September 6, 2007, 10:11 PM CT

Managing Children's Fevers

Australian parents need to be educated about managing fever in young children because a number of give medicine incorrectly and often unnecessarily, as per a Queensland University of Technology nursing researcher.

QUT senior research fellow Anne Walsh conducted the first study into how Australian parents' manage childhood fever as part of her PhD. Her results were reported in the latest Journal of Paediatrics and Child Health.

Ms Walsh observed that, of more than 400 Queensland parents surveyed, paracetamol was administered too frequently by 4 per cent and ibuprofen by 32 per cent.

She said the finding that 23 per cent administered ibuprofen every four hours instead of the recommended six- to eight-hourly intervals was disturbing.

Ms Walsh expressed concern at the rise over the past decade of the practice of alternating over-the-counter antipyretic medications such as paracetamol and ibuprofen (in products such as Nurofen).

"This is disturbing because our survey revealed that it was very common for parents to give these medications for mild fever and at too frequent doses," Ms Walsh said.

"Given that such a high percentage of parents are giving ibuprofen too frequently, it may be that they are assuming it is the same as paracetamol which can be given four hourly"......... Posted by: JoAnn      Read more         Source

September 6, 2007, 9:55 PM CT

Parenting help for bipolar mums and dads

Parents with bipolar disorder are taking part in a study that will give them the chance to follow a highly successful parenting skills programme.

Dr Steven Jones and Dr Rachel Calam at the University of Manchesters School of Psychological Sciences assess the volunteers current mood and experiences of parenting with an online questionnaire before offering some of them help via an online version of the Triple P Positive Parenting Programme that featured on the ITV1 television series called Driving Mum and Dad Mad.

The Triple P system, developed by Australian clinical psychology expert Professor Matt Sanders, is known to be effective in modifying and improving childrens behaviour by rebuilding positive relationships, tackling discipline and setting rules and limits.

The first series of Driving Mum and Dad Mad in spring 2005 followed the experiences of five families attending a Triple P group. An average of 4.23 million viewers watched the show, with 500 families taking part in a parallel study by Dr Calam, The Great Parenting Experiment. All the parents who followed the TV series and used the strategies shown reported improved behaviour in their child and greater confidence in managing it. The group receiving additional web-based information and email support experienced an even greater improvement, and six months after the series most of the families reported long term benefits and continued improvements to their childrens behaviour......... Posted by: JoAnn      Read more         Source

September 6, 2007, 9:47 PM CT

Soy isoflavone may inhibit rotavirus illness in infants

The soy isoflavone genistin--at concentrations present in soy infant formula-- may reduce a babys susceptibility to rotavirus infections by as much as 74 percent, as per a University of Illinois study published in Septembers Journal of Nutrition.

Rotavirus is the primary cause of diarrhea in infants, affecting virtually all children before age five. In the United States, it mainly leads to dehydration, doctors visits, and parents missing work to care for sick children. In developing countries, though, rotavirus causes approximately 611,000 deaths each year, said Sharon Donovan, the Melissa M. Noel Professor of Nutrition at the U of I.

Eventhough rotavirus vaccines have recently become available, they are expensive and cannot be given to some infants, she said.

Its exciting to believe that the isoflavones in soy formula could be a cost-effective nutritional approach to decreasing the incidence and severity of rotavirus infections, particularly among children in developing countries who are most at risk, said the scientist of her work with doctoral candidate Aline Andres, who conducted the experiments.

In the study, cells in culture were exposed to rotavirus in the absence or presence of soy isoflavones, biologically active compounds in soy that are thought to have health benefits. Soy contains many different forms of isoflavones, and all were tested individually and as the complete mixture present in infant formula......... Posted by: JoAnn      Read more         Source

September 4, 2007, 7:02 PM CT

Ibuprofen for children with cystic fibrosis

The results of a clinical trial, published in late August in the Journal of Pediatrics, indicates that, when used as part of routine treatment, high-dose ibuprofen is safe, and effective in slowing down lung disease in children with cystic fibrosis (CF).

Headed by Dr. Larry Lands, Director of Pediatric Respiratory Medicine at Montreal Childrens Hospital of the McGill University Health Centre, the multi-centre study monitored 142 children aged six to 18 with mild lung disease over two years.

Children given high-dose ibuprofen twice a day showed a significant reduction in the rate of decline in lung function, and had fewer and shorter hospital stays.

