Chickenpox Lollipops? Mailing Tainted Suckers So Kids Develop Immunity Is Illegal

AppId is over the quota
AppId is over the quota

NASHVILLE, Tenn. — Parents fearful of vaccinations are being warned by a federal prosecutor that making a deal with a stranger who promises to mail them lollipops licked by children with chickenpox isn't just a bad idea, it's against the law.

Jerry Martin, U.S. attorney for the Middle District of Tennessee, said he was spurred by reports this week by KPHO-TV in Phoenix and WSMV-TV in Nashville about people turning to Facebook to find lollipops, spit or other items from children who have chickenpox.

“Can you imagine getting a package in the mail from this complete stranger that you know from Facebook because you joined a group, and say here, drink this purported spit from some other kid?” Martin told The Associated Press.Isaac Thomsen, a specialist in pediatric infectious diseases at Vanderbilt Children's Hospital, said it's unlikely the items will succeed in giving other children chickenpox.“If there's a very high load on the virus and shipped very quickly, it's theoretically possible,” he said. “But it's probably not an effective way to transmit it. It typically has to be inhaled.”

But Thomsen warned the lollipops could carry more dangerous viruses, including hepatitis.

Martin said it is a federal crime to send diseases or viruses across state lines, whether through the U.S. Postal Service or private services like FedEx or UPS. Sending the lollipops would be illegal under the same law that makes it illegal to mail contagions like anthrax. He said a conviction could lead to a sentence from less than a year to 20 years in prison.

MORE: 1 in 10 Parents Skip or Delay Vaccines

Martin said the items are sought by parents who don't want to give their children vaccines. He said he could neither confirm nor deny that his office is investigating or seeking charges against anyone.

According to the TV reports, parents have turned to a Facebook group called “Find a Pox Party in Your Area” to link up people looking to share the virus.

One of the Facebook postings from Wendy Werkit of Nashville offered a “fresh batch of pox in Nashville shipping of suckers, spit and Q-tips available tomorrow 50 dollars via PayPal.”

Werkit told WSMV that the money was used to cover the shipping costs of the lollipops had been licked by her children.

MORE: Should Pediatricians 'Fire' Patients Whose Parents Don't Vaccinate?

“They can't get (chickenpox) the normal way anymore of just naturally catching and just naturally getting the immunity for life,” Werkit said.

Thomsen, the Vanderbilt physician, said he was even more concerned by a person in the KPHO report seeking items tainted with measles to avoid a school-required vaccination. Measles has a significant mortality rate, causes more complications and is very infectious compared with chickenpox, he said.

And law enforcement won't take any such cases lightly, Martin said.

“If you are engaged in this type of behavior, you're not only potentially exposing innocent people to dangerous viruses and illnesses and diseases, you're also exposing yourself potentially to federal criminal prosecution,” he said.

News

Debt Financing

Read More

Fast Food's Biggest Customer: Not the Poor, But the Middle Class

AppId is over the quota
AppId is over the quota

Contrary to popular wisdom, eating at McDonald's isn't exactly cheap, costing some $28 for a family of four. Which might help explain the results of a recent study from the University of California, Davis, which found that people's visits to fast-food joints increased along with their incomes, and that poor people were spending fewer dollars on fast food than lower-middle and middle-income Americans.

The authors said their study suggests that the availability of fast food isn't the only driver of obesity in poor groups. "There is a correlation between obesity and lower income, but it cannot be solely attributed to restaurant choice," said J. Paul Leigh, professor of public health sciences at U.C. Davis and senior author of the study, in a statement. "Fast-food dining is most popular among the middle class, who are less likely to be obese."

MORE: Why Lovin' the McRib Isn't Heart Smart

Leigh and colleague DaeHwan Kim analyzed 1994-96 data from the Continuing Survey of Food Intakes by Individuals and the accompanying Diet and Health Knowledge Survey. The data included responses from 5,000 Americans who were asked about restaurant dining habits, income, race, gender, age and education.

The researchers found that people visited fast-food restaurants more often as their household income increased — at least up to a point. Fast-food visits rose along with annual income up to $60,000; beyond that, visits started to drop back down, replaced by full-service, sit-down dining at slightly higher prices.

Based on the data, the researchers described the typical fast-food consumer as a lower-middle income head of household, who is budget-conscious and harried and likes the convenience and low price of fast food, compared with other restaurants. Poor people, by contrast, can't easily afford fast-food "value meals," and the poorest, who may rely on the FNS Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP, certainly can't use food stamps at McDonald's.

LIST: Health-Washing: Is 'Healthy' Fast Food for Real?

For many years, the connection between poverty and obesity has been linked in part to the abundance of fast food in low-income areas. While the current study challenges the notion that poorer people eat more fast food than those who are better off, it doesn't absolve fast-food restaurants completely.

The study didn't take into consideration what people ate outside of restaurants, for example, and it's well established that low-income neighborhoods tend to be "food deserts" — where fresh, whole foods are scarce and where the bulk of available food is the high-fat, high-sugar stock of convenience stores. That type of environment is thought to contribute to unhealthy eating and weight gain.

"It would be a big mistake to look at the results of this report and say the environments people live in don't matter, because they do," Micah Weinberg, a senior policy adviser at the Bay Area Council who works on public health issues, told The Sacramento Bee.

The study's authors agreed that fast food certainly isn't helping the national waistline. "I'm not a big fan of fast food," Leigh told the Bee. "I'm sure that fast food in general has a big effect on obesity. This research does not contradict that."

The study will be published in Population Health Management in December

MORE:
Orders Fast-Food Salads, But That's Not the Real Problem" href="http://healthland.time.com/2011/10/04/fat-nation-fast-food-salads-arent-selling-but-thats-not-the-problem/">Nobody Orders Fast-Food Salads, But That's Not the Real Problem

Meredith Melnick is a reporter at TIME. Find her on Twitter at @MeredithCM. You can also continue the discussion on TIME's Facebook page and on Twitter at @TIME.

News

Debt Financing

Read More

Halloween Humor: Did Jimmy Kimmel Go Too Far Encouraging Parents to Deceive their Kids?

AppId is over the quota
AppId is over the quota

Late-night shows are, by definition, irreverent, but Jimmy Kimmel may have taken it a bit far last week when he challenged parents to record themselves telling their kids that they'd binged on all their Halloween candy.

Last Monday, I took issue on Healthland with the mean parents who scheme to deny their kids of their Halloween loot: they collaborate with neighbors to hand out only healthy snacks, they let them trick-or-treat only to force them to hand out their stash to kids who ring their doorbell later in the evening; they whisk it away and leave books and toys in its place.

But Kimmel elevated the “trick” to a whole new level, instructing parents to title their kids' reaction, “Hey, Jimmy Kimmel, I Told My Kids I Ate All Their Halloween Candy!” and upload the protests to YouTube.

As a third-party viewer, the footage was hilarious — the dire parental declaration predictably followed by tears and wails. My fave: the toddler at the end who chastises his mother (who reveals her good taste in candy by saying how much she enjoyed the peanut-butter cups): “You sneaky mom!” he cries out. Babble delighted in the dad who upped the reality quotient by strewing candy wrappers all over the dining room table. And TIME's Newsfeed warmed to the “adorable pair of brothers at the end who turned the tables and lectured their parents for the faux-transgression.”

I think I have a pretty good sense of humor, but I found the vigor with which parents delighted in deceiving their kids a little jarring. Cruel might be another word for it. It's kind of hard to imagine intentionally trying to make your kids cry — even for a few minutes of late-night glory. As a Huffington Post reader noted, “breaking your kids' trust for your amusement at their reaction and hurt feelings…is not cool.” Others dubbed it “emotional bullying" and “sadism masquerading as humor.”

What the parents didn't film was their rapprochement with their kids, post-lie. What must that have been like? I asked my kids if they would have forgiven me had I answered Kimmel's call. It wouldn't have come to that, they assured me. Said my 8-year-old: "We never would have believed you."

Guess the joke's on me.

Bonnie Rochman is a reporter at TIME. Find her on Twitter at @brochman. You can also continue the discussion on TIME's Facebook page and on Twitter at @TIME.

