, television and Internet outlets. Dr. Hill is the author of Dad to Dad: Parenting Like A Pro (AAP Publishing 2012).
Boyfriend
As soon as I saw the look of horror mixed with hope on my 13-year-old daughter’s face last weekend I knew what must have happened: Justin Bieber and Selena Gomez have called it quits. According to reliable innuendo, the pop megastars have ended their two-year relationship, leaving the editors of Tiger Beat magazine scrambling for meaningful content.
The couple are being coy about the reasons behind their split, although their age difference can’t help in this May-later-May romance: Bieber has three years until, like Gomez, he can legally drink. As for what a Bieber-Gomez wedding might have looked like, now we can only “dream out loud” (I know that doesn’t make any sense, but it is the name of Selina Gomez’s new signature fashion line for K-mart). Saddest, I think, is that the two jejeune celebrities will never know the sort of wedded bliss enjoyed by Richard Burton and Elizabeth Taylor, Jennifer Lopez and Marc Anthony, or Britney Spears and Kevin Federline.
Smørrebrød
Have you ever found that something you thought was a problem was actually a solution, like how you’re having a hard time finding clothes for a date, and then you get dumped? New research on autism spectrum disorders (ASD) suggests that vaccines, repeatedly accused of causing ASD, may actually play a role in preventing them. The study, which looked at nearly 100,000 Danish mother-infant pairs, found a strong association between maternal influenza infections during pregnancy and children’s subsequent development of autism. Additional risk factors included prolonged maternal fever and maternal antibiotic use. Researchers had also hoped to measure the effect of maternal pickled herring consumption, but they were unable to find a control group.
While this study joins a growing body of evidence suggesting that maternal inflammation plays a role in the development of autism, the report still only proves correlation and not causation, yada, yada, whatever. Dr. Coleen Boyle, director of the National Center on Birth Defects and Developmental Disabilities with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, was quick to point out in an interview that most infants whose mothers contract flu during pregnancy don’t develop autism, after which she reiterated the CDC’s recommendation that pregnant women be vaccinated against influenza. While I understand that this is just one intriguing study, I like to dream out loud of the day we confirm that, at least in some cases, autism is actually a vaccine-preventable disease. In my dream, I’m standing next to Jenny McCarthy.
Getting Your Bell Rung
A new study from the Children’s Hospital of Pennsylvania (CHOP) surveyed pediatricians and pediatric emergency medicine docs within the CHOP Care Network about their comfort levels with managing concussions. The conclusion: if you have a child in Philadelphia, ensure she wears a helmet at all times. The highlights: 30% of primary care providers and 68% of emergency providers felt their practice settings were “not always appropriate for management of concussions...”. So where then should I go if my child has a head injury in Philadelphia, Independence Hall? Maybe this explains why Sylvester Stallone talks that way.
Other highlights: 83% of emergency providers were likely to refer a patient with suspected concussion to a trauma surgeon. Because nothing helps the injured brain recover like a splenectomy. Of providers who reported they lacked access to concussion decision support tools, 96% believed having such tools would be helpful; presumably the other 4% would just ask a trauma surgeon what to do. Of course the fundamental problem here is that managing concussions properly requires a comprehensive evaluation of neurological function, which takes well over the 10 minutes allotted each patient in most urgent care settings. That’s why I propose a solution everyone in Philly can embrace: print copies of a do-it-yourself Sport Concussion Assessment Tool on cheesesteak wrappers.
Hive Of Fashion
As the gap between the wealthy and the rest of us yawns ever wider, the rich keep finding more exotic status symbols. According to a new study presented at the annual scientific meeting of the American College of Allergy, Asthma, and Immunology the new it-bag might just be...an EpiPen. That’s right, peanut allergies are the latest marker of wealth, a trend that supports the hygiene hypothesis: kids who are not exposed to enough dirt and natural infections are more likely to suffer allergic disease. And nothing wipes away dirt like full-time domestic help. How long can it be until street vendors are hawking imported knock-off Medic Alert bracelets? I admit it may not come to pass, but hey, a guy can always dream out loud.
As soon as I saw the look of horror mixed with hope on my 13-year-old daughter’s face last weekend I knew what must have happened: Justin Bieber and Selena Gomez have called it quits. According to reliable innuendo, the pop megastars have ended their two-year relationship, leaving the editors of Tiger Beat magazine scrambling for meaningful content.
The couple are being coy about the reasons behind their split, although their age difference can’t help in this May-later-May romance: Bieber has three years until, like Gomez, he can legally drink. As for what a Bieber-Gomez wedding might have looked like, now we can only “dream out loud” (I know that doesn’t make any sense, but it is the name of Selina Gomez’s new signature fashion line for K-mart). Saddest, I think, is that the two jejeune celebrities will never know the sort of wedded bliss enjoyed by Richard Burton and Elizabeth Taylor, Jennifer Lopez and Marc Anthony, or Britney Spears and Kevin Federline.
Smørrebrød
Have you ever found that something you thought was a problem was actually a solution, like how you’re having a hard time finding clothes for a date, and then you get dumped? New research on autism spectrum disorders (ASD) suggests that vaccines, repeatedly accused of causing ASD, may actually play a role in preventing them. The study, which looked at nearly 100,000 Danish mother-infant pairs, found a strong association between maternal influenza infections during pregnancy and children’s subsequent development of autism. Additional risk factors included prolonged maternal fever and maternal antibiotic use. Researchers had also hoped to measure the effect of maternal pickled herring consumption, but they were unable to find a control group.
While this study joins a growing body of evidence suggesting that maternal inflammation plays a role in the development of autism, the report still only proves correlation and not causation, yada, yada, whatever. Dr. Coleen Boyle, director of the National Center on Birth Defects and Developmental Disabilities with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, was quick to point out in an interview that most infants whose mothers contract flu during pregnancy don’t develop autism, after which she reiterated the CDC’s recommendation that pregnant women be vaccinated against influenza. While I understand that this is just one intriguing study, I like to dream out loud of the day we confirm that, at least in some cases, autism is actually a vaccine-preventable disease. In my dream, I’m standing next to Jenny McCarthy.
Getting Your Bell Rung
A new study from the Children’s Hospital of Pennsylvania (CHOP) surveyed pediatricians and pediatric emergency medicine docs within the CHOP Care Network about their comfort levels with managing concussions. The conclusion: if you have a child in Philadelphia, ensure she wears a helmet at all times. The highlights: 30% of primary care providers and 68% of emergency providers felt their practice settings were “not always appropriate for management of concussions...”. So where then should I go if my child has a head injury in Philadelphia, Independence Hall? Maybe this explains why Sylvester Stallone talks that way.
Other highlights: 83% of emergency providers were likely to refer a patient with suspected concussion to a trauma surgeon. Because nothing helps the injured brain recover like a splenectomy. Of providers who reported they lacked access to concussion decision support tools, 96% believed having such tools would be helpful; presumably the other 4% would just ask a trauma surgeon what to do. Of course the fundamental problem here is that managing concussions properly requires a comprehensive evaluation of neurological function, which takes well over the 10 minutes allotted each patient in most urgent care settings. That’s why I propose a solution everyone in Philly can embrace: print copies of a do-it-yourself Sport Concussion Assessment Tool on cheesesteak wrappers.
Hive Of Fashion
As the gap between the wealthy and the rest of us yawns ever wider, the rich keep finding more exotic status symbols. According to a new study presented at the annual scientific meeting of the American College of Allergy, Asthma, and Immunology the new it-bag might just be...an EpiPen. That’s right, peanut allergies are the latest marker of wealth, a trend that supports the hygiene hypothesis: kids who are not exposed to enough dirt and natural infections are more likely to suffer allergic disease. And nothing wipes away dirt like full-time domestic help. How long can it be until street vendors are hawking imported knock-off Medic Alert bracelets? I admit it may not come to pass, but hey, a guy can always dream out loud.
As soon as I saw the look of horror mixed with hope on my 13-year-old daughter’s face last weekend I knew what must have happened: Justin Bieber and Selena Gomez have called it quits. According to reliable innuendo, the pop megastars have ended their two-year relationship, leaving the editors of Tiger Beat magazine scrambling for meaningful content.
The couple are being coy about the reasons behind their split, although their age difference can’t help in this May-later-May romance: Bieber has three years until, like Gomez, he can legally drink. As for what a Bieber-Gomez wedding might have looked like, now we can only “dream out loud” (I know that doesn’t make any sense, but it is the name of Selina Gomez’s new signature fashion line for K-mart). Saddest, I think, is that the two jejeune celebrities will never know the sort of wedded bliss enjoyed by Richard Burton and Elizabeth Taylor, Jennifer Lopez and Marc Anthony, or Britney Spears and Kevin Federline.
Smørrebrød
Have you ever found that something you thought was a problem was actually a solution, like how you’re having a hard time finding clothes for a date, and then you get dumped? New research on autism spectrum disorders (ASD) suggests that vaccines, repeatedly accused of causing ASD, may actually play a role in preventing them. The study, which looked at nearly 100,000 Danish mother-infant pairs, found a strong association between maternal influenza infections during pregnancy and children’s subsequent development of autism. Additional risk factors included prolonged maternal fever and maternal antibiotic use. Researchers had also hoped to measure the effect of maternal pickled herring consumption, but they were unable to find a control group.