Slowing the rate of the decline of lung function will result in enhanced longevity and quality of life for patients with CF, said Dr. Larry Lands.

A number of therapys for cystic fibrosis can be a financial hardship for families, said Cathleen Morrison, Chief Executive Officer at the Canadian Cystic Fibrosis Foundation. News that ibuprofen a relatively inexpensive therapy in comparison to other therapies for CF is effective, is very exciting.

"We are delighted to share this great news. The findings of this study show that through research and innovation, a simple inexpensive therapy can have a profound impact on the lives of children affected by CF and their families," said Dr. Peter Liu, Scientific Director of CIHR's Institute of Circulatory and Respiratory Health......... Posted by: JoAnn      Read more         Source

August 31, 2007, 4:54 AM CT

Underage drinking starts before adolescence

As schools reopen around the country, a new study finds that parents and teachers should pay attention to alcohol prevention starting as early as fourth grade.

A review of national and statewide surveys conducted over the last 15 years shows that among typical 4th graders, 10% have already had more than a sip of alcohol and 7% have had a drink in the past year. While the numbers are small in the fourth grade, the surveys show that the percent of children who have used alcohol increases with age, and doubles between grades four and six. The largest jump in rates occurs between grades five and six, as per John E. Donovan, Ph.D., an associate professor of psychiatry and epidemiology at the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center. He is author of the study, Really Underage Drinkers: The Epidemiology of Childrens Alcohol Use in the United States, reported in the recent issue of Prevention Science, a peer-evaluated journal of the Society for Prevention Research (SPR).

Dr. Donovan said that eventhough there are a number of published national surveys of alcohol use among adolescents, national surveys and those conducted by state governments that have looked at alcohol use among young children are often unpublished. He observed that 39 of the 50 states have conducted statewide surveys that included children in the 6th grade or younger. His study summarized the results of the available national surveys as well as the statewide surveys conducted by Arizona, Delaware, New York, Ohio and Texas, which included fourth and fifth graders. Several of the surveys conducted on a regular basis since 1990 show that the numbers of elementary school children who have ever used alcohol, who have used alcohol in the past year, and who have used alcohol in the past month have all decreased significantly over time. But the numbers are still alarming because of the correlation between early alcohol consumption and negative outcomes later during both adolescence and young adulthood. It is this linkage that argues most strongly for preventing alcohol use previous to adolescence, Donovan said......... Posted by: JoAnn      Read more         Source

August 31, 2007, 4:52 AM CT

Children stressed 6 months before starting school

The first few days at school can be an anxious time as children face the challenge of a new environment and making new friends but as per new research funded by the Economic and Social Research Council, children show signs of stress three to six months before term even starts.

The researchers, led by Dr Julie Turner-Cobb at the University of Bath, were studying the effect of childrens temperament and behaviour on how stressful they found the experience of starting school.

To do this, they measured the levels of the stress hormone cortisol in children two weeks after they had started primary school and then measured them again six months later. They also took cortisol measurements three to six months before the children started school to provide baseline levels for comparison.

But the scientists were surprised to find that, far from providing a baseline, childrens cortisol levels were already high several months before the start of the school term. This suggests that stress levels in anticipation of starting school begin to rise much earlier than we expected, says Dr Turner-Cobb.

Why a preschool child should be anxious about an event so far in the future is something of a mystery but Dr Turner-Cobb speculates that parents were getting stressed about their children starting school and that their stress was being passed on to the children......... Posted by: JoAnn      Read more         Source

August 28, 2007, 8:43 PM CT

Hospital Practices Affect Long-Term Breastfeeding Success

Breast milk and breastfeeding are recognized to be the ideal choices of nutrition and feeding for infants. Breastfeeding is the normal method of feeding infants, and provides a number of benefits to both infants and mothers. In addition to receiving essential nutrients, breastfed infants have lower rates of ear infections, gastroenteritis, asthma, obesity and diabetes. Benefits for mothers include decreased occurence rate of breast and ovary cancer. National goals in the U.S. are a breastfeeding initiation rate of 75 percent (with an exclusive breastfeeding rate for the first 3 months of 60 percent), and continuation of 50 percent at 6 months of age (with 25 percent exclusively breastfeeding).