News

Debt Financing

Read More

NYC Marathon Sunday: Healthland's Tips for a Safe, Fun Run

AppId is over the quota
AppId is over the quota
EMMANUEL DUNAND/AFP/Getty Images

On Sunday, Nov. 6, tens of thousands of participants of the annual ING New York City Marathon will hurtle through the city's five boroughs. That's a lot of potential for fun — and for pain.

Following are a few tips Healthland has collected for running a safe race and recovering from the post-marathon blues.

Are you ready? This is a no-brainer, but make sure you are in truly race-ready shape — the fitter you are before a mega-run like a marathon, the lower your chances of injury and the less damage you'll do to your heart during the race. The good news is that marathon-associated heart damage is only temporary.Avoid the wall. Some 40% of runners hit "the wall," the dreaded moment, usually around mile 21, when the body depletes its available carbohydrate stores and starts burning fat instead, causing pain, dizziness and extreme fatigue. This calculator might help you avoid it.Good pain, bad pain. Take a page from these endurance runners and know the difference between injuries that require you to stop and those you can run through. In simplest terms: muscle inflammation is O.K., joint inflammation probably means its time to call it a day.Duck the post-race funk. An episode of mild depression is fairly common in the aftermath of a major event, especially one that you've spent a considerable amount of time and energy planning for. Avoid the post-race blues by scheduling away any empty downtime. Make plans to start a new project, or socialize with friends and family. Your plans don't have to be epic, but just make sure you stay occupied.

Most of all, have fun out there. We'll be cheering — and marveling — from the comfort of the sidelines. Good luck!

News

Debt Financing

Read More

Trick or Treat? FDA Warns Against Too Much Black Licorice

AppId is over the quota
AppId is over the quota

Just in time for Halloween, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) is warning people away from eating too much black licorice.

For adults age 40 or older, the FDA says, eating 2 ounces of black licorice a day for at least two weeks may lead to arrhythmia, or irregular heart rhythm, which could land you in the emergency room.

The culprit is glycyrrhizin, a sweetening compound derived from licorice root. In large amounts, glycyrrhizin can cause the body's potassium levels to drop, which in turn, may lead to abnormal heartbeat and high blood pressure. It can also cause water retention and swelling, which is a particular risk for people with congestive heart failure.

MORE: Enjoy! Chocolate Is Good For Your Heart

This isn't exactly a widespread risk — the FDA says that the agency received one report of a black licorice-related problem last year — but studies in several medical journals have linked the candy to health problems in people over 40 (some with a history of heart disease or high blood pressure).

The good news is that your potassium levels go right back to normal once you stop eating black licorice, with no permanent health effects. And if you like the taste, you'll be glad to know that many licorice-flavored products don't actually contain any real licorice; they're usually flavored with anise oil instead.

Also, although licorice root has long been used as a folk remedy in many cultures — it's purported to treat heartburn, stomach ulcers, sore throat, cough and even some viral infections — there's no evidence that it has any such health benefits, the FDA reports.

Black licorice can interfere with some medications, however, such as heart drugs and birth control pills, as well as some herbs and dietary supplements, so the FDA advises consumers to check with their doctor, if they have concerns.

MORE: The Chocolate Milk Wars: A Mom's Perspective

"No matter what your age, don't eat large amounts of black licorice at one time," the FDA says. If you have been eating a lot of it and have an irregular heart rhythm or muscle weakness, stop eating it immediately and call your doctor.

Sora Song is the health editor at TIME. Find her on Twitter @sora_song. You can also continue the discussion on TIME's Facebook page and on Twitter at @TIME.

News

Debt Financing

Read More

FDA Touts Increased Drug Approvals, Near Record for a Decade

AppId is over the quota
AppId is over the quota

Number of new drugs approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration in the year ending in September 2011 — an approval rate that has been exceeded just once in the previous decade. The FDA said it was the first in the world to approve 24 of the drugs, including many that were "truly medically important," according to FDA Commissioner Dr. Margaret Hamburg, such as the first drug for lupus in 50 years, the first drug for Hodgkin's lymphoma in 30 years, and the first drug to prolong survival in late-stage melanoma patients. The FDA pointed to its increase in approvals in part to counter increasing criticism that the agency's overly stringent approval process is hindering American innovation and competitiveness. [via The New York Times]

News

Debt Financing

Read More

It's No Guarantee, But You Should Get the Flu Shot Anyway

AppId is over the quota
AppId is over the quota

As vaccines go, the flu shot is no exemplar. A comprehensive new review of the research, published online by The Lancet Infectious Diseases, finds that the vaccine prevented illness in 59% of adults aged 18 to 64, and in eight of 12 flu seasons studied.

The authors said that evidence of effectiveness was particularly lacking in children aged 2 to 17 and in certain populations that are especially vulnerable to flu like elderly people over 65.

Still, said lead author Michael Osterholm, director of the Center for Infectious Disease Research & Policy at the University of Minnesota, 59% is better than zero, so people should still be getting their annual flu shots.

MORE: No Excuses! A Brief Guide to the Flu Shot

In their analysis, Osterholm and his team included 31 previously published studies (out of 5,707 they considered) — 17 randomized controlled trials and 14 observational studies — chosen based on strict study design criteria. Pooling data from various studies, the researchers found that the H1N1 vaccine was somewhat more effective than the seasonal flu shot, preventing infection in 69% of adults under 65. Nasal spray vaccines, which contain weakened live flu viruses, were more effective still, protecting 83% of children under age 7.

Because of the stringent criteria Osterholm and his team used to exclude trials from their analysis, their findings veer from those of the most recent review by the Cochrane group, which estimated that the flu vaccine was 73% effective when circulating flu strains matched those in the vaccine, and 44% when they didn't.

The findings may come as a surprise to the average consumer, but public health officials and vaccine makers are familiar with the flu shot's imperfect performance. Based on its own recent, unpublished data on the 2010-11 flu season, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) estimates that the vaccine was 60% effective in all age groups combined, cautioning that protection may vary widely:

At least two factors play an important role in determining the likelihood that influenza vaccine will protect a person from influenza illness: 1) characteristics of the person being vaccinated (such as their age and health), and 2) the similarity or "match" between the influenza viruses in the vaccine and those spreading in the community. During years when the viruses in the vaccine and circulating viruses are not well matched, it's possible that no benefit from vaccination may be observed. During years when the viruses in the vaccine and circulating viruses are very well matched, it's possible to measure substantial benefits from vaccination in terms of preventing influenza illness. However, even during years when the vaccine match is very good, the benefits of vaccination will vary across the population, depending on characteristics of the person being vaccinated and even, potentially, which vaccine was used.

MORE: 1 in 10 Parents Skip or Delay Vaccines

Indeed, a study published on Monday found that the vaccine may be even less effective than previously thought in overweight and obese people. About 11 months after it was administered, the vaccine had worn off by a factor of four in twice as many heavy people (50%) as in those of healthy weight (25%), according to the study by researchers from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. What's more, when blood samples from the 461 participants were exposed to the flu virus, 75% of samples from normal-weight people showed the appropriate immune response, compared with only 25% of obese people's blood samples.

"It's clear that what we really need is to develop new and better vaccines," Osterholm told NPR's Shots blog. But because the current vaccine, while not ideal, is safe and moderately effective, and because it would cost so much to introduce a new vaccine that works significantly better, it's held up development.

Scientists are now working on a universal flu vaccine that would offer protection against all flu strains for years. The current flu shot must be reformulated and manufactured anew each year, with the three strains that health officials predict will be the most commonly circulating.

There's another way to boost the potency of flu shots: by adding adjuvants. In a recent study published in the New England Journal of Medicine, researchers found that seasonal flu shots with adjuvants were 86% effective in children aged 6 or younger, compared with a 43% protection rate for conventional shots. No flu shots with adjuvants are currently approved for use in the U.S.

On balance, though, getting the regular old flu shot is better than not getting one. The CDC recommends the vaccine for everyone over 6 months old. It may not eradicate all influenza infections, but it can help prevent illness, hospitalizations and deaths.

MORE: Do Flu Shots Really Work? A Skeptic's View

Meredith Melnick is a reporter at TIME. Find her on Twitter at @MeredithCM. You can also continue the discussion on TIME's Facebook page and on Twitter at @TIME.

News

Debt Financing

Read More

Your Product Is Free of Parabens, Sulfates and Lots of Other Things: Should You Care?