While this study joins a growing body of evidence suggesting that maternal inflammation plays a role in the development of autism, the report still only proves correlation and not causation, yada, yada, whatever. Dr. Coleen Boyle, director of the National Center on Birth Defects and Developmental Disabilities with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, was quick to point out in an interview that most infants whose mothers contract flu during pregnancy don’t develop autism, after which she reiterated the CDC’s recommendation that pregnant women be vaccinated against influenza. While I understand that this is just one intriguing study, I like to dream out loud of the day we confirm that, at least in some cases, autism is actually a vaccine-preventable disease. In my dream, I’m standing next to Jenny McCarthy.
Getting Your Bell Rung
A new study from the Children’s Hospital of Pennsylvania (CHOP) surveyed pediatricians and pediatric emergency medicine docs within the CHOP Care Network about their comfort levels with managing concussions. The conclusion: if you have a child in Philadelphia, ensure she wears a helmet at all times. The highlights: 30% of primary care providers and 68% of emergency providers felt their practice settings were “not always appropriate for management of concussions...”. So where then should I go if my child has a head injury in Philadelphia, Independence Hall? Maybe this explains why Sylvester Stallone talks that way.
Other highlights: 83% of emergency providers were likely to refer a patient with suspected concussion to a trauma surgeon. Because nothing helps the injured brain recover like a splenectomy. Of providers who reported they lacked access to concussion decision support tools, 96% believed having such tools would be helpful; presumably the other 4% would just ask a trauma surgeon what to do. Of course the fundamental problem here is that managing concussions properly requires a comprehensive evaluation of neurological function, which takes well over the 10 minutes allotted each patient in most urgent care settings. That’s why I propose a solution everyone in Philly can embrace: print copies of a do-it-yourself Sport Concussion Assessment Tool on cheesesteak wrappers.
Hive Of Fashion
As the gap between the wealthy and the rest of us yawns ever wider, the rich keep finding more exotic status symbols. According to a new study presented at the annual scientific meeting of the American College of Allergy, Asthma, and Immunology the new it-bag might just be...an EpiPen. That’s right, peanut allergies are the latest marker of wealth, a trend that supports the hygiene hypothesis: kids who are not exposed to enough dirt and natural infections are more likely to suffer allergic disease. And nothing wipes away dirt like full-time domestic help. How long can it be until street vendors are hawking imported knock-off Medic Alert bracelets? I admit it may not come to pass, but hey, a guy can always dream out loud.
Gym, Tan, Laundry
Hurricane Sandy wreaked havoc on the Jersey shore, including a key setting of the popular MTV series Jersey Shore, the Seaside Heights Boardwalk (now re-named the Seaside Heights Planks-Floating-At-Sea). Hardcore fans, however, should not despair. Not only has MTV already planned a benefit show to help rebuild Seaside Heights, but breakout star “Snooki” (Nicole Polizzi) has tweeted that she is cleaning out her closet to donate clothes to the relief effort. Having seen what she wears on the show, I can only imagine her leopard-print tank tops and micro-minis providing warmth for scores of grateful preschoolers.
Northern Exposure
As a member of the AAP’s Council On Communications And The Media, I was excited to see a paper this week examining the effects of an intervention to help Canadian families reduce preschoolers’ screen time. Spoiler alert: it didn’t work. It wasn’t for lack of an elegant hypothesis: a short behavioral counseling session focusing on reducing screen time, especially TV-watching during meals, should lead kids to watch less TV, and we know from previous research that those kids’ diets would then improve and their BMI’s would fall, after which fairies should fly out of my left ear. As it turned out, none of that happened, unless fairies are orange and gooey.
What did happen was that kids in the intervention group ended up eating fewer meals in front of the television, down from two a day to 1.6 (and remember, this was in Canada, where televised sports include curling). Total hours of television watched per child did not fall, nor did the percentage of children with televisions in their bedrooms. Kids’ BMIs also didn’t budge, although is anyone really surprised in the country that perfected the art of bacon? Asked to comment on the fact that I appear to be wasting hours every week counseling families on media use, University at Albany - SUNY, media expert Dayna M. Maniccia, DrPH responded, "The new study is great because it means that people are looking at this and pediatricians are taking it seriously." Yes, I am seriously considering giving up.
Finger Lickin’ Finger Pointing
While counseling doesn’t seem to change families’ unhealthy eating habits, parents are at least willing to take the blame, according to a new study from Yale’s Rudd Center for Food Policy and Obesity. According to their most recent annual survey, parents feel that 60% of America’s childhood obesity problem rests squarely in their laps. Parents admitted to giving in to their kids’ requests too often and to not always being great dietary role models themselves. Researchers concurred, noting that many of the returned surveys had to be processed by hand on account of grease stains.
As for the other 40% of the blame, parents cited the costs of healthy food, ease of access to unhealthy foods in schools, and that hellishly catchy “Doo-doo-doo-dee-doo, I’m lovin’ it,” jingle. The Rudd Center has been especially critical of the insidious ways corporations market unhealthy foods to vulnerable children, but industry spokesperson Elaine Kalish responded in an interview, “Food marketing to children isn’t exactly the foremost thing on parents' minds,” possibly adding under her breath, “and that’s just the way we like it.”
Say It...
Epidemiologists publishing in the New England Journal of Medicine have determined that while mumps vaccine is highly effective, its protection can be overwhelmed if someone spits in your face for hours. That, at least, appears to be the upshot of their analysis of a mumps outbreak occurring in Orthodox Jewish communities in New York and New Jersey in 2009 and 2010. The researchers blamed the outbreak on the practice peculiar to yeshivas of chavrusa study, in which two partners sit face-to-face engaging in often impassioned theological debate. A related article in Pediatrics suggests that a third dose of mumps vaccine could provide protection against even intense exposures, but until then you might take a good long look at your Uncle Walter’s cheeks before getting him started on politics this Thanksgiving. Alternately, if you can get to the Jersey Shore, you might be able to cover your nose and mouth with one of Snooki’s dresses.
David L. Hill, M.D, FAAP, is vice president of Cape Fear Pediatrics in Wilmington, NC and is an adjunct assistant professor of pediatrics at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. He is Program Director for the AAP Council on Communications and Media and an executive committee member of the North Carolina Pediatric Society. He has recorded commentaries for NPR's All Things Considered and provided content for various print, television and Internet outlets. Dr. Hill is the author of Dad to Dad: Parenting Like A Pro (AAP Publishing 2012).
Hurricane Sandy wreaked havoc on the Jersey shore, including a key setting of the popular MTV series Jersey Shore, the Seaside Heights Boardwalk (now re-named the Seaside Heights Planks-Floating-At-Sea). Hardcore fans, however, should not despair. Not only has MTV already planned a benefit show to help rebuild Seaside Heights, but breakout star “Snooki” (Nicole Polizzi) has tweeted that she is cleaning out her closet to donate clothes to the relief effort. Having seen what she wears on the show, I can only imagine her leopard-print tank tops and micro-minis providing warmth for scores of grateful preschoolers.
Northern Exposure
As a member of the AAP’s Council On Communications And The Media, I was excited to see a paper this week examining the effects of an intervention to help Canadian families reduce preschoolers’ screen time. Spoiler alert: it didn’t work. It wasn’t for lack of an elegant hypothesis: a short behavioral counseling session focusing on reducing screen time, especially TV-watching during meals, should lead kids to watch less TV, and we know from previous research that those kids’ diets would then improve and their BMI’s would fall, after which fairies should fly out of my left ear. As it turned out, none of that happened, unless fairies are orange and gooey.
What did happen was that kids in the intervention group ended up eating fewer meals in front of the television, down from two a day to 1.6 (and remember, this was in Canada, where televised sports include curling). Total hours of television watched per child did not fall, nor did the percentage of children with televisions in their bedrooms. Kids’ BMIs also didn’t budge, although is anyone really surprised in the country that perfected the art of bacon? Asked to comment on the fact that I appear to be wasting hours every week counseling families on media use, University at Albany - SUNY, media expert Dayna M. Maniccia, DrPH responded, "The new study is great because it means that people are looking at this and pediatricians are taking it seriously." Yes, I am seriously considering giving up.
Finger Lickin’ Finger Pointing
While counseling doesn’t seem to change families’ unhealthy eating habits, parents are at least willing to take the blame, according to a new study from Yale’s Rudd Center for Food Policy and Obesity. According to their most recent annual survey, parents feel that 60% of America’s childhood obesity problem rests squarely in their laps. Parents admitted to giving in to their kids’ requests too often and to not always being great dietary role models themselves. Researchers concurred, noting that many of the returned surveys had to be processed by hand on account of grease stains.
