MedicineWorld.Org brings daily pediatric news from various sources to keep you updated on the latest events in the world on this topic. Medicineworld pediatric news service is the most comprehensive pediatric news service on the internet. We keep an archive of previous few days of news on this site. Please go down through the list to find the older news items. Fri, 06 Nov 2009 14:54:15 GMT en-us http://medicineworld.org/images/Pediatric-news.jpg 90 90 http://medicineworld.org/stories/lead/11-2009/air-pollution-and-infants-bronchiolitis.html http://medicineworld.org/stories/lead/11-2009/air-pollution-and-infants-bronchiolitis.html Fri, 06 Nov 2009 14:54:15 GMT Infants who are exposed to higher levels of air pollution are at increased risk for bronchiolitis, as per a newly released study. The study appears in the November 15 issue of the American Thoracic Society's American Journal of Respiratory and Critical Care Medicine. "There has been very little study of the consequences of early life exposure to air pollution," said Catherine Karr, M.D. PhD, assistant professor of pediatrics at the University of Washington and the paper's main author. "This study is unique in that we were able to look at multiple sources including wood smoke in a region with relatively low concentrations of ambient air pollution overall"........ ]]> http://medicineworld.org/stories/lead/11-2009/religion-and-medicine.html http://medicineworld.org/stories/lead/11-2009/religion-and-medicine.html Fri, 06 Nov 2009 14:54:15 GMT Do pediatric oncologists feel that religion is a bridge or a barrier to their work? Or do they feel it can be either, depending on whether their patients are recovering or deteriorating? A novel Brandeis University study examines these questions in the current issue of Social Problems Through in-depth interviews with 30 pediatricians and pediatric oncologists at elite medical centers, the authors discovered that physicians tend to view religion and spirituality pragmatically, considering them resources in family decision-making and in end of life situations, and barriers when they conflict with medical decisions, said main author Brandeis sociologist Wendy Cadge........ ]]> http://medicineworld.org/stories/lead/10-2009/suboptimal-vitamin-d-levels-in-millions-of-us-children.html http://medicineworld.org/stories/lead/10-2009/suboptimal-vitamin-d-levels-in-millions-of-us-children.html Fri, 06 Nov 2009 14:54:15 GMT Boston, Mass. -- Millions of children in the United States between the ages of 1 and 11 may suffer from suboptimal levels of vitamin D, as per a large nationally representative study reported in the recent issue of Pediatrics, accompanied by an editorial. The study, led by Jonathan Mansbach, MD, at Children's Hospital Boston, is the most up-to-date analysis of vitamin D levels in U.S. children. It builds on the growing evidence that levels have fallen below what's considered healthy, and that black and Hispanic children are at especially high risk........ ]]> http://medicineworld.org/stories/lead/10-2009/blood-lead-levels-and-test-scores.html http://medicineworld.org/stories/lead/10-2009/blood-lead-levels-and-test-scores.html Fri, 06 Nov 2009 14:54:15 GMT Exposure to lead in early childhood significantly contributes to lower performances on end-of-grade (EOG) reading tests among minority and low-income children, as per scientists at Duke University and North Carolina Central University. "We found a clear dose-response pattern between lead exposure and test performance, with the effects becoming more pronounced as you move from children at the high end to the low end of the test-score curve," said lead investigator Marie Lynn Miranda, director of the Children's Environmental Health Initiative (CEHI) at Duke's Nicholas School of the Environment........ ]]> http://medicineworld.org/stories/lead/10-2009/pre-term-births-and-higher-rates-of-eye-problems.html http://medicineworld.org/stories/lead/10-2009/pre-term-births-and-higher-rates-of-eye-problems.html Fri, 06 Nov 2009 14:54:15 GMT As more extremely pre-term infants survive in Sweden, an increasing number of babies are experiencing vision problems caused by abnormalities involving the retina, as per a report in the recent issue of Archives of Ophthalmology, one of the JAMA/Archives journals. "Retinopathy of prematurity [abnormal development of blood vessels in the retina] remains an important cause of childhood blindness and visual impairment throughout the world," the authors write as background information in the article. "During the last decade, neonatal care has changed with an increase in centralization, implementation of new therapies and provision of intensive care for infants of extremely low gestational age. These changes have contributed to an increasing population of survivors in neonatal intensive care units today. The occurence rate of retinopathy of prematurity in these extremely preterm infants is, therefore, unknown"........ ]]> http://medicineworld.org/stories/lead/10-2009/how-do-people-choose-a-name-for-their-child.html http://medicineworld.org/stories/lead/10-2009/how-do-people-choose-a-name-for-their-child.html Fri, 06 Nov 2009 14:54:15 GMT How do people choose a name for their child? Scientists have long noted that the overall popularity of a name exerts a strong influence on people's preferencesmore popular names, such as Robert or Susan, are more frequent and, by their sheer ubiquity, drive more parents to adopt a similar choice. However, new research by psychology experts at New York University and Indiana University, Bloomington suggests that the change in popularity of a name over time increasingly influences naming decisions in the United States. Like momentum traders in the stock market, parents today appear to favor names that have recently risen in popularity relative to names that are on the decline........ ]]> http://medicineworld.org/stories/lead/10-2009/using-imagination-to-reduce-abdominal-pain.html http://medicineworld.org/stories/lead/10-2009/using-imagination-to-reduce-abdominal-pain.html Fri, 06 Nov 2009 14:54:15 GMT Children with functional abdominal pain who used audio recordings of guided imagery at home in addition to standard medical therapy were almost three times as likely to improve their pain problem, in comparison to children who received standard therapy alone. And those benefits were maintained six months after therapy ended, a newly released study by University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and Duke University Medical Center scientists has found........ ]]> http://medicineworld.org/stories/lead/10-2009/autism-speaks-genetic-resource-exchange.html http://medicineworld.org/stories/lead/10-2009/autism-speaks-genetic-resource-exchange.html Fri, 06 Nov 2009 14:54:15 GMT Autism Speaks' Autism Genetic Resource Exchange (AGRE) and the Autism Tissue Program (ATP) continue to play an integral role in continuing genetic research and new findings in the complex autism inheritance and causation puzzle. As per a research findings reported in the October 7, edition of the journal Nature, an extensive research team of more than 75 research institutions identified semaphoring 5A, a gene implicated in the growth of neurons to form proper contacts and connections with other neurons. Prior studies have reported lower levels of this protein in blood samples from individuals with autism as in comparison to controls. In this study, the scientists were also able to extend that observation to the brain tissue of individuals with autism vs. control brains........ ]]> http://medicineworld.org/stories/lead/10-2009/many-children-are-exposed-to-violence-and-abuse.html http://medicineworld.org/stories/lead/10-2009/many-children-are-exposed-to-violence-and-abuse.html Fri, 06 Nov 2009 14:54:15 GMT A newly released study from the University of New Hampshire finds that U.S. children are routinely exposed to even more violence and abuse than has been previously recognized, with nearly half experiencing a physical assault in the study year. "Children experience far more violence, abuse and crime than do adults," said David Finkelhor, director of the UNH Crimes against Children Research Center and the study director. "If life were this dangerous for ordinary grown-ups, we'd never tolerate it"........ ]]> http://medicineworld.org/stories/lead/10-2009/dont-let-him-eat-sweet-everyday.html http://medicineworld.org/stories/lead/10-2009/dont-let-him-eat-sweet-everyday.html Fri, 06 Nov 2009 14:54:15 GMT Children who eat sweets and chocolate every day are more likely to be violent as adults, as per new research. A study of almost 17,500 participants in the 1970 British Cohort Study observed that 10-year-olds who ate confectionary daily were significantly more likely to have been convicted for violence at age 34 years........ ]]> http://medicineworld.org/stories/lead/10-2009/antidepressant-or-placebo.html http://medicineworld.org/stories/lead/10-2009/antidepressant-or-placebo.html Fri, 06 Nov 2009 14:54:15 GMT When used "off-label," the antidepressant amitriptyline works just as well as placebo in treating pain-predominant gastrointestinal disorders in children, as per a newly released study in Gastroenterology, the official journal of the American Gastroenterological Association (AGA) Institute. To view this article's video abstract, go to the AGA's YouTube Channel at www.youtube.com/AmerGastroAssn........ ]]> http://medicineworld.org/stories/lead/9-2009/how-to-deliver-the-bad-news.html http://medicineworld.org/stories/lead/9-2009/how-to-deliver-the-bad-news.html Fri, 06 Nov 2009 14:54:15 GMT New prenatal tests for Down syndrome are soon to be offered to all pregnant women across the United States, yet telling an expectant couple that their child will be born with Down syndrome is a task very few physicians are trained for, claims research reported in the American Journal of Medical Genetics The study, which evaluated decades of surveys and interviews, offers several recommendations for how physicians can best deliver the news........ ]]> http://medicineworld.org/stories/lead/9-2009/screening-for-jaundice-in-new-born-infants.html http://medicineworld.org/stories/lead/9-2009/screening-for-jaundice-in-new-born-infants.html Fri, 06 Nov 2009 14:54:15 GMT Screening for excess amounts of bilirubin in new born infants can significantly decrease the occurrence rate of severe jaundice which, in extreme cases, can lead to seizures and brain damage, as per scientists at UCSF Children's Hospital and Kaiser Permanente's Division of Research in Oakland, CA. The study, one of the first to examine the effectiveness of universal screening for hyperbilirubinemia, appears in the current issue of "Pediatrics," the official journal of the American Academy of Pediatrics. The study is one of six in this issue to explore the topic of bilirubin and hyperbilirubinemia........ ]]> http://medicineworld.org/stories/lead/9-2009/why-its-hard-to-be-good.html http://medicineworld.org/stories/lead/9-2009/why-its-hard-to-be-good.html Fri, 06 Nov 2009 14:54:15 GMT Being seen as either well behaved or naughty at school is never entirely in the hands of the individual child, this study funded by the Economic and Social Research Council shows. The research demonstrates that being good is not a simple matter. Once some children acquire poor overall reputations among teachers and other school staff, classmates and parents, it becomes difficult for them to be regarded as good. When young children start school they also have to develop interpretive skills to decode and negotiate mixed messages about how to behave........ ]]> http://medicineworld.org/stories/lead/8-2009/visits-nanas-with-your-toddlers.html http://medicineworld.org/stories/lead/8-2009/visits-nanas-with-your-toddlers.html Fri, 06 Nov 2009 14:54:15 GMT It's easy to list the negative stereotypes attributed to the elderly: they are considered forgetful, hard-of-hearing, absent-minded and confused. What's unsettling is that those stereotypes can be present in children as young as two or three. Research conducted by the University of Alberta's Sheree Kwong See, a psychology researcher, has identified that those stereotypes exist in some children at that age, which could adversely affect them when they are older........ ]]>