AppId is over the quota
AppId is over the quota

Roxanne Green is a corporate ingredient-reader. What that means is she gets paid to do what savvy (neurotic?) consumers spend hours doing in the cosmetics aisle.

Green, who works at PCC Markets outside Seattle, follows an extensive list from the nonprofit Natural Products Association (NPA) detailing what ingredients the group prohibits. She scrutinizes every label and tosses any products that don't meet the NPA's strict standards. In the course of this laborious work, she's noticed a new marketing trend: an increasing number of shampoos, soaps and moisturizers are touting what they don't contain.

Kiss My Face sunscreen proclaims it's paraben-free. Avalon Organics shampoo boasts it's got no grapefruit seed extract. Even cosmetics giant L'Oreal has a sulfate-free shampoo line. And here's a real doozy: Hugo Naturals soap states it's free of "parabens, phenoxyethanol, SLS, PEGs, propylene glycol, petroleum products, artificial colors or synthetic fragrances."

But what are parabens? Or grapefruit seed extract? And why exactly is sulfate something you don't want in your shampoo?

In the current print issue of TIME, we explore the concept of "ingredient anxiety" — that feeling of stress that bubbles up when you learn you should be avoiding a particular ingredient but you're not exactly sure why. Subscribers can read it here — and try to relax.

After all, even the experts can get overwhelmed. Cara Welch, chief scientist for the NPA, acknowledges that all those polysyllabic chemicals can be really confusing. "Look for ingredients you recognize," advises Welch. "We know not everyone has a Ph.D. in chemistry."

Bonnie Rochman is a reporter at TIME. Find her on Twitter at @brochman. You can also continue the discussion on TIME's Facebook page and on Twitter at @TIME.

News

Debt Financing

Read More

How Being Socially Connected May Sap Your Empathy

AppId is over the quota
AppId is over the quota

Feeling socially connected is good for you, both physically and mentally, but in a paradox, it may also make you less empathetic to the plight of others.

Numerous studies have established that having lots of social support is associated with longevity and better psychological health, but past studies have also hinted that there's something about the chemistry of connection that inclines people toward unkindness — particularly toward stigmatized groups like those with disabilities or addictions.

The researchers of the new study wanted to explore this issue further by looking at how people who had a strong sense of social support would behave toward those outside their circle. Specifically, the researchers sought to examine whether feelings of connectedness led to increased tendencies to dehumanize others.

"By 'dehumanization,' we mean the failure to consider another person as having a mind," says lead author Adam Waytz, assistant professor at the Kellogg School of Management at Northwestern University, explaining that the idea of "mind" includes the capacity to feel pain and pleasure, as well as to plan and intend.

MORE: Why Kids Bully: Because They're Popular

In one experiment, the researchers randomly assigned 38 participants to write essays: some were asked to write about a time they felt supported by a loved one; others were instructed to write about a person whom they see in daily life but don't interact with, like someone they see in the hall at school or work.

Afterward, the volunteers were asked to evaluate their perceptions of four different groups: rich people, middle class people, those with drug addictions and disabled people. The evaluations had to do with different aspects of mind that they were asked to attribute to the average group member, such as how capable the person would be of "engaging in a great deal of thought" or "doing things on purpose."

The participants who had written about feeling supported were more likely to dehumanize the addicted and disabled people, lowering their rankings of various aspects of mind by about one point on a 7-point scale.

In another experiment, 59 participants were given photos of people they were told were terrorists responsible for planning the attacks of 9/11. Some of the volunteers looked through the pictures with a friend, while others did so with a stranger who was also participating in the research.

Afterward, when questioned, people who perused the photos with a friend were more likely to support the use of waterboarding and the use of greater levels of electric shock on the suspects. On a 450-volt scale, those who'd been with their friends said that 170.6 volts would be acceptable to use on average, while those working with a stranger were only willing to go up to 136.

"We think there are two reasons," says Waytz. "One is that experience of social connection draws a circle around you that defines who is in and who is out. It very clearly delineates who is 'us versus them' and when it is 'us versus them,' people outside appear to be less human.

"The more interesting reason is that social connection is sort of like eating. When you are hungry, you seek out food. When you are lonely, you seek social connection. When the experience of social connection is elevated, we feel socially 'full' and have less desire to seek out other people and see them in a way that treats them as essentially human."

MORE: Why Getting 'High' Increases Acts of Charity

A similar psychology may affect our everyday interactions. "People talk about being overextended, having too many dinner dates, coffee dates, meetings. They feel depleted," says Waytz. "We think this plays into our findings. Even though you are extremely socially connected, at some point, it comes at the expense of the ability to consider the full humanity of those around you."

While Waytz doesn't suggest people should limit their feelings of genuine connectedness, he does think there are bounds to our ability to be truly present for others. "Empathy is a fixed resource and when we are spending it on those close to us, we simply have less to spend on others whom we feel less close to," he says.

But that doesn't preclude us from rationally recognizing the tendency to dehumanize outsiders, he says, and relying on our moral principles to avoid behaving dishonorably. "I think expanding the circle of empathy has been good for humankind," he says. "But that's only part of the story. Another part is [using moral guidelines] like the Universal Declaration of Human Rights."

Waytz' research also suggests that we might reconsider the way we characterize people with addictions. Although the notion of addiction as brain disease may absolve addicts of some of the blame for their affliction, it also suggests that they are not operating under free will. Since dehumanization itself involves seeing people as having "less mind" and a reduced ability to plan or control behavior, that view may increase the stigma of the condition, not reduce it.

The paradoxes of human nature make these issues much more complicated than they initially seem.

The research [PDF] was published in the Journal of Experimental Social Psychology.

MORE:
Mind Reading: Steven Pinker's Case for Why the World Is Heading Toward

Peace" href="http://healthland.time.com/2011/10/10/mind-reading-steven-pinkers-case-for-why-the-world-is-heading-toward-peace/">Mind Reading: Steven Pinker's Case for Why the World Is Heading Toward Peace

Maia Szalavitz is a health writer at TIME.com. Find her on Twitter at @maiasz. You can also continue the discussion on TIME Healthland's Facebook page and on Twitter at @TIMEHealthland.

News

Debt Financing

Read More

Study: H1N1 Can Be Deadly Even for Healthy Kids

AppId is over the quota
AppId is over the quota

Flu prevention is important for everyone, but here's another reason to make sure to get vaccinated: in a study of childhood flu deaths from the 2009 H1N1 pandemic, researchers found that otherwise healthy kids can succumb to the virus, particularly if they've already got an increasingly common bacterial infection.

The infection, methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA), sent previously healthy kids to the hospital and increased their risk of death from flu to eight times that of MRSA-free children, according to research published Monday in Pediatrics. MRSA, which is becoming increasingly resistant to antibiotics, can cause skin infections, invade surgical wounds and wreak havoc internally.

"There's more risk for MRSA to become invasive in the presence of flu or other viruses," said lead researcher Dr. Adrienne Randolph of the Division of Critical Care Medicine at Children's Hospital Boston in a statement. "These deaths in co-infected children are a warning sign."

MORE: CDC: 115 Kids Died of Flu Last Season, Most Weren't Vaccinated

The flu virus suppresses even robust immune systems, making the body more vulnerable to infection. And in children, who typically withstand exposure to massive quantities of bacteria, a dip in immunity may be the difference between a manageable bacterial colony and an invasive bacterial disease.

Randolph and her team examined the medical records of 838 children whose average age was 6; they were all admitted to intensive-care units with H1N1 flu virus during the 2009-2010 flu pandemic. Of the 75 children who died, most had at least one preexisting condition such as asthma or weakened immune systems that further compromised their ability to fight the flu. But researchers were particularly curious what contributed to the critical illnesses faced by the 251 children who were considered otherwise healthy.

They found that MRSA and its more common cousin, S. aureus, was to blame: it upped the risk of death for previously healthy kids who contracted H1N1, which is alarming because MRSA infections — though rare — are on the rise. A recent study found that more than 2% of all 2008 pediatric hospital admissions were due to MRSA — up from only .2% in 1999.

MORE: 1 in 10 Parents Skip or Delay Vaccines

"There's a nice message here about vaccines: that even otherwise healthy children are still at risk, and they are at risk of death,” Dr. Lisa Saiman, a professor of clinical pediatrics at Columbia University, told The New York Times. “These findings provide further support for the recent recommendations by the C.D.C. to immunize all eligible people."