As for the other 40% of the blame, parents cited the costs of healthy food, ease of access to unhealthy foods in schools, and that hellishly catchy “Doo-doo-doo-dee-doo, I’m lovin’ it,” jingle. The Rudd Center has been especially critical of the insidious ways corporations market unhealthy foods to vulnerable children, but industry spokesperson Elaine Kalish responded in an interview, “Food marketing to children isn’t exactly the foremost thing on parents' minds,” possibly adding under her breath, “and that’s just the way we like it.”
Say It...
Epidemiologists publishing in the New England Journal of Medicine have determined that while mumps vaccine is highly effective, its protection can be overwhelmed if someone spits in your face for hours. That, at least, appears to be the upshot of their analysis of a mumps outbreak occurring in Orthodox Jewish communities in New York and New Jersey in 2009 and 2010. The researchers blamed the outbreak on the practice peculiar to yeshivas of chavrusa study, in which two partners sit face-to-face engaging in often impassioned theological debate. A related article in Pediatrics suggests that a third dose of mumps vaccine could provide protection against even intense exposures, but until then you might take a good long look at your Uncle Walter’s cheeks before getting him started on politics this Thanksgiving. Alternately, if you can get to the Jersey Shore, you might be able to cover your nose and mouth with one of Snooki’s dresses.
David L. Hill, M.D, FAAP, is vice president of Cape Fear Pediatrics in Wilmington, NC and is an adjunct assistant professor of pediatrics at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. He is Program Director for the AAP Council on Communications and Media and an executive committee member of the North Carolina Pediatric Society. He has recorded commentaries for NPR's All Things Considered and provided content for various print, television and Internet outlets. Dr. Hill is the author of Dad to Dad: Parenting Like A Pro (AAP Publishing 2012).
Hurricane Sandy wreaked havoc on the Jersey shore, including a key setting of the popular MTV series Jersey Shore, the Seaside Heights Boardwalk (now re-named the Seaside Heights Planks-Floating-At-Sea). Hardcore fans, however, should not despair. Not only has MTV already planned a benefit show to help rebuild Seaside Heights, but breakout star “Snooki” (Nicole Polizzi) has tweeted that she is cleaning out her closet to donate clothes to the relief effort. Having seen what she wears on the show, I can only imagine her leopard-print tank tops and micro-minis providing warmth for scores of grateful preschoolers.
Northern Exposure
As a member of the AAP’s Council On Communications And The Media, I was excited to see a paper this week examining the effects of an intervention to help Canadian families reduce preschoolers’ screen time. Spoiler alert: it didn’t work. It wasn’t for lack of an elegant hypothesis: a short behavioral counseling session focusing on reducing screen time, especially TV-watching during meals, should lead kids to watch less TV, and we know from previous research that those kids’ diets would then improve and their BMI’s would fall, after which fairies should fly out of my left ear. As it turned out, none of that happened, unless fairies are orange and gooey.
What did happen was that kids in the intervention group ended up eating fewer meals in front of the television, down from two a day to 1.6 (and remember, this was in Canada, where televised sports include curling). Total hours of television watched per child did not fall, nor did the percentage of children with televisions in their bedrooms. Kids’ BMIs also didn’t budge, although is anyone really surprised in the country that perfected the art of bacon? Asked to comment on the fact that I appear to be wasting hours every week counseling families on media use, University at Albany - SUNY, media expert Dayna M. Maniccia, DrPH responded, "The new study is great because it means that people are looking at this and pediatricians are taking it seriously." Yes, I am seriously considering giving up.
Finger Lickin’ Finger Pointing
While counseling doesn’t seem to change families’ unhealthy eating habits, parents are at least willing to take the blame, according to a new study from Yale’s Rudd Center for Food Policy and Obesity. According to their most recent annual survey, parents feel that 60% of America’s childhood obesity problem rests squarely in their laps. Parents admitted to giving in to their kids’ requests too often and to not always being great dietary role models themselves. Researchers concurred, noting that many of the returned surveys had to be processed by hand on account of grease stains.
As for the other 40% of the blame, parents cited the costs of healthy food, ease of access to unhealthy foods in schools, and that hellishly catchy “Doo-doo-doo-dee-doo, I’m lovin’ it,” jingle. The Rudd Center has been especially critical of the insidious ways corporations market unhealthy foods to vulnerable children, but industry spokesperson Elaine Kalish responded in an interview, “Food marketing to children isn’t exactly the foremost thing on parents' minds,” possibly adding under her breath, “and that’s just the way we like it.”
Say It...
Epidemiologists publishing in the New England Journal of Medicine have determined that while mumps vaccine is highly effective, its protection can be overwhelmed if someone spits in your face for hours. That, at least, appears to be the upshot of their analysis of a mumps outbreak occurring in Orthodox Jewish communities in New York and New Jersey in 2009 and 2010. The researchers blamed the outbreak on the practice peculiar to yeshivas of chavrusa study, in which two partners sit face-to-face engaging in often impassioned theological debate. A related article in Pediatrics suggests that a third dose of mumps vaccine could provide protection against even intense exposures, but until then you might take a good long look at your Uncle Walter’s cheeks before getting him started on politics this Thanksgiving. Alternately, if you can get to the Jersey Shore, you might be able to cover your nose and mouth with one of Snooki’s dresses.
David L. Hill, M.D, FAAP, is vice president of Cape Fear Pediatrics in Wilmington, NC and is an adjunct assistant professor of pediatrics at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. He is Program Director for the AAP Council on Communications and Media and an executive committee member of the North Carolina Pediatric Society. He has recorded commentaries for NPR's All Things Considered and provided content for various print, television and Internet outlets. Dr. Hill is the author of Dad to Dad: Parenting Like A Pro (AAP Publishing 2012).
Topical Ivermectin Proves Safe, Effective in Treating Head Lice
Researchers published in the New England Journal of Medicine new safety and efficacy data for ivermectin lotion, the newest weapon in the millennia-old battle against head lice.
In two multisite, randomized, double-blinded studies, Dr. David M. Pariser of Eastern Virginia Medical School, Norfolk, and his associates found that a single 10-minute application of 0.5% ivermectin lotion eliminated live lice in nearly 95% of patients at day 2 without the need for nit combing, with around 74% remaining lice-free 15 days after the application (N. Engl. J. Med. 2012;367:1687-93).
The studies evaluated a total of 765 patients aged 6 months and older. The vast majority of subjects were children, reflecting the typical distribution of head lice in the population. Control patients received an identical 10-minute application of the inert vehicle. The most common adverse events in both groups were itching, scratching, and redness of the skin, occurring at rates of over 1% in the control group and less than 1% in the treatment group.
Earlier this year, topical ivermectin (Sklice, Sanofi-Pasteur) joined the growing list of medications approved by the Food and Drug Administration for use against lice. Increasing reports of lice resistant to the traditional first-line therapies of permethrin and pyrethrins have driven interest in alternative therapies. Lindane shampoo, an older alternative treatment, is no longer recommended because of safety concerns.
While solid numbers are lacking, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimates that 6-12 million Americans suffer louse infestations annually, with children between the ages of 3 and 11 years accounting for the bulk of cases. The annual economic impact of infestations runs around $1 billion. In addition to itching and scratching, lice can cause skin infections such as impetigo and, rarely, infection by Bartonella quintana (trench fever). Additionally, those infested suffer from the stigma of being thought unclean, even though in reality lice infestations are not associated with hair length, hygiene practices, or social class.
More than 45 million people worldwide have taken the oral form of ivermectin to treat nematode infections, and some doctors have prescribed it off label to treat lice and scabies when conventional treatments have failed. Permethrin and pyrethrins paralyze lice by modifying voltage-gated sodium channels, so that resistance to one agent usually confers resistance to all of them.
Ivermectin, on the other hand, acts primarily at glutamate-gated chloride ion channels, making it a useful second-line therapy. Researchers also point out that while malathion is the only currently approved therapy that kills louse eggs, ivermectin does seem to penetrate the eggs and kill nymphs shortly after they hatch.
Despite this study, I’m likely to continue to keep ivermectin as a backup therapy and not start using it as frontline treatment. The American Academy of Pediatrics Red Book still recommends using 1% permethrin or pyrethrins (both available over the counter) first line. If, 24 hours after appropriate use, live lice are still visible in the hair, then other second-line options include benzyl alcohol lotion, malathion, or spinosad suspension. Compliance rates with malathion appear to be around 50%, presumably because it’s the only one of the treatments that has to remain in the hair for 8-10 hours. Head-to-head comparisons (so to speak) of these interventions remain to be performed. Folk remedies such as petroleum jelly, olive oil, butter, or mayonnaise have never been proven to be effective therapies.
I always try to remind parents of children with lice that lice cannot jump, and they can only survive a few hours away from the human scalp. Hats, combs, clothing, and sheets rarely serve as fomites for louse transmission, and washing these items in hot water should easily kill any remaining lice and nits. Since louse egg sacs (nits) may cling tenaciously to hair shafts long after all the lice are killed, children with nits may return to school so long as they no longer have any living lice visible in the hair.