A new study in Birth: Issues in Perinatal Care suggests that implementing 5 breastfeeding-friendly practices in hospitals following birth can significantly improve long-term breastfeeding success. Nearly two-thirds of mothers who engaged in all 5 supportive practices were still breastfeeding 4 months after going home. The specific hospital practices include:.

• Initiating breastfeeding within 1 hour of delivery
• Keeping infants in the mother's hospital room
• Feeding infants only breast milk in the hospital; no supplementation of water or formula
• Prohibiting pacifier use in the hospital
........


Posted by: Emily      Read more         Source

August 21, 2007, 5:44 PM CT

Baby talk is universal

A major function of speech is the communication of intentions. In everyday conversation between adults, intentions are conveyed through multiple channels, including the syntax and semantics of the language, but also through nonverbal vocal cues such as pitch, loudness, and rate of speech.

The same thing occurs when we talk to infants. Regardless of the language we speak, most adults, for example, raise their voices to elicit the infants attention and talk at a much slower rate to communicate effectively. In the scientific community, this baby talk is termed infant-directed speech.

There are direct relationships between the way we speak and what we wish to convey. For example, when we see a child reaching for the electrical socket, we do not call out their name as we would during a game of hide-and-go-seek.

Scientists Greg Bryant and Clark Barrett, at the University of California, Los Angeles, propose that the relationships between sounds and intentions are universal, and thus, should be understood by anyone regardless of the language they speak.

To test their hypothesis, Bryant and Barrett recorded native English-speaking mothers as if they were talking to their own child and then as if they were speaking to an adult. The speech varied across four categories: prohibitive, approval, comfort, and attention. Then, they played the recordings to habitants of a Shuar (South American hunter-horticulturalists) village in Ecuador to see if the participants could discriminate between infant-directed (ID) and adult-directed (AD) speech, and whether they could tell the difference between the categories in both types of speech......... Posted by: JoAnn      Read more         Source

August 21, 2007, 5:19 PM CT

Nonmedicinal treatment for preschoolers with ADHD

Non-medicinal interventions are highly effective in preventing the behavioral and academic problems linked to Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD), as per a five-year study led by scientists at Lehigh Universitys College of Education.

The study, titled Project Achieve and funded by the National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH), was the largest of its kind focusing on children aged 3 to 5 who have shown significant symptoms of ADHD. It also involved scientists from Lehigh Valley Hospital in Allentown, Pa.

The researchers, led by George DuPaul, professor of school psychology at Lehigh; Lee Kern, professor of special education at Lehigh; and Dr. John Van Brakle, chair of the pediatrics department at Lehigh Valley Hospital, studied 135 preschool students with ADHD symptoms. They reviewed the effectiveness of early intervention techniques in helping children decrease defiant behavior and aggression, while improving academic and social skills.

The studys results are reported in a special series on ADHD in the most recent issue of School Psychology Review. Published by the National Association of School Psychology experts, the quarterly is the worlds second-largest peer-evaluated psychology journal.

Early identification and intervention are essential, but there has been a lack of research on how to identify and intervene effectively with these children during their preschool years, said Thomas Power, editor of the journal and program director with the Center for Management of ADHD at The Childrens Hospital of Philadelphia......... Posted by: JoAnn      Read more         Source

August 21, 2007, 5:18 PM CT

Newborn In-hospital Weight Loss

Healthy, full-term newborn babies tend to lose weight during the first few days after their birth. A groundbreaking new study reported in the latest issue of the Journal of Human Lactation explores the reasons why certain newborns lose more (or less) than others and what conclusions can be drawn from the research.

The purpose of the study, published by SAGE in the Journal of Human Lactation, for the International Lactation Consultant Association, was to determine the factors linked to in-hospital weight loss of healthy, full-term newborns, including birth and infant-feeding factors as well as maternal and newborn demographics.

The study found a substantial difference in weight loss between exclusively breastfed and completely formula-fed newborns, which lost less. That disparity led the scientists to conjecture that formula-fed infants may be at risk of early overfeeding. Supplemented breastfed infants had similar weight loss patterns to the exclusively breastfed newborns.

Degree of weight loss is critical in the decision to supplement breastfed infants with formula, write the studys authors, Patricia J. Martens, IBCLC, PhD, and Linda Romphf, IBCLC. However, given the overhydration of newborns, the early loss of meconium, and small fluid intake in the first few days, loss of 5-7% of birth weight is considered physiologically appropriate......... Posted by: JoAnn      Read more         Source