Everyone older than 6 months should get vaccinated, recommends the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (this year's seasonal vaccine also guards against 2009 H1N1, which hasn't mutated significantly since then). Roll up your sleeve — no excuses.

Meredith Melnick is a reporter at TIME. Find her on Twitter at @MeredithCM. You can also continue the discussion on TIME's Facebook page and on Twitter at @TIME.

News

Debt Financing

Read More

Study: Whites More Likely to Abuse Drugs Than Blacks

AppId is over the quota
AppId is over the quota

Black youth are arrested for drug crimes at a rate ten times higher than that of whites. But new research shows that young African Americans are actually less likely to use drugs and less likely to develop substance use disorders, compared to whites, Native Americans, Hispanics and people of mixed race.

“Our goal is to alert people to the burden of drug problems and also to how some of our concern about who has these problems may not be true,” says Dr. Dan Blazer, senior author of the study and a professor of psychiatry at Duke University. “There's a perception among many individuals that African Americans as a group — regardless of socioeconomic status — tend to abuse or use drugs at higher rate and this [does not support] that."

Using data from 72,561 youth interviewed for the National Survey on Drug Use and Health, researchers found that 37% of those aged between 12 and 17 had used alcohol or other drugs at least once in the past year. Nearly 8% met criteria for a substance use disorder — either the less severe “substance abuse” diagnosis or the more problematic “substance dependence,” which is more commonly known as addiction.

The study, which was published Monday in the Archives of General Psychiatry, controlled for variables like socioeconomic status because rates of severe drug problems tend to be greater amongst the poor. Despite this, Native American youth fared worst, with 15% having a substance use disorder, compared to 9.2% for people of mixed racial heritage, 9.0% for whites, 7.7% for Hispanics, 5% for African Americans and 3.5% for Asians and Pacific Islanders.

It is not known why rates for Native Americans were so elevated, but the category of substance use disorders does include alcoholism, a disorder for which this group is known to be at high risk.  Marijuana and prescription opioid problems also occurred at higher rates in Native Americans.

MORE: How to Find the Best Drug Treatment for Teens: A Guide for Parents

The authors considered abuse and dependence together rather than separating them because the next edition of psychiatry's diagnostic manual, the DSM-V, will combine them into one diagnosis, with different levels of severity.

“It's really difficult when you look at the data to actually separate out abuse and dependence,” says Blazer, while acknowledging that merging the categories could pose different problems.

For example, a large proportion of youth with drug problems recover without treatment. While rates of substance use disorders tend to be around 8% in the teen years, these rates dip to less than 2% for those over 26; the number of people who've gotten better far exceeds that which could have possibly attended treatment or even self-help groups.

That poses a problem: addiction treatment centers tend to focus on getting youth to acknowledge that they have a chronic, relapsing disease, but this — in combination with surrounding youth with peers who are also in trouble — could create a self-fulfilling prophecy.

MORE: Does Teen Rehab Cure Addiction or Create It?

“Labeling can be problematic,” says Blazer, “but also, treating these individuals is not easy. Most programs have modest success at best and with ongoing use over time the ability to actually reverse [the disorder] declines. Therefore, by identifying these individuals early and intervening early, they have a much better chance.”

That is, of course, if the treatment is effective and doesn't use tactics that can backfire. “I would hope we get a little more enlightened in the way we treat adolescents,” Blazer says, explaining that treatment must be culturally sensitive if it is to help all types of youth resolve drug problems.

MORE: The Authentic Self: How Do You Know If You're 'Really' Racist or Sexist?

Maia Szalavitz is a health writer at TIME.com. Find her on Twitter at @maiasz. You can also continue the discussion on TIME Healthland's Facebook page and on Twitter at @TIMEHealthland.

News

Debt Financing

Read More

Why Leather Football Helmets Could Provide a Better Defense Against Concussion

AppId is over the quota
AppId is over the quota

If we want to cut down on football concussions, should we bring back the leather helmet? Not quite, says a new study in the Journal of Neurosurgery, though the noggin-protectors of yore do at least as good of a job as modern helmets at staving off concussions.

Modern helmets do a much better job of preventing deadly skull fractures. But on the type of lower-impact hits to the head you typically see in college and high school games — the constant subconcussive blows that can also cause brain damage — leatherheads do a comparable, and sometimes better, job of reducing concussion risks than today's helmets, according to Cleveland Clinic researchers.

“The fact that leather helmets were even in the neighborhood with modern helmets was surprising,” says Adam Bartsch, the study's lead researcher and director of the Spine Research Laboratory at the Cleveland Clinic's Center for Spine Health.

To reach this conclusion, Bartsch says his team basically “smashed some helmets together.” In the experiments, 11 widely-used high school football helmets and two vintage turn-of-the-century models were placed on the heads of crash-test dummies. The researchers simulated head impacts at gravity-force (Gs) levels of 75 Gs or less, which are typically encountered in high school and college games. They simulated impacts at different angles – a head-on collision, a hit to the side of the head, a hit to the back of the head – and measured their effects on skull rotation, neck force, neck torque and other head movements.

MORE: Study Ranks 10 Football Helmets for Concussion Safety

This data was input into a software program that estimates risk of brain contusions, acute subdural hematoma (bleeding on the surface of the brain), and diffuse axonal injury (DAI), which causes the shearing of nerve cells within the brain. “Overall,” the study concludes, leather helmets and modern helmets provide a “similar protectiveness profile” during subconcussive hits. In fact, under one testing scenario, a leather helmet provided a lower level of DAI risk than any of the modern helmets.

How could a leatherhead possibly be more protective? One reason, Bartsch says, probably has to with the stiffness of today's helmets. While these helmets are effective shields against catastrophic skull fractures, they don't do as good a job absorbing energy from a lower impact hit. These hits might not break the skull, but they can cause the brain to shift a little bit within the skull. And such jiggling causes concussions.

Bartsch offers a useful analogy: Think about hitting your thumb with a hammer. If you put, say, a piece of a padded gym mat on your thumb, that padding will absorb the impact from the hammer, and dull the pain. Now, imagine putting a two-by-four on top of your thumb. Whack the hammer against that stiffer surface; your thumb will probably hurt more than the gym mat.  Think of the leatherhead as the gym mat, and a plastic helmet as the two-by-four. The hammer is like a football hit, while the thumb is like your head.

MORE: Study: Boys, Girls Suffer Different Concussion Symptoms

Still, we won't be returning to the leather helmet days; no one wants fatalities on the football field. Yet it's worth considering whether today's football helmets might benefit from a slightly softer outer shell.

For inspiration, Bartsch suggests that the sporting-goods industry look at car companies.  “Unlike cars, in which seat belts, airbags and crumple zones make the choice between a 1920s Model T and the modern mini-van a no-brainer," said Bartsch in a release that accompanied the study, "these results tell us that modern helmets have ample room to improve safety against many typical in-game hits."

Sean Gregory is a staff writer at TIME. Find him on Twitter at @seanmgregory. You can also continue the discussion on TIME's Facebook page and on Twitter at @TIME.

News

Debt Financing

Read More

Why Air Fresheners Can Trigger Respiratory Problems

AppId is over the quota
AppId is over the quota

They may smell sweet, but popular air fresheners can cause serious lung problems.

That's the message from a new study presented over the weekend at the annual meeting of the American College of Allergy, Asthma and Immunology (ACAAI). Home fragrance products often contain volatile organic compounds (VOCs) that include such nasty chemicals as formalehyde, petroleum distillates, limonene, esters and alcohols. (Download a copy of the presentation here.

Exposures to such VOCs — even at levels below currently accepted safety recommendations — can increase the risk of asthma in kids. That's because VOCs can trigger eye and respiratory tract irritation, headaches and dizziness, as Dr. Stanley Fineman, ACAAI president-elect, pointed out:

This is a much bigger problem than people realize. About 20 percent of the population and 34 percent of people with asthma report health problems from air fresheners. We know air freshener fragrances can trigger allergy symptoms, aggravate existing allergies and worsen asthma.

MORE: 5 Ways Americans' Allergies Are Getting Worse

And if you hope that "all-natural" fragrance products can give you a nice scent without the chemicals, Fineman has bad news for you — even products marketed as organic tend to have hazardous chemicals. That shouldn't be surprising since fragrance products don't eliminate bad smells; they just cover them up, and that usually requires something strong.