The studies were funded by Topaz Pharmaceuticals (now Sanofi-Pasteur). Ms. Bell reported receiving consulting fees from Topaz Pharmaceuticals and Sanofi Pasteur. Dr. Ryan reported being a former employee of Topaz Pharmaceuticals, receiving consulting fees and stock or stock options from Topaz Pharmaceuticals, and receiving consulting fees and payment for manuscript preparation from Sanofi Pasteur. Ms. Meinking reported receiving a grant on consulting fees from Topaz Pharmaceuticals. Dr. Pariser said he had no other relevant potential conflicts of interest.
Dr. Hill is vice president of Cape Fear Pediatrics in Wilmington, N.C., and is an adjunct assistant professor of pediatrics at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. He is a member of the editorial advisory board of Pediatric News, and the author of Needles, a weekly blog, at www.pediatricnews.com.
Researchers published in the New England Journal of Medicine new safety and efficacy data for ivermectin lotion, the newest weapon in the millennia-old battle against head lice.
In two multisite, randomized, double-blinded studies, Dr. David M. Pariser of Eastern Virginia Medical School, Norfolk, and his associates found that a single 10-minute application of 0.5% ivermectin lotion eliminated live lice in nearly 95% of patients at day 2 without the need for nit combing, with around 74% remaining lice-free 15 days after the application (N. Engl. J. Med. 2012;367:1687-93).
The studies evaluated a total of 765 patients aged 6 months and older. The vast majority of subjects were children, reflecting the typical distribution of head lice in the population. Control patients received an identical 10-minute application of the inert vehicle. The most common adverse events in both groups were itching, scratching, and redness of the skin, occurring at rates of over 1% in the control group and less than 1% in the treatment group.
Earlier this year, topical ivermectin (Sklice, Sanofi-Pasteur) joined the growing list of medications approved by the Food and Drug Administration for use against lice. Increasing reports of lice resistant to the traditional first-line therapies of permethrin and pyrethrins have driven interest in alternative therapies. Lindane shampoo, an older alternative treatment, is no longer recommended because of safety concerns.
While solid numbers are lacking, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimates that 6-12 million Americans suffer louse infestations annually, with children between the ages of 3 and 11 years accounting for the bulk of cases. The annual economic impact of infestations runs around $1 billion. In addition to itching and scratching, lice can cause skin infections such as impetigo and, rarely, infection by Bartonella quintana (trench fever). Additionally, those infested suffer from the stigma of being thought unclean, even though in reality lice infestations are not associated with hair length, hygiene practices, or social class.
More than 45 million people worldwide have taken the oral form of ivermectin to treat nematode infections, and some doctors have prescribed it off label to treat lice and scabies when conventional treatments have failed. Permethrin and pyrethrins paralyze lice by modifying voltage-gated sodium channels, so that resistance to one agent usually confers resistance to all of them.
Ivermectin, on the other hand, acts primarily at glutamate-gated chloride ion channels, making it a useful second-line therapy. Researchers also point out that while malathion is the only currently approved therapy that kills louse eggs, ivermectin does seem to penetrate the eggs and kill nymphs shortly after they hatch.
Despite this study, I’m likely to continue to keep ivermectin as a backup therapy and not start using it as frontline treatment. The American Academy of Pediatrics Red Book still recommends using 1% permethrin or pyrethrins (both available over the counter) first line. If, 24 hours after appropriate use, live lice are still visible in the hair, then other second-line options include benzyl alcohol lotion, malathion, or spinosad suspension. Compliance rates with malathion appear to be around 50%, presumably because it’s the only one of the treatments that has to remain in the hair for 8-10 hours. Head-to-head comparisons (so to speak) of these interventions remain to be performed. Folk remedies such as petroleum jelly, olive oil, butter, or mayonnaise have never been proven to be effective therapies.
I always try to remind parents of children with lice that lice cannot jump, and they can only survive a few hours away from the human scalp. Hats, combs, clothing, and sheets rarely serve as fomites for louse transmission, and washing these items in hot water should easily kill any remaining lice and nits. Since louse egg sacs (nits) may cling tenaciously to hair shafts long after all the lice are killed, children with nits may return to school so long as they no longer have any living lice visible in the hair.
The studies were funded by Topaz Pharmaceuticals (now Sanofi-Pasteur). Ms. Bell reported receiving consulting fees from Topaz Pharmaceuticals and Sanofi Pasteur. Dr. Ryan reported being a former employee of Topaz Pharmaceuticals, receiving consulting fees and stock or stock options from Topaz Pharmaceuticals, and receiving consulting fees and payment for manuscript preparation from Sanofi Pasteur. Ms. Meinking reported receiving a grant on consulting fees from Topaz Pharmaceuticals. Dr. Pariser said he had no other relevant potential conflicts of interest.
Dr. Hill is vice president of Cape Fear Pediatrics in Wilmington, N.C., and is an adjunct assistant professor of pediatrics at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. He is a member of the editorial advisory board of Pediatric News, and the author of Needles, a weekly blog, at www.pediatricnews.com.
Researchers published in the New England Journal of Medicine new safety and efficacy data for ivermectin lotion, the newest weapon in the millennia-old battle against head lice.
In two multisite, randomized, double-blinded studies, Dr. David M. Pariser of Eastern Virginia Medical School, Norfolk, and his associates found that a single 10-minute application of 0.5% ivermectin lotion eliminated live lice in nearly 95% of patients at day 2 without the need for nit combing, with around 74% remaining lice-free 15 days after the application (N. Engl. J. Med. 2012;367:1687-93).
The studies evaluated a total of 765 patients aged 6 months and older. The vast majority of subjects were children, reflecting the typical distribution of head lice in the population. Control patients received an identical 10-minute application of the inert vehicle. The most common adverse events in both groups were itching, scratching, and redness of the skin, occurring at rates of over 1% in the control group and less than 1% in the treatment group.
Earlier this year, topical ivermectin (Sklice, Sanofi-Pasteur) joined the growing list of medications approved by the Food and Drug Administration for use against lice. Increasing reports of lice resistant to the traditional first-line therapies of permethrin and pyrethrins have driven interest in alternative therapies. Lindane shampoo, an older alternative treatment, is no longer recommended because of safety concerns.
While solid numbers are lacking, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimates that 6-12 million Americans suffer louse infestations annually, with children between the ages of 3 and 11 years accounting for the bulk of cases. The annual economic impact of infestations runs around $1 billion. In addition to itching and scratching, lice can cause skin infections such as impetigo and, rarely, infection by Bartonella quintana (trench fever). Additionally, those infested suffer from the stigma of being thought unclean, even though in reality lice infestations are not associated with hair length, hygiene practices, or social class.
More than 45 million people worldwide have taken the oral form of ivermectin to treat nematode infections, and some doctors have prescribed it off label to treat lice and scabies when conventional treatments have failed. Permethrin and pyrethrins paralyze lice by modifying voltage-gated sodium channels, so that resistance to one agent usually confers resistance to all of them.
Ivermectin, on the other hand, acts primarily at glutamate-gated chloride ion channels, making it a useful second-line therapy. Researchers also point out that while malathion is the only currently approved therapy that kills louse eggs, ivermectin does seem to penetrate the eggs and kill nymphs shortly after they hatch.
Despite this study, I’m likely to continue to keep ivermectin as a backup therapy and not start using it as frontline treatment. The American Academy of Pediatrics Red Book still recommends using 1% permethrin or pyrethrins (both available over the counter) first line. If, 24 hours after appropriate use, live lice are still visible in the hair, then other second-line options include benzyl alcohol lotion, malathion, or spinosad suspension. Compliance rates with malathion appear to be around 50%, presumably because it’s the only one of the treatments that has to remain in the hair for 8-10 hours. Head-to-head comparisons (so to speak) of these interventions remain to be performed. Folk remedies such as petroleum jelly, olive oil, butter, or mayonnaise have never been proven to be effective therapies.
I always try to remind parents of children with lice that lice cannot jump, and they can only survive a few hours away from the human scalp. Hats, combs, clothing, and sheets rarely serve as fomites for louse transmission, and washing these items in hot water should easily kill any remaining lice and nits. Since louse egg sacs (nits) may cling tenaciously to hair shafts long after all the lice are killed, children with nits may return to school so long as they no longer have any living lice visible in the hair.
The studies were funded by Topaz Pharmaceuticals (now Sanofi-Pasteur). Ms. Bell reported receiving consulting fees from Topaz Pharmaceuticals and Sanofi Pasteur. Dr. Ryan reported being a former employee of Topaz Pharmaceuticals, receiving consulting fees and stock or stock options from Topaz Pharmaceuticals, and receiving consulting fees and payment for manuscript preparation from Sanofi Pasteur. Ms. Meinking reported receiving a grant on consulting fees from Topaz Pharmaceuticals. Dr. Pariser said he had no other relevant potential conflicts of interest.
Dr. Hill is vice president of Cape Fear Pediatrics in Wilmington, N.C., and is an adjunct assistant professor of pediatrics at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. He is a member of the editorial advisory board of Pediatric News, and the author of Needles, a weekly blog, at www.pediatricnews.com.
Can I Run This Bayou?