Fineman suggests that you'd be better off simply opening up your window and letting fresh air in — though that advice might not work well where I live.

MORE: Environmental Toxins Cost Billions in Childhood Disease

The study also gives some much-needed attention to the problem of indoor air pollution. While air freshener-related asthma is certainly a health hindrance in the developed world — at least among those who like to live in artificially sweet-smelling homes — indoor air pollution is a major health catastrophe for much of the developing world, one that leads to the premature deaths of nearly 2 million people a year according to the World Health Organization. The majority of those affected are very poor women and children who might spent hours cooking food over a wood-burning fire in a hut with little ventilation.

One solution would be to supply cleaner cookstoves that might burn biogas with far less smoke. That's one health intervention that would save lives at an incredibly low cost— almost certainly less than the $8.3 billion in revenue the global air fragrance industry is expected to earn by 2015.

MORE:  Could Microwaves Be Associated With Children's Asthma?

Bryan Walsh is a senior writer at TIME. Find him on Twitter at @bryanrwalsh. You can also continue the discussion on TIME's Facebook page and on Twitter at @TIME

News

Debt Financing

Read More

This race isn't about running

AppId is over the quota
AppId is over the quota
Chris Fenton completed his sixth marathon of the year in Appleton, Wisconsin, in September. The Leukemia & Lymphoma Society's team raises money for blood cancer researchChris Fenton is running 10 marathons in six months in honor of his motherSharing personal stories helps runners focus on the goal, donors open wallets

(CNN) -- While the coastal town of Savannah, Georgia, fills with spectators on Saturday for the Rock 'n' Roll marathon, Chris Fenton and Laura Devrieze will be focused on the finish line.

For Fenton, crossing that line means completing his 10th marathon in six months. For Devrieze, it means finishing her first. For both, it's about running 26.2 miles for a parent with cancer.

Fenton and Devrieze are a part of the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society's Team in Training program. As the world's largest endurance sports training program, Team in Training has raised $1.2 billion for blood cancer research.

The program started 23 years ago when Bruce Cleland formed a group to run the New York City Marathon in honor of his daughter, a leukemia survivor.

Approximately 45,000 runners are signed up this year for the New York marathon, which takes place on November 6. Many are associated with one of the 200 registered charities; in 2010 the race raised more than $30 million for different causes.

Train with Sanjay: 2012 Fit Nation Triathlon Challenge

Leukemia & Lymphoma Society communications manager Kristin Hoose says having a cause helps athletes focus on a goal, and having an athlete to support helps donors open their wallets.

"When people share their personal stories, and those of their heroes ... people see that their $10 can make a big difference."

A mother's strength

Chris Fenton was on a business trip in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, when he got a message from the secretary. His sister had called from Manhattan. Fenton looked at his watch and realized it was close to midnight in the States. Something was wrong.

"You hear those words for the first time: 'Mom has cancer.' You just kind of drop the phone and go into shock and say 'Oh my god. Oh my god. Oh my god,'" he said.

Chris Fenton with his mom, Barbara, left, and his Aunt Vicki, who has also survived cancer.

His mom, Barbara, is the matriarch of the Fenton family. As the second oldest of 14 children and a mother of six, Barbara received an outpouring of love after her non-Hodgkin lymphoma diagnosis. She had always taken care of everyone else, now they would take care of her.

Treatment was hard. Barbara endured four courses of chemo and four of radiation therapy. In October 2001, she went into remission.

Fenton's left Achilles tendon is screaming at him as he talks about his mom -- now the picture of health at 78 -- from home in Kohler, Wisconsin.

"She's settling in, loves to be a grandmother and spoil the grandkids, and (is) just kind of enjoying the golden years," he says with a laugh.

A long-time runner, Fenton started his journey to honor his mom in May. He's running 10 marathons (to celebrate her 10th anniversary of going into remission) in six months -- the time it took from diagnosis to remission. Since May, he has logged more than 200 official miles. Saturday marks his final race.

"I'm still a middle-of-the-pack plodder," he says, "but I'm able to find my way around a marathon course."

He has raised close to $100,000 over the last 10 years and hopes to continue supporting blood cancer research with Team in Training.

"My mom's story had a positive outcome. There are a lot of people who don't."

A father's joy

People loved Harry Devrieze. With thinning dark hair and bright blue eyes, he had a smile that lit up a room. Friends and family were his priority and he never hesitated to lend a helping hand.

The owner of a construction business, he often came by his daughter Laura's house in Carrollton, Georgia, to make repairs. It was from him that she learned plumbing, drywall and her way around the Home Depot store.

Laura Devrieze smiles with her dad, Harry, at a family member's graduation party.

"He loved doing that -- he loved fixing things, he loved gardening, he loved working around the house."

Two years ago, Harry developed a rare, aggressive form of non-Hodgkin lymphoma. After chemotherapy, he was giving a clean bill of health, but the cancer returned and was discovered in January.

The Devrieze family was almost surprised by the intensity of the disease the second time around. The toll it took on Harry's body was more menacing.

"This was a full attack on his bones, his lungs, his muscles," Devrieze remembers.

It was during this time that she went to her first Team in Training meeting and signed up for the Rock 'n' Roll marathon. Running gave her time to clear her mind and be by herself. Her dad supported Devrieze's decision to race and to raise money for the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society.

"It was always important for him for me to be involved and kind of have a cause," Devrieze says. "He's the reason I was doing it, but he didn't want to be the reason I was doing it."

While she ran 5 miles, then 10, then 15, her dad started preparing for a stem cell transplant. He spent the month of May at Emory University Hospital. On Saturdays, Devrieze joined Team in Training in Atlanta for a run and then went to visit him.

Harry was released from the hospital in late June after the transplant didn't take. He passed away on August 16, 2011 at age 70.

For a couple of weeks, Devrieze refused to run, clutching to the friends and family Harry had held so close. Then she picked up her shoes and moved with the pain.

For Devrieze, Saturday will be yet another reminder of her loss. Her dad won't be there to watch her cross the finish line. That's why she's all the more determined to do exactly that.

"He was very proud and very excited. This is the longest I've ever run. It's mind over body, and having a greater purpose ... makes the mind part work better."

Education Information

Technology

Read More

The Plutonium Problem: Who Pays For Space Fuel?

AppId is over the quota
AppId is over the quota
November 8, 2011

Audio for this story from Morning Edition will be available at approx. 9:00 a.m. ET

NASA

NASA's next Mars rover, Curiosity, seen in this artist's concept, will use 8 pounds of plutonium-238 as its power supply. That's a significant portion of the remaining space fuel. NASA and the Department of Energy have offered to split the costs of producing the fuel, but Congress has so far opposed that arrangement.

When NASA's next Mars rover blasts off later this month, the car-sized robot will carry with it nearly eight pounds of a special kind of plutonium fuel that's in short supply.

NASA has relied on that fuel, called plutonium-238, to power robotic missions for five decades.

But with supplies running low, scientists who want the government to make more are finding that it can sometimes seem easier to chart a course across the solar system than to navigate the budget process inside Washington, D.C.

Plutonium-238 gives off heat that can be converted to electricity in the cold, dark depths of space. It's not the same plutonium used for bombs. But during the cold war, the United States did produce this highly toxic stuff in facilities that supported the nuclear weapons program — although those facilities stopped making it in the late 1980s.

"Because the United States has access to plutonium 238, we are the only country that has ever sent a science mission beyond Mars," says Len Dudzinski, the program executive for radioisotope power systems at NASA headquarters.

Dudzinski says NASA has used these plutonium-powered systems for famous missions like the Voyager probes. "In fact, we've got Voyager now with over 30 years of successful operation," he says. "It is the farthest manmade object from Earth that NASA has ever sent out."

Besides Voyager, plutonium fuels the Cassini probe, which is orbiting Saturn, as well as the New Horizons mission, which is headed to Pluto.

The pounds of plutonium loaded onto the soon-to-be-launched Mars Science Laboratory represent a significant fraction of a dwindling inventory. "I can't tell you exactly what that fraction is," says Dudzinski. "The Department of Energy knows the exact amount of plutonium that we have, and they don't ordinarily share that number publicly."

But the shortage is public knowledge and has been for years. For a while Russia sold us some of the material, but that source has dried up too. In 2009, a report from the National Research Council warned that the day of reckoning had arrived and that quick action was needed.