I am almost too excited to write this week’s blog, anticipating heading to New Orleans on Friday for the annual AAP National Conference and Exhibition! I and over 10,000 other pediatricians will descend on the Big Easy and proceed to show them how we throw down, AAP style! Starting at the opening reception in the “AAP Jazz Club” and rocking until, oh, I don’t know, maybe 10:00 PM, we intend to show the natives what happens when you give a bunch of gentle souls in sensible shoes one domestic beer, a watered-down cocktail, or, for many, a club soda with a lime twist! One thing’s for sure: the Crescent City has never seen anything like it.
Protection Projection
Finally, a study has proven that girls vaccinated against human papillomavirus (HPV) at age 12 are no more likely than their unvaccinated peers to become sexually active by age 15. Hopefully this news will reassure the many parents who fear their kids may view the HPV vaccine as a license to have sex. They imagine their daughters thinking, “I really love him, and I know he loves me, so despite the risks of pregnancy, HIV, chlamydia, gonorrhea, herpes, syphilis, hepatitis, chancroid, lympogranuloma venereum, gardnerella, and trichomonas, so long as I won’t get cervical cancer in ten to twenty years I think I’ll say yes.”
As it turns out, girls who received HPV vaccine were also no less likely to have sex, become pregnant, use contraception, or contract non-HPV sexually transmitted infections. I have to say as the father of a daughter who has received the full HPV vaccine series, I’m disappointed. I thought kids who got the vaccine might have the sorts of parents who would be better at protecting them from the risks of early and unprotected sexual encounters. I guess there’s only one thing to do: read her the above paragraph.
Danger, Will Robinson!
The Wellcome Trust-sponsored ADHD VOICES study (for Voices On Identity, Childhood, Ethics, Stimulants, and Torturous Acronyms) announced this week that children taking stimulant medications for attention deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) do not feel like robots. The interview-based exploration of how children with ADHD feel about taking medications was designed to answer a basic question: how do children with ADHD feel about taking medications? Out of 151 families in the US and Great Britain, not one child said, “The medicine makes me feel like a robot.” On more detailed questioning, kids denied any resemblance to Astro-Boy, Robby, R2D2, C3PO, Twiki, the T-800, Inspector Gadget, Data, Optimus Prime, or Zane, although fifty-six kids did plan to dress as Iron Man for Halloween/All Hallow’s Eve.
In fact, rather than feeling that ADHD medications robbed them of free will, many interviewees said they felt the drugs liberated them to make the choices they wanted. As the parent of a daughter with ADHD, I was again disappointed, having hoped that her medication would, at the very least, give her laser vision. I wonder if that HPV vaccine might turn her into a robot?
Dr. Sandman
I don’t know what they pay research subjects in Quebec, but it’s gotta be good. How else could the team publishing in Pediatrics this week have convinced 33 families to let them mess with their children’s sleep schedules? The goal was to see how kids fared in school with either one hour more or one hour less sleep than they usually get. I assume the Institutional Review Board that approved this protocol was not packed with parents.
Amazingly, families managed to comply with these alterations of their children’s sleep schedules, a feat that in my house would require a power outage and a barrel of melatonin. What they discovered was ... wait for it ... tired kids get really cranky and do poorly in school. More usefully, they found that kids given some extra sleep saw their mood and school performance improve remarkably. I’m putting these findings into practice at home tonight, assuming I can find the right size tranquilizer darts for five kids. This weekend, of course, I’ll be on Bourbon Street, which means to my kids, “Laissez les bon temps rouler!”
David L. Hill, M.D, FAAP, is vice president of Cape Fear Pediatrics in Wilmington, NC and is an adjunct assistant professor of pediatrics at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. He is Program Director for the AAP Council on Communications and Media and an executive committee member of the North Carolina Pediatric Society. He has recorded commentaries for NPR's All Things Considered and provided content for various print, television and Internet outlets. Dr. Hill is the author of Dad to Dad: Parenting Like A Pro (AAP Publishing 2012).
I am almost too excited to write this week’s blog, anticipating heading to New Orleans on Friday for the annual AAP National Conference and Exhibition! I and over 10,000 other pediatricians will descend on the Big Easy and proceed to show them how we throw down, AAP style! Starting at the opening reception in the “AAP Jazz Club” and rocking until, oh, I don’t know, maybe 10:00 PM, we intend to show the natives what happens when you give a bunch of gentle souls in sensible shoes one domestic beer, a watered-down cocktail, or, for many, a club soda with a lime twist! One thing’s for sure: the Crescent City has never seen anything like it.
Protection Projection
Finally, a study has proven that girls vaccinated against human papillomavirus (HPV) at age 12 are no more likely than their unvaccinated peers to become sexually active by age 15. Hopefully this news will reassure the many parents who fear their kids may view the HPV vaccine as a license to have sex. They imagine their daughters thinking, “I really love him, and I know he loves me, so despite the risks of pregnancy, HIV, chlamydia, gonorrhea, herpes, syphilis, hepatitis, chancroid, lympogranuloma venereum, gardnerella, and trichomonas, so long as I won’t get cervical cancer in ten to twenty years I think I’ll say yes.”
As it turns out, girls who received HPV vaccine were also no less likely to have sex, become pregnant, use contraception, or contract non-HPV sexually transmitted infections. I have to say as the father of a daughter who has received the full HPV vaccine series, I’m disappointed. I thought kids who got the vaccine might have the sorts of parents who would be better at protecting them from the risks of early and unprotected sexual encounters. I guess there’s only one thing to do: read her the above paragraph.
Danger, Will Robinson!
The Wellcome Trust-sponsored ADHD VOICES study (for Voices On Identity, Childhood, Ethics, Stimulants, and Torturous Acronyms) announced this week that children taking stimulant medications for attention deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) do not feel like robots. The interview-based exploration of how children with ADHD feel about taking medications was designed to answer a basic question: how do children with ADHD feel about taking medications? Out of 151 families in the US and Great Britain, not one child said, “The medicine makes me feel like a robot.” On more detailed questioning, kids denied any resemblance to Astro-Boy, Robby, R2D2, C3PO, Twiki, the T-800, Inspector Gadget, Data, Optimus Prime, or Zane, although fifty-six kids did plan to dress as Iron Man for Halloween/All Hallow’s Eve.
In fact, rather than feeling that ADHD medications robbed them of free will, many interviewees said they felt the drugs liberated them to make the choices they wanted. As the parent of a daughter with ADHD, I was again disappointed, having hoped that her medication would, at the very least, give her laser vision. I wonder if that HPV vaccine might turn her into a robot?
Dr. Sandman
I don’t know what they pay research subjects in Quebec, but it’s gotta be good. How else could the team publishing in Pediatrics this week have convinced 33 families to let them mess with their children’s sleep schedules? The goal was to see how kids fared in school with either one hour more or one hour less sleep than they usually get. I assume the Institutional Review Board that approved this protocol was not packed with parents.
Amazingly, families managed to comply with these alterations of their children’s sleep schedules, a feat that in my house would require a power outage and a barrel of melatonin. What they discovered was ... wait for it ... tired kids get really cranky and do poorly in school. More usefully, they found that kids given some extra sleep saw their mood and school performance improve remarkably. I’m putting these findings into practice at home tonight, assuming I can find the right size tranquilizer darts for five kids. This weekend, of course, I’ll be on Bourbon Street, which means to my kids, “Laissez les bon temps rouler!”
David L. Hill, M.D, FAAP, is vice president of Cape Fear Pediatrics in Wilmington, NC and is an adjunct assistant professor of pediatrics at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. He is Program Director for the AAP Council on Communications and Media and an executive committee member of the North Carolina Pediatric Society. He has recorded commentaries for NPR's All Things Considered and provided content for various print, television and Internet outlets. Dr. Hill is the author of Dad to Dad: Parenting Like A Pro (AAP Publishing 2012).
I am almost too excited to write this week’s blog, anticipating heading to New Orleans on Friday for the annual AAP National Conference and Exhibition! I and over 10,000 other pediatricians will descend on the Big Easy and proceed to show them how we throw down, AAP style! Starting at the opening reception in the “AAP Jazz Club” and rocking until, oh, I don’t know, maybe 10:00 PM, we intend to show the natives what happens when you give a bunch of gentle souls in sensible shoes one domestic beer, a watered-down cocktail, or, for many, a club soda with a lime twist! One thing’s for sure: the Crescent City has never seen anything like it.
Protection Projection
Finally, a study has proven that girls vaccinated against human papillomavirus (HPV) at age 12 are no more likely than their unvaccinated peers to become sexually active by age 15. Hopefully this news will reassure the many parents who fear their kids may view the HPV vaccine as a license to have sex. They imagine their daughters thinking, “I really love him, and I know he loves me, so despite the risks of pregnancy, HIV, chlamydia, gonorrhea, herpes, syphilis, hepatitis, chancroid, lympogranuloma venereum, gardnerella, and trichomonas, so long as I won’t get cervical cancer in ten to twenty years I think I’ll say yes.”
As it turns out, girls who received HPV vaccine were also no less likely to have sex, become pregnant, use contraception, or contract non-HPV sexually transmitted infections. I have to say as the father of a daughter who has received the full HPV vaccine series, I’m disappointed. I thought kids who got the vaccine might have the sorts of parents who would be better at protecting them from the risks of early and unprotected sexual encounters. I guess there’s only one thing to do: read her the above paragraph.
Danger, Will Robinson!
The Wellcome Trust-sponsored ADHD VOICES study (for Voices On Identity, Childhood, Ethics, Stimulants, and Torturous Acronyms) announced this week that children taking stimulant medications for attention deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) do not feel like robots. The interview-based exploration of how children with ADHD feel about taking medications was designed to answer a basic question: how do children with ADHD feel about taking medications? Out of 151 families in the US and Great Britain, not one child said, “The medicine makes me feel like a robot.” On more detailed questioning, kids denied any resemblance to Astro-Boy, Robby, R2D2, C3PO, Twiki, the T-800, Inspector Gadget, Data, Optimus Prime, or Zane, although fifty-six kids did plan to dress as Iron Man for Halloween/All Hallow’s Eve.
In fact, rather than feeling that ADHD medications robbed them of free will, many interviewees said they felt the drugs liberated them to make the choices they wanted. As the parent of a daughter with ADHD, I was again disappointed, having hoped that her medication would, at the very least, give her laser vision. I wonder if that HPV vaccine might turn her into a robot?
Dr. Sandman
I don’t know what they pay research subjects in Quebec, but it’s gotta be good. How else could the team publishing in Pediatrics this week have convinced 33 families to let them mess with their children’s sleep schedules? The goal was to see how kids fared in school with either one hour more or one hour less sleep than they usually get. I assume the Institutional Review Board that approved this protocol was not packed with parents.
Amazingly, families managed to comply with these alterations of their children’s sleep schedules, a feat that in my house would require a power outage and a barrel of melatonin. What they discovered was ... wait for it ... tired kids get really cranky and do poorly in school. More usefully, they found that kids given some extra sleep saw their mood and school performance improve remarkably. I’m putting these findings into practice at home tonight, assuming I can find the right size tranquilizer darts for five kids. This weekend, of course, I’ll be on Bourbon Street, which means to my kids, “Laissez les bon temps rouler!”
David L. Hill, M.D, FAAP, is vice president of Cape Fear Pediatrics in Wilmington, NC and is an adjunct assistant professor of pediatrics at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. He is Program Director for the AAP Council on Communications and Media and an executive committee member of the North Carolina Pediatric Society. He has recorded commentaries for NPR's All Things Considered and provided content for various print, television and Internet outlets. Dr. Hill is the author of Dad to Dad: Parenting Like A Pro (AAP Publishing 2012).
Lost
A two-year-old boy was found by police wandering alone in the streets of Bell, Calif., last week. Neighbors reported that before he was apprehended, the boy approached a series of barnyard animals and asked, “Are you my mother?” In fact, the toddler apparently was just running down to the convenience store to pick up a new binkie and a six-pack of juice boxes when he panicked, realizing he still didn’t know how to unsnap his onesie. As officers returned the child to his parents’ outstretched arms he could be heard to say, “YOU are my mother! Now about that cell phone ...”
That’s Colic
You know how some things are a lot more stressful for parents than they are for kids, like the first day of school, driver’s education, and childbirth? According to a new study in Pediatrics it appears we can add colic to that list. Incredibly patient Australian researchers followed a cohort of over 7,000 infants for 21 years, all while waiting for “Crocodile” Dundee to make a comeback. They noted which infants had colic, or as they say in Australia, “infant behavioral dysregulation,” which, trust me, sounds a lot sexier with the accent. They then surveyed the mothers, asking whether those children had behavioral problems at age 5, 14, and 21. At the same time, the researchers assessed the children themselves for the presence of behavioral problems, such as drinking too much Foster’s Lager or tormenting wallabies.
Mothers of colicky infants reported that their children had a higher-than-average rate of behavioral problems at every age, but by the time the kids could answer questions for themselves at ages 14 and 21 it turned out they were at no more risk of behavioral and emotional problems than kids who had not been colicky. There is good news here for pediatricians to share with mothers of fussy infants: in 21 years not only will their kids have grown into mentally stable young adults, there’s a chance some Hollywood visionary will finally greenlight “Crocodile” Dundee IV.
Risky Business Downturn
Despite all signs to the contrary, it’s becoming clear that today’s teens are measurably less stupid than were those in past decades. Not only are teen birth rates at historic lows, but now the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) tell us that half as many teens are drinking and driving, compared to only 2 decades ago! How long can it be before we have a generation of kids telling their elders to pull up their pants, comb their hair, and turn down that noise that they call music?
CDC researchers evaluated the annual Youth Behavioral Risk Surveys to determine that only 10.3% of US teens report drinking and driving in 2011, compared to 22.3% in 1991. Data do not exist to analyze what role was played by the cancellation of Cheers. Teens who did drink and drive were also more likely to binge drink than were their peers, a finding that led one researcher to comment, “Well, duh!” If current trends continue this generation of teens can be expected to reverse global warming, cure cancer, and finally put an end to Casual Fridays.
Wipeout
An industry-sponsored study has demonstrated that giving free hygiene supplies to children in school classrooms increases the use of hygiene supplies by children in school classrooms. The report, destined to serve as a landmark in the field of giving-away-sanitizer-and-wipes, demonstrated reductions as great as 76% in the presence of germs on such surfaces as school desks, cafeteria tables, and bathroom stall handles. In addition to being given samples of hand sanitizer, antibacterial wipes, and antiviral facial tissues, children were instructed in proper hand-washing technique, how to cough into their elbows, and the importance of never licking bathroom stall handles, even if double-dog-dared. Ongoing studies will examine whether giving toddlers free binkies and juice boxes will keep them from wandering in the streets.
David L. Hill, M.D, FAAP, is vice president of Cape Fear Pediatrics in Wilmington, NC and is an adjunct assistant professor of pediatrics at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. He is Program Director for the AAP Council on Communications and Media and an executive committee member of the North Carolina Pediatric Society. He has recorded commentaries for NPR's All Things Considered and provided content for various print, television and Internet outlets. Dr. Hill is the author of Dad to Dad: Parenting Like A Pro (AAP Publishing 2012).
A two-year-old boy was found by police wandering alone in the streets of Bell, Calif., last week. Neighbors reported that before he was apprehended, the boy approached a series of barnyard animals and asked, “Are you my mother?” In fact, the toddler apparently was just running down to the convenience store to pick up a new binkie and a six-pack of juice boxes when he panicked, realizing he still didn’t know how to unsnap his onesie. As officers returned the child to his parents’ outstretched arms he could be heard to say, “YOU are my mother! Now about that cell phone ...”
That’s Colic
You know how some things are a lot more stressful for parents than they are for kids, like the first day of school, driver’s education, and childbirth? According to a new study in Pediatrics it appears we can add colic to that list. Incredibly patient Australian researchers followed a cohort of over 7,000 infants for 21 years, all while waiting for “Crocodile” Dundee to make a comeback. They noted which infants had colic, or as they say in Australia, “infant behavioral dysregulation,” which, trust me, sounds a lot sexier with the accent. They then surveyed the mothers, asking whether those children had behavioral problems at age 5, 14, and 21. At the same time, the researchers assessed the children themselves for the presence of behavioral problems, such as drinking too much Foster’s Lager or tormenting wallabies.
Mothers of colicky infants reported that their children had a higher-than-average rate of behavioral problems at every age, but by the time the kids could answer questions for themselves at ages 14 and 21 it turned out they were at no more risk of behavioral and emotional problems than kids who had not been colicky. There is good news here for pediatricians to share with mothers of fussy infants: in 21 years not only will their kids have grown into mentally stable young adults, there’s a chance some Hollywood visionary will finally greenlight “Crocodile” Dundee IV.
Risky Business Downturn
Despite all signs to the contrary, it’s becoming clear that today’s teens are measurably less stupid than were those in past decades. Not only are teen birth rates at historic lows, but now the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) tell us that half as many teens are drinking and driving, compared to only 2 decades ago! How long can it be before we have a generation of kids telling their elders to pull up their pants, comb their hair, and turn down that noise that they call music?
CDC researchers evaluated the annual Youth Behavioral Risk Surveys to determine that only 10.3% of US teens report drinking and driving in 2011, compared to 22.3% in 1991. Data do not exist to analyze what role was played by the cancellation of Cheers. Teens who did drink and drive were also more likely to binge drink than were their peers, a finding that led one researcher to comment, “Well, duh!” If current trends continue this generation of teens can be expected to reverse global warming, cure cancer, and finally put an end to Casual Fridays.
Wipeout
An industry-sponsored study has demonstrated that giving free hygiene supplies to children in school classrooms increases the use of hygiene supplies by children in school classrooms. The report, destined to serve as a landmark in the field of giving-away-sanitizer-and-wipes, demonstrated reductions as great as 76% in the presence of germs on such surfaces as school desks, cafeteria tables, and bathroom stall handles. In addition to being given samples of hand sanitizer, antibacterial wipes, and antiviral facial tissues, children were instructed in proper hand-washing technique, how to cough into their elbows, and the importance of never licking bathroom stall handles, even if double-dog-dared. Ongoing studies will examine whether giving toddlers free binkies and juice boxes will keep them from wandering in the streets.