Enlarge NASA

NASA's Voyager spacecraft, seen in this artist's concept, runs on plutonium-238. It's the farthest man-made object from Earth NASA has ever sent out.

NASA NASA's Voyager spacecraft, seen in this artist's concept, runs on plutonium-238. It's the farthest man-made object from Earth NASA has ever sent out.

The Debate Over Cost-Sharing

Space exploration advocates point out that it will take years to get the plutonium production process started, so delays now could have consequences later.

Jim Adams, deputy director of planetary science at NASA, says that with budget pressure slowing the pace of exploration, there's enough of the fuel for NASA missions currently planned through the end of this decade, to around 2022. "Beyond that, we'll need more plutonium," he says.

If NASA doesn't get it, he says, "then we won't go beyond Mars anymore. We won't be exploring the solar system beyond Mars and the asteroid belt."

"It takes at least five years to get enough for one spacecraft," says Bethany Johns, a public policy expert with the American Astronomical Society who has been lobbying Congress on this issue. "So there's a long time between turning on the on switch at the facility and then actually producing enough that can be handled by humans to put into a spacecraft."

NASA has made some progress in helping the Department of Energy develop plans to restart production, says Adams. "We have worked with the Department of Energy to supply up to $5 million this fiscal year," he says.

But the agencies have run into trouble convincing Congress to accept their plan for how to deal with the costs.

The price to restart production is expected to be $75 million to $90 million over five years. And NASA and the Department of Energy want to split the bill between them. That's how they've done this sort of thing in the past, because even though NASA will use the plutonium, only the Department of Energy can make and handle this nuclear material.

But some key decision-makers don't like that cost-sharing idea. Lawmakers in Congress have refused to give the Department of Energy the requested funds for this project for three years in a row.

Earlier this year, Representative Adam Schiff, D-Calif., pleaded with his colleagues to reconsider during an appropriations committee meeting. "Does anyone in this room think that we don't we need the plutonium 238? Does anyone not want to continue to do deep space missions?" Schiff asked. "Well, the Russians won't give it to us, and we don't have enough of it."

But others said if NASA wants the stuff, NASA should pick up the whole tab. They said putting half of it under energy's budget would mean taking money away from other kinds of nuclear research.

Schiff argued that $733 million dollars was being allocated to nuclear energy research and that dedicating $10 million for the plutonium project shouldn't be a big deal. "This has got to get done," Schiff urged. "All we're quibbling about here is whether it's paid for by NASA completely or it's paid for by DOE completely, and both agencies have said what makes sense is to split it down the middle."

But the majority of his colleagues were unconvinced. Given the opposition in Congress, officials say they need to rethink things and figure out how much NASA can legally pay for under the Atomic Energy Act.

As things stand, experts don't expect production of new plutonium to be fully up and running before 2020.

"Our perspective is, we don't really care where the money comes from, as long as we get the money," says Johns. "Because we need to start immediately."

Health Management

Education Information

Read More

Nebraska May Play Key Role In Canada Pipeline Battle

AppId is over the quota
AppId is over the quota
Nati Harnik/AP

TransCanada plans to build the Keystone XL pipeline through Nebraska's Sandhills region shown here in Mills, Neb. State legislators have introduced bills barring pipelines in environmentally sensitive areas like the Sandhills and the Ogallala aquifer.

Thousands of demonstrators ringed the White House on Sunday afternoon, demanding that President Obama deny permission for a proposed pipeline to carry crude oil from the tar sands of Canada to refineries in Texas.

Business and labor groups support the Keystone XL project; many environmentalists oppose it. But deliberations in Nebraska may play a decisive role.

There, lawmakers have introduced bills in response to concerns over the pipeline's projected path through an important source of water. One bill would prevent companies from building pipelines over certain ecologically sensitive areas; another would require pipeline companies to set up a $500 million indemnity bond in case of any leaks.

We ask: Why would you risk an oil spill or leak over the aquifer when TransCanada already has a pipeline route on the eastern side of Nebraska?

- Nebraska Gov. Dave Heineman

Opposition To Pipeline Route

On one recent afternoon, a small crowd gathered in the vaulting rotunda of Nebraska's towering state Capitol in Lincoln. Light streamed into the space from arched windows high above, bouncing off the floor where a marble mosaic depicts Mother Earth yielding gifts of food and water.

"Nebraskans live here because we choose to be here," Nebraska author Mary Pipher said about her state. "Our state is not glamorous, exciting or an easy place to make a living. What we have in our state is our history, our relationships, our land and our water."

The occasion wasn't an abstract celebration of civic pride: It was a news conference preceding a special session of the Legislature meeting a few steps away to discuss the pipeline. Nebraska Gov. Dave Heineman recently reversed himself and called the Legislature into special session to deal with this issue.

"Many Nebraskans, including myself, support the pipeline, but we are opposed to the route that goes through the Sandhills and over the Ogallala aquifer," Heineman explained. "We ask: Why would you risk an oil spill or leak over the aquifer when TransCanada already has a pipeline route on the eastern side of Nebraska?"

The vast Sandhills in the northwest region of the state are home to more cattle than people. Beneath the grass-covered dunes is the Ogallala aquifer, which supplies about 80 percent of Nebraska's water for drinking and irrigation.

Upcoming Legislative Issues

Concerns over a pipeline carrying 700,000 barrels of oil a day through the aquifer have produced an unlikely coalition against it.

"You have conservative farmers and ranchers, you have progressive environmentalists, you have independents who care about eminent domain and private individual property rights," says Jane Kleeb, who helps coordinate the opposition.

The pipeline company, TransCanada, promises state-of-the-art safety systems. It complains that nearly three years into the federal approval process, it would now be impossible to change the pipeline's route. TransCanada spokesman Shawn Howard says opponents are just being unrealistic.

"Anybody who looks at this objectively knows that we're decades away from being able to turn off a fossil fuel switch and flip on an alternative energy switch without affecting our quality of life," he says.

TransCanada encountered almost no opposition when it built a similar pipeline across eastern Nebraska two years ago. That one skirted the Sandhills, though it crosses a small portion of the aquifer. But legislative Speaker Mike Flood, who opposed this special session, says the earlier pipeline was built before the Gulf of Mexico oil spill.

"It's a different environment than it was even a couple of years ago," Flood says.

The question remains whether it's different enough to persuade the usually pro-business Legislature to pass a bill aimed at changing the route. And if the Legislature does act, the almost-certain legal challenges could provide their own detour in getting Canadian oil to Texas.

Around the Nation

Subscribe to Around the Nation podcast via:

Or use this URL:

close

Morning Edition–

A good Samaritan had a heart attack after helping change a tire. The stranded travelers saved him.

Voters in Washington state will decide whether to privatize the sale of hard liquor on Tuesday.

Herman Cain's presidential campaign is questioning the motives of the accuser and her attorney.

Health Management

Education Information

Read More

Are you missing your child's pain?

AppId is over the quota
AppId is over the quota
Pediatric pain experts say children's pain is often undermedicated.Doctors say they children's pain is often undermedicatedParents, doctors worry about drug overdoses or misuseParents encouraged to ask doctors questions before child leaves hospitalDoctors, parents often miss the pain of quiet children

(CNN) -- It's happened so many times that Dr. Raymond Pitetti has lost count: A child comes into the emergency room with, say, a broken leg, and doctors give him strong narcotic painkillers in the ER, but then send the child home with no pain medication at all.

"The pain is just as severe as when they were in the hospital, but they're sent home with nothing and that broken bone is going to hurt like crap for a while," he says."Then we see the kid back in the ER the next day because they're in horrible pain."

Pitetti and other pediatric pain experts say children's pain is often undermedicated, whether that pain is from a broken bone or after a surgery. For example, a study out last week in The Journal of Pediatric Surgery reported that 13% of children had pain that lingered for months after surgeries such as appendectomies.

"Children are not being given enough pain medication, and they're suffering needlessly," says Dr. Zeev Kain, senior author of the study and a pediatric anesthesiologist at the University of California, Irvine.

"We really need to get better about this, because we've been horrible at it for a long time, adds Pitteti, an associate professor of pediatrics at Children's Hospital of Pittsburgh.