David L. Hill, M.D, FAAP, is vice president of Cape Fear Pediatrics in Wilmington, NC and is an adjunct assistant professor of pediatrics at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. He is Program Director for the AAP Council on Communications and Media and an executive committee member of the North Carolina Pediatric Society. He has recorded commentaries for NPR's All Things Considered and provided content for various print, television and Internet outlets. Dr. Hill is the author of Dad to Dad: Parenting Like A Pro (AAP Publishing 2012).
A two-year-old boy was found by police wandering alone in the streets of Bell, Calif., last week. Neighbors reported that before he was apprehended, the boy approached a series of barnyard animals and asked, “Are you my mother?” In fact, the toddler apparently was just running down to the convenience store to pick up a new binkie and a six-pack of juice boxes when he panicked, realizing he still didn’t know how to unsnap his onesie. As officers returned the child to his parents’ outstretched arms he could be heard to say, “YOU are my mother! Now about that cell phone ...”
That’s Colic
You know how some things are a lot more stressful for parents than they are for kids, like the first day of school, driver’s education, and childbirth? According to a new study in Pediatrics it appears we can add colic to that list. Incredibly patient Australian researchers followed a cohort of over 7,000 infants for 21 years, all while waiting for “Crocodile” Dundee to make a comeback. They noted which infants had colic, or as they say in Australia, “infant behavioral dysregulation,” which, trust me, sounds a lot sexier with the accent. They then surveyed the mothers, asking whether those children had behavioral problems at age 5, 14, and 21. At the same time, the researchers assessed the children themselves for the presence of behavioral problems, such as drinking too much Foster’s Lager or tormenting wallabies.
Mothers of colicky infants reported that their children had a higher-than-average rate of behavioral problems at every age, but by the time the kids could answer questions for themselves at ages 14 and 21 it turned out they were at no more risk of behavioral and emotional problems than kids who had not been colicky. There is good news here for pediatricians to share with mothers of fussy infants: in 21 years not only will their kids have grown into mentally stable young adults, there’s a chance some Hollywood visionary will finally greenlight “Crocodile” Dundee IV.
Risky Business Downturn
Despite all signs to the contrary, it’s becoming clear that today’s teens are measurably less stupid than were those in past decades. Not only are teen birth rates at historic lows, but now the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) tell us that half as many teens are drinking and driving, compared to only 2 decades ago! How long can it be before we have a generation of kids telling their elders to pull up their pants, comb their hair, and turn down that noise that they call music?
CDC researchers evaluated the annual Youth Behavioral Risk Surveys to determine that only 10.3% of US teens report drinking and driving in 2011, compared to 22.3% in 1991. Data do not exist to analyze what role was played by the cancellation of Cheers. Teens who did drink and drive were also more likely to binge drink than were their peers, a finding that led one researcher to comment, “Well, duh!” If current trends continue this generation of teens can be expected to reverse global warming, cure cancer, and finally put an end to Casual Fridays.
Wipeout
An industry-sponsored study has demonstrated that giving free hygiene supplies to children in school classrooms increases the use of hygiene supplies by children in school classrooms. The report, destined to serve as a landmark in the field of giving-away-sanitizer-and-wipes, demonstrated reductions as great as 76% in the presence of germs on such surfaces as school desks, cafeteria tables, and bathroom stall handles. In addition to being given samples of hand sanitizer, antibacterial wipes, and antiviral facial tissues, children were instructed in proper hand-washing technique, how to cough into their elbows, and the importance of never licking bathroom stall handles, even if double-dog-dared. Ongoing studies will examine whether giving toddlers free binkies and juice boxes will keep them from wandering in the streets.
David L. Hill, M.D, FAAP, is vice president of Cape Fear Pediatrics in Wilmington, NC and is an adjunct assistant professor of pediatrics at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. He is Program Director for the AAP Council on Communications and Media and an executive committee member of the North Carolina Pediatric Society. He has recorded commentaries for NPR's All Things Considered and provided content for various print, television and Internet outlets. Dr. Hill is the author of Dad to Dad: Parenting Like A Pro (AAP Publishing 2012).
And The Winner Is...
Everyone is talking about the Emmys this week: is Modern Family really funnier than 30 Rock? Is Claire Danes really more dramatic than Glenn Close? Is there really an award for “Host For A Reality Or Reality Competition Program”? Really?
As a dad who has spent hours on the couch with his kids and watching Nickelodeon and The Disney Channel, I was most invested in the Outstanding Children’s Program category. Would it be Victorious (Fame meets Welcome Back Kotter) or iCarly (Laverne And Shirley meet an iPhone)? I was shocked when the winner was Wizards of Waverly Place (Harry Potter meets Married With Children)! Honestly, watching any of these shows I’d love to meet just one fresh idea.
Ups And Downs
This week the American Academy of Pediatrics Council On Sports Medicine And Fitness officially went on the record as opposing fun. To be fair, it wasn’t any old sort of fun, just the kind of fun that causes around 100,000 pediatric injuries a year and, occasionally, quadriplegia and death. That’s right, the AAP reiterated its opposition to trampolines, for those of you who weren’t listening in 1977, 1981, and 1999.
What’s different now? For one thing, a flood of inexpensive imports has opened up trampoline ownership to everyone, not just that rich family down the street that also has the swimming pool, the dirt bikes, and the dueling pistols. For another thing, widespread use of padding and protective netting has given parents a false sense of security, leading them to believe there’s no way 12 kids bouncing around and turning flips over each other could possibly hurt themselves.
In an interview, Arch Adams, president of Fun Spot Trampolines in Hartwell, GA, countered, “It’s one of the few forms of exercise kids want to do.” Okay, he’s got us there. He went on to remind parents to always heed the warnings printed on every trampoline: only allow one jumper at a time; absolutely no somersaults, and adult supervision is essential. Now who’s no fun?
Eye Of The Needle
A report in this week’s New England Journal Of Medicine points the way to increasing childhood vaccination rates: make it harder for unvaccinated children to attend school. Researchers compared vaccination rates of children in states with only a religious exemption for required vaccines versus states that also allowed a philosophical exemption. For those confused about the difference, a philosophical exemption is, “I would rather risk my child suffering death or permanent disability than to protect him against preventable diseases.” A religious exemption is, “I would rather risk my child suffering death or permanent disability than to protect him against preventable diseases, amen.”
In states that allowed philosophical exemptions, rates of vaccine refusal were over 2.5 times as high as in the states with only religious exemptions. Vaccine rates also improved when parents had to obtain and fill out a government form to forgo vaccination rather than scrawl out a few hand-written lines on a Post-it note. Based on these results, I propose that future vaccine exemption laws require a notarized statement directly from the parent’s deity of choice, submitted on papyrus, vellum, or a stone tablet. We wouldn’t want to get too picky.
Once More, With Feeling
Have you ever noticed that men are not as emotionally sensitive as women? (If you’re male you probably haven’t, because that would require paying attention to someone else’s feelings for once, wouldn’t it?) It turns out there may be a reason much simpler than a patriarchal society that punishes men for expressing emotional connections, although you can’t write that one off. It may be the binkies.
In three separate studies of pacifiers and emotional sensitivity, researchers publishing in Basic And Applied Social Psychology make a strong case that in boys (but, for some reason, not girls) sucking on a pacifier impairs the reflective changes in facial expression needed to learn how to interpret others’ emotions. Next time some guy gives you a blank stare, just imagine a binkie in his mouth, then look away before you start to snicker and he asks you what’s so funny.
Tons of psychological research shows that when we listen to someone else talk we use our own facial expressions to help us understand how they feel. For example, if a friend tells you her dog is sick, your eyebrows tilt up in the middle, and the corners of your mouth turn down to reflect her sadness. If your brother tells you about his promotion, your eyes open wide and you smile, to better share his joy. If your mom tells you she just finished watching a Hoarders marathon, you squint and look away, hoping she can’t tell you think she’s getting senile. Just like adults who have had Botox injections, male infants seem less able to process emotional input when their mouths are paralyzed by pacifiers. This may have a lifelong effect on their emotional development, causing them to form weaker attachments as adults and, in the case of some Emmy judges, to favor Wizards Of Waverly Place over the vastly superior Degrassi. I mean, really?!
David L. Hill, M.D, FAAP, is vice president of Cape Fear Pediatrics in Wilmington, NC and is an adjunct assistant professor of pediatrics at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. He is Program Director for the AAP Council on Communications and Media and an executive committee member of the North Carolina Pediatric Society. He has recorded commentaries for NPR's All Things Considered and provided content for various print, television and Internet outlets. Dr. Hill is the author of Dad to Dad: Parenting Like A Pro (AAP Publishing 2012).
Everyone is talking about the Emmys this week: is Modern Family really funnier than 30 Rock? Is Claire Danes really more dramatic than Glenn Close? Is there really an award for “Host For A Reality Or Reality Competition Program”? Really?
As a dad who has spent hours on the couch with his kids and watching Nickelodeon and The Disney Channel, I was most invested in the Outstanding Children’s Program category. Would it be Victorious (Fame meets Welcome Back Kotter) or iCarly (Laverne And Shirley meet an iPhone)? I was shocked when the winner was Wizards of Waverly Place (Harry Potter meets Married With Children)! Honestly, watching any of these shows I’d love to meet just one fresh idea.
Ups And Downs
This week the American Academy of Pediatrics Council On Sports Medicine And Fitness officially went on the record as opposing fun. To be fair, it wasn’t any old sort of fun, just the kind of fun that causes around 100,000 pediatric injuries a year and, occasionally, quadriplegia and death. That’s right, the AAP reiterated its opposition to trampolines, for those of you who weren’t listening in 1977, 1981, and 1999.
What’s different now? For one thing, a flood of inexpensive imports has opened up trampoline ownership to everyone, not just that rich family down the street that also has the swimming pool, the dirt bikes, and the dueling pistols. For another thing, widespread use of padding and protective netting has given parents a false sense of security, leading them to believe there’s no way 12 kids bouncing around and turning flips over each other could possibly hurt themselves.
In an interview, Arch Adams, president of Fun Spot Trampolines in Hartwell, GA, countered, “It’s one of the few forms of exercise kids want to do.” Okay, he’s got us there. He went on to remind parents to always heed the warnings printed on every trampoline: only allow one jumper at a time; absolutely no somersaults, and adult supervision is essential. Now who’s no fun?
Eye Of The Needle
A report in this week’s New England Journal Of Medicine points the way to increasing childhood vaccination rates: make it harder for unvaccinated children to attend school. Researchers compared vaccination rates of children in states with only a religious exemption for required vaccines versus states that also allowed a philosophical exemption. For those confused about the difference, a philosophical exemption is, “I would rather risk my child suffering death or permanent disability than to protect him against preventable diseases.” A religious exemption is, “I would rather risk my child suffering death or permanent disability than to protect him against preventable diseases, amen.”
In states that allowed philosophical exemptions, rates of vaccine refusal were over 2.5 times as high as in the states with only religious exemptions. Vaccine rates also improved when parents had to obtain and fill out a government form to forgo vaccination rather than scrawl out a few hand-written lines on a Post-it note. Based on these results, I propose that future vaccine exemption laws require a notarized statement directly from the parent’s deity of choice, submitted on papyrus, vellum, or a stone tablet. We wouldn’t want to get too picky.
Once More, With Feeling
Have you ever noticed that men are not as emotionally sensitive as women? (If you’re male you probably haven’t, because that would require paying attention to someone else’s feelings for once, wouldn’t it?) It turns out there may be a reason much simpler than a patriarchal society that punishes men for expressing emotional connections, although you can’t write that one off. It may be the binkies.
In three separate studies of pacifiers and emotional sensitivity, researchers publishing in Basic And Applied Social Psychology make a strong case that in boys (but, for some reason, not girls) sucking on a pacifier impairs the reflective changes in facial expression needed to learn how to interpret others’ emotions. Next time some guy gives you a blank stare, just imagine a binkie in his mouth, then look away before you start to snicker and he asks you what’s so funny.
Tons of psychological research shows that when we listen to someone else talk we use our own facial expressions to help us understand how they feel. For example, if a friend tells you her dog is sick, your eyebrows tilt up in the middle, and the corners of your mouth turn down to reflect her sadness. If your brother tells you about his promotion, your eyes open wide and you smile, to better share his joy. If your mom tells you she just finished watching a Hoarders marathon, you squint and look away, hoping she can’t tell you think she’s getting senile. Just like adults who have had Botox injections, male infants seem less able to process emotional input when their mouths are paralyzed by pacifiers. This may have a lifelong effect on their emotional development, causing them to form weaker attachments as adults and, in the case of some Emmy judges, to favor Wizards Of Waverly Place over the vastly superior Degrassi. I mean, really?!
David L. Hill, M.D, FAAP, is vice president of Cape Fear Pediatrics in Wilmington, NC and is an adjunct assistant professor of pediatrics at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. He is Program Director for the AAP Council on Communications and Media and an executive committee member of the North Carolina Pediatric Society. He has recorded commentaries for NPR's All Things Considered and provided content for various print, television and Internet outlets. Dr. Hill is the author of Dad to Dad: Parenting Like A Pro (AAP Publishing 2012).
Everyone is talking about the Emmys this week: is Modern Family really funnier than 30 Rock? Is Claire Danes really more dramatic than Glenn Close? Is there really an award for “Host For A Reality Or Reality Competition Program”? Really?
As a dad who has spent hours on the couch with his kids and watching Nickelodeon and The Disney Channel, I was most invested in the Outstanding Children’s Program category. Would it be Victorious (Fame meets Welcome Back Kotter) or iCarly (Laverne And Shirley meet an iPhone)? I was shocked when the winner was Wizards of Waverly Place (Harry Potter meets Married With Children)! Honestly, watching any of these shows I’d love to meet just one fresh idea.
Ups And Downs
This week the American Academy of Pediatrics Council On Sports Medicine And Fitness officially went on the record as opposing fun. To be fair, it wasn’t any old sort of fun, just the kind of fun that causes around 100,000 pediatric injuries a year and, occasionally, quadriplegia and death. That’s right, the AAP reiterated its opposition to trampolines, for those of you who weren’t listening in 1977, 1981, and 1999.
What’s different now? For one thing, a flood of inexpensive imports has opened up trampoline ownership to everyone, not just that rich family down the street that also has the swimming pool, the dirt bikes, and the dueling pistols. For another thing, widespread use of padding and protective netting has given parents a false sense of security, leading them to believe there’s no way 12 kids bouncing around and turning flips over each other could possibly hurt themselves.
In an interview, Arch Adams, president of Fun Spot Trampolines in Hartwell, GA, countered, “It’s one of the few forms of exercise kids want to do.” Okay, he’s got us there. He went on to remind parents to always heed the warnings printed on every trampoline: only allow one jumper at a time; absolutely no somersaults, and adult supervision is essential. Now who’s no fun?
Eye Of The Needle
A report in this week’s New England Journal Of Medicine points the way to increasing childhood vaccination rates: make it harder for unvaccinated children to attend school. Researchers compared vaccination rates of children in states with only a religious exemption for required vaccines versus states that also allowed a philosophical exemption. For those confused about the difference, a philosophical exemption is, “I would rather risk my child suffering death or permanent disability than to protect him against preventable diseases.” A religious exemption is, “I would rather risk my child suffering death or permanent disability than to protect him against preventable diseases, amen.”
In states that allowed philosophical exemptions, rates of vaccine refusal were over 2.5 times as high as in the states with only religious exemptions. Vaccine rates also improved when parents had to obtain and fill out a government form to forgo vaccination rather than scrawl out a few hand-written lines on a Post-it note. Based on these results, I propose that future vaccine exemption laws require a notarized statement directly from the parent’s deity of choice, submitted on papyrus, vellum, or a stone tablet. We wouldn’t want to get too picky.
Once More, With Feeling
Have you ever noticed that men are not as emotionally sensitive as women? (If you’re male you probably haven’t, because that would require paying attention to someone else’s feelings for once, wouldn’t it?) It turns out there may be a reason much simpler than a patriarchal society that punishes men for expressing emotional connections, although you can’t write that one off. It may be the binkies.
In three separate studies of pacifiers and emotional sensitivity, researchers publishing in Basic And Applied Social Psychology make a strong case that in boys (but, for some reason, not girls) sucking on a pacifier impairs the reflective changes in facial expression needed to learn how to interpret others’ emotions. Next time some guy gives you a blank stare, just imagine a binkie in his mouth, then look away before you start to snicker and he asks you what’s so funny.
Tons of psychological research shows that when we listen to someone else talk we use our own facial expressions to help us understand how they feel. For example, if a friend tells you her dog is sick, your eyebrows tilt up in the middle, and the corners of your mouth turn down to reflect her sadness. If your brother tells you about his promotion, your eyes open wide and you smile, to better share his joy. If your mom tells you she just finished watching a Hoarders marathon, you squint and look away, hoping she can’t tell you think she’s getting senile. Just like adults who have had Botox injections, male infants seem less able to process emotional input when their mouths are paralyzed by pacifiers. This may have a lifelong effect on their emotional development, causing them to form weaker attachments as adults and, in the case of some Emmy judges, to favor Wizards Of Waverly Place over the vastly superior Degrassi. I mean, really?!
David L. Hill, M.D, FAAP, is vice president of Cape Fear Pediatrics in Wilmington, NC and is an adjunct assistant professor of pediatrics at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. He is Program Director for the AAP Council on Communications and Media and an executive committee member of the North Carolina Pediatric Society. He has recorded commentaries for NPR's All Things Considered and provided content for various print, television and Internet outlets. Dr. Hill is the author of Dad to Dad: Parenting Like A Pro (AAP Publishing 2012).