Doctors and parents both at fault

While physicians often feel comfortable giving a child narcotic pain medication in the hospital, they get nervous about continuing that medication once the child goes home, even if the child is in severe pain.

"They're worried patients will misuse the drugs, or overdose," says Pitetti, "But really if you dose the drug right and write the prescription for only a short period of time, there shouldn't be anything to worry about."

When doctors do send children home with the right medication, some parents decide not to give it.

Many of these parents have heard news stories about the growing number of people who die after overdosing on prescription narcotics. This week, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention called prescription drug overdoses an "epidemic," noting that 15,000 people died in 2008 from prescription drug overdoses -- more than died from cocaine and heroin overdoses combined.

Pediatric pain experts say narcotic pain medications are safe for children at the right doses, and there's little if any risk of addiction if the drugs are taken for a short time.

"If you treat someone with Percocet or morphine for three days, nothing's going to happen," Pitetti says. "We worry about people taking these drugs for weeks or months or years, not for days."

If you don't alleviate your child's pain, his or her recovery will most likely be slower, says Kain, pointing to studies that show children walk sooner after surgery, sleep better and get back to school sooner if they're not in pain.

Advice for parents

Pediatric pain experts have these tips for parents:

1. Ask your doctor about pain medication before your child leaves the hospital

If you think your child is in pain or will be in pain once you return home from the hospital, ask about pain medication.

"And if your child was on something for pain in the hospital, ask why they're not continuing it when they go home," Petitti advises.

2. Ask your doctor when to give the medication

Ask if you should give your child medication before the pain starts or only if they're in pain, or if you should give the medication before your child tries to do a physical activity such as walking.

"You need to be really aggressive in terms of asking questions," Kain advises.

3. Fill out your child's prescription before you get home

When you arrive home with a sick child after a surgery or visit to the ER, it's often tough to leave that child to go get the medication. Kain advises filling the prescription on the way home or at the hospital pharmacy if your hospital has one.

4. Recognize when your child is in pain

Once you get home, remember that a child won't always cry, scream, or complain when they're in pain, pediatric pain experts say. Some children in pain become quiet and withdrawn or have trouble eating or sleeping.

Unfortunately, both parents and doctors sometimes miss the pain in the quiet kids.

A 2008 study titled "The Squeaky Wheel Gets the Grease" showed that a day after having a broken limb treated in the emergency room, 20% of children received no pain medication, and 44% received only one dose. The children who were most likely to get medication were those who were loud and cried a lot.

Children in certain ethnic groups may be less likely to say they're in pain because their culture places a high value on appearing stoic. Some studies have shown that Hispanics, for example, are less likely to talk about pain and ask for medicine.

5. Think about other ways to address the pain besides drugs

Alternative methods such as aromatherapy, acupuncture and music can be extremely helpful for kids in pain, Kain says.

Another technique is particularly powerful: distraction.

"You should definitely acknowledge your child's pain by saying something like 'Poor baby, I know it hurts to move, but then you should quickly move on to a solution," Kain says. "You can say 'let's go for a drive' or 'let's read a book' or 'let's plan your birthday party together.' Don't just let your child lie there miserably on the sofa."

Education Information

Technology

Read More

New pain for cancer baby and family

AppId is over the quota
AppId is over the quota
Both Saoirse Fitzgerald and her mother, Kezia, have battled cancer this year.A family faces new setbacks as both mom, baby have struggled with cancerFamily relies on food stamps after dad loses job and health insuranceMedical events are leading cause of bankruptcies, 2009 study says

(CNN) -- Since Kezia Fitzgerald and her 1-year-old daughter, Saiorse, started cancer treatments this year, the disease has upended nearly every aspect of their lives.

CNNHealth.com told the family's story in September after both mother and daughter received cancer diagnoses. A little more than a month later, the family has faced more setbacks: uncertainty over Saiorse's health, a father's lost job, no income and food stamps.

After Saiorse's seventh round of chemotherapy, doctors found cancer in her bone marrow this month. An earlier test had not shown any signs of cancer.

"That was a huge blow to us," said her dad, Mike Fitzgerald. "That's bad news for neuroblastoma in stage 4."

Neuroblastoma develops in young kids when their immature nerve cells turn into tumors instead of cells and fibers. Cancer is "staged" to indicate its spread; stage 4 is the furthest the disease can progress.

Saoirse went through her eighth round of chemotherapy using a potent drug last week. This drug is highly toxic since it has to reach Saiorse's bone marrow. It's also much stronger than the drugs her mother has taken for Hodgkin's lymphoma.

Saoirse Fitzgerald has spent the last six months of her life getting chemotherapy and staying in hospitals.

The treatments have taken a toll on the toddler.

Both her adrenal glands have been removed because they were cancerous. Saiorse also has partial hearing loss and will not be able to have children when she's older due to the effects of chemotherapy, her father said.

Saoirse, who is usually bubbly and curious, petting the family dog and scampering around the house, now weakly clings to her mom and dad. With three anti-nausea drugs making her sleepy, she's quiet and listless, her parents said. Many mornings, she wakes up vomiting.

"For me to see that, it breaks my heart," her dad said. "I want to take it all away. I should be the one going through this, not her."

The family's blog

Whenever she has to take another medication, Saiorse looks deeply at her daddy.

"I watch her eyes," Mike Fitzgerald said. "They speak so much. We're giving her three to four different medications. I can see in her eyes -- 'Why? Please let this end.' She's so stressed about it."

The doctors don't know if Saoirse's neuroblastoma is the type resistant to chemotherapy. In two weeks, she returns to Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center in New York to get another bone marrow biopsy to see if the samples are cancer-free.

Saoirse's mom has had better news. After her diagnosis with stage 3 Hodgkin's lymphoma in January, her cancer is in remission as of September.

"I don't have 100% of my energy back, but I'm getting there," Kezia Fitzgerald said.

The additional strain is that Saoirse's dad lost his job at the end of October. The sole breadwinner for the family, he had taken a long leave of absence from his job at a car dealership to take care of his wife and child.

Mike Fitzgerald and his daughter play in the hospital in August. "I should be the one going through this, not her," he says.

"It hasn't been a very good couple of weeks," Mike Fitzgerald said.

His employer allowed him to retain his health insurance during a three-month leave after Saoirse's diagnosis in May. The dealership also extended his health insurance for two extra months when he was shuttling in and out of hospitals. Fitzgerald remains grateful and said his former employer went out of its way to accommodate his family.

"I don't want to be out of work now," Fitzgerald said. "I have no choice. It doesn't do my family any good. I hope to get back to work and get a routine going."

Although Fitzgerald lost his health insurance with the job termination, the family lives in Massachusetts and is able to receive coverage through MassHealth, the public health insurance program in the state for low- or middle-income residents.

Components of the Massachusetts health care overhaul passed in 2006 are similar to the Affordable Care Act, a nationwide health reform that will require individuals to have health insurance.

For the Fitzgeralds, MassHealth pays for COBRA, which gives workers who have lost their health benefits the right to continue coverage for a limited period. The family is responsible for deductibles and co-payments for medication and treatment.

With no income, the family now relies on food stamps. Mike Fitzgerald said he worries about making car and house payments with mounting health bills.

A 2009 study found that 62% of bankruptcies were medically related and that on average, these families had nearly $18,000 in out-of-pocket expenses. A majority of the people with these medically related bankruptcies had health insurance.

Saiorse's mom said she considers her family pretty fortunate.

"We're lucky that we do have good health insurance," she said. "It makes a big difference in the cost. But at the same time, it's too bad that a lot of people get in a situation where if they want to have a treatment, they ... have to sell everything they own and they never actually can afford it."

The family travels to New York for five to seven days for Saiorse's intensive cancer treatments. They decided to take her to Sloan-Kettering because they thought the treatment available there would be less invasive. The treatment is not available locally.

Saoirse's antibody treatment uses her own immune system to target and kill neuroblastoma cells. She needs a cancer-free bone marrow biopsy before beginning that treatment.

"You have to be optimistic," Kezia Fitzgerald said. "You wouldn't be able to get through it. We have moments where we get upset. We just have to figure it out. It's a challenge in problem-solving. We have to do everything to help her get better."

Education Information

Technology

Read More

Nobel Prize-Winning Physicist Norman Ramsey Dies

AppId is over the quota
AppId is over the quota

If you want to know what time it is, a smart way to find out is call the U.S. Naval Observatory in Washington, D.C. We owe this accurate timekeeping to a man named Norman Ramsey. Ramsey died Friday at 96. It was his scientific research in the years following World War II that revolutionized how we keep track of time.

Copyright © 2011 National Public Radio®. For personal, noncommercial use only. See Terms of Use. For other uses, prior permission required.

GUY RAZ, host: If you want to know what time it is, a smart way to do so is call the U.S. Naval Observatory here in Washington, D.C.

(SOUNDBITE OF USNO TIME SERVICE)

MARTY EDWARDS: U.S. Naval Observatory Master Clock. At the tone, Eastern Standard Time, 11 hours, 13 minutes, 15 seconds.

ROBERT SIEGEL: We owe this accurate timekeeping to a man named Norman Ramsey. Ramsey died Friday at age 96. It was his scientific research in the years following World War II that revolutionized how we keep track of time.

RAZ: Now, before his breakthrough, clock time was based on the age-old observation of the Earth whirling around the sun. That gave us the year. We divided that into days, hours, minutes, seconds, Norman Ramsey changed that.

SIEGEL: After the Second World War, Ramsey found himself at Harvard experimenting with measurements of electromagnetic radiation being absorbed by molecules and atoms. From this, the idea of an atomic clock was born. We no longer looked up to the cosmos for time, instead we drilled down to the inner workings of the cesium atom. Deep in that atom, a pulsating nine billion oscillations per second provided a new basis for clock time.

RAZ: By the way, Ramsey's research wasn't just useful in clocks. It also led to nuclear magnetic resonance, the machines we know as MRI used by doctors. Later in his career, Ramsey helped found the world renowned Fermilab in Chicago. Adrienne Kolb is Fermilab's historian. She says Ramsey was instrumental in convincing the federal government to support the research there.

ADRIENNE KOLB: Norman, with his sensitivities for a national laboratory, was able to reach out to everyone and convince them that this was the way to go. That we needed a national laboratory to allow the researchers throughout the country and indeed the world to operate at the highest energies to produce next generation of scientists for America.

SIEGEL: She was speaking of Norman Ramsey, 1989 Nobel Laureate in Physics and the father of the atomic clock. He died Friday at his home in Massachusetts at age 96.

Copyright © 2011 National Public Radio®. All rights reserved. No quotes from the materials contained herein may be used in any media without attribution to National Public Radio. This transcript is provided for personal, noncommercial use only, pursuant to our Terms of Use. Any other use requires NPR's prior permission. Visit our permissions page for further information.

NPR transcripts are created on a rush deadline by a contractor for NPR, and accuracy and availability may vary. This text may not be in its final form and may be updated or revised in the future. Please be aware that the authoritative record of NPR's programming is the audio.

Health Management

Education Information

Read More

After dieting, hormone changes may fuel weight regain

AppId is over the quota
AppId is over the quota
"Maintenance of weight loss requires continued vigilance and conscious effort to resist hunger," lead researcher says.Hunger-related hormones can remain at altered levels for at least a yearA drop in body fat percentage causes a decrease in the levels of certain hormones Finding an appetite suppressant of this sort is the next logical step in research

(Health.com) -- Losing weight is hard, but keeping the pounds off can be even harder.

By some estimates, as many as 80% of overweight people who manage to slim down noticeably after a diet gain some or all of the weight back within one year.

A shortage of willpower may not be the only reason for this rebound weight gain. According to a new study in the New England Journal of Medicine, hunger-related hormones disrupted by dieting and weight loss can remain at altered levels for at least a year, fueling a heartier-than-normal appetite and thwarting the best intentions of dieters.

"Maintaining weight loss may be more difficult than losing weight," says lead researcher Joseph Proietto, Ph.D., a professor of medicine at the University of Melbourne's Heidelberg Repatriation Hospital, in Victoria, Australia. "This may be due to biological changes rather than [a] voluntary return to old habits."

Health.com: Diet-busting foods you should never eat

Scientists have known for years that hormones found in the gut, pancreas, and fatty tissue strongly influence body weight and processes such as hunger and calorie burning. And the reverse is also true: A drop in body fat percentage, for instance, causes a decrease in the levels of certain hormones (such as leptin, which signals to your brain when you're full) and an increase in others (such as ghrelin, which stimulates hunger).

What wasn't so well known, until now, was whether these changes in hormone levels persist after an individual loses weight. To find out, Proietto and his colleagues put 50 overweight or obese men and women on a very low-calorie diet for 10 weeks, then tracked their hormone levels for one year.

The average weight loss during the initial diet period was about 30 pounds, which for most of the participants represented at least 10% of their starting body weight. (Seven people who did not meet this target were dismissed from the study.) Blood tests showed that average levels of several hormones (including leptin, ghrelin, and insulin) had changed as a result of the weight loss. As expected, the participants also reported being hungrier -- both before and after breakfast -- than they had been at the study's start.

Health.com: 25 ways to cut 500 calories a day

At the 10-week mark the participants were allowed to resume a normal diet, but they continued to receive periodic advice from a dietitian and were also encouraged to get 30 minutes of exercise most days of the week. One year later, they'd regained about 12 pounds, on average, and follow-up tests showed that their hormone levels had only partially stabilized. Their hunger levels remained elevated as well.

The results aren't surprising, says Charles Burant, M.D., the director of the University of Michigan Nutrition Obesity Research Center, in Ann Arbor, who was not involved in the research. In fact, he says, the hormone changes seen in the study are a well-known evolutionary survival tactic.

"Multiple mechanisms have been developed, over eons of evolution, to get you to regain weight once you lose it...to tell your brain you're hungry and to ensure that you don't stop eating," he says. "If you don't have those drives, you wouldn't be alive."

Health.com: The best superfoods for weight loss

But now that we live in a world where calories are so easily consumed and physical exercise -- the best way to burn off those calories -- is largely unnecessary for day-to-day survival, these biological drives are backfiring and contributing to obesity, Burant says.

That's not to say that weight regain is inevitable, or that these drives can't be overcome through willpower. Although the hormone changes noted in the study are very real physical effects, Proietto says, personality and psychological factors may play a role in an individual's ability to manage chronic hunger.

"This may explain why some people maintain weight loss for longer than others," he says. "Maintenance of weight loss requires continued vigilance and conscious effort to resist hunger."

Promising research is being done to discover ways to restore hormone levels in people who lose weight, Burant says. Preliminary studies from Columbia University, for example, have found that when dieters are injected with replacement leptin hormones, it's easier for them to maintain or continue weight loss.

"When diabetics don't have enough insulin in their bodies, we give them back insulin in order to maintain their blood glucose," Burant says. Researchers should be finding a way to do the same for people who have lost weight, he adds, "whether it's with a drug, a dietary supplement, or certain nutrients—something that will stimulate the release of these hormones."

Proietto agrees that finding an appetite suppressant of this sort is the next logical step in hormone and obesity research. Until then, he says, weight-loss surgery is a possible option for some severely obese people who have not been able to keep weight off by other methods.

Copyright Health Magazine 2010

Education Information

Technology

Read More

A love story of Halloween

This is a weekend full of things, go in the dark, boo, so here a little Boo (a love story between a skeleton and a beautiful maiden is). They meet - or they have already made? -in a famous Bookstore in Paris.

That comes from director Spike Jonze and Olympia Le-Tan-Designer. It is called mourir auprès de Toi, or to die by your side.

Many beautiful books and a very famous whale make cameo appearances.

Warning: There is explicitly sexual behaviour at the end, while the credits, but since they are all dead, there is no x-rated parts of the body. However, should imaginative left young people when the story ends.

Have a happy and not too scary Halloween.

Health Management

Education Information

Read More

Dad's depression may rub off on kids

AppId is over the quota
AppId is over the quota
A child's odds of developing emotional problems increase by as much as 70% if the father shows signs of depression.The situation is predictably worse if both parents are depressedThat proportion increases to 11% if the father is depressedGenes often play a role in passing depression and other mental-health problems

(Health.com) -- Doctors and researchers have known for years that children are more likely to develop mental-health problems if their mother has struggled with depression. But what if it's the father who's depressed?

According to a new study -- one of the first to examine mental-health patterns in a nationally representative sample of dads and kids -- a child's odds of developing emotional or behavioral problems increase by as much as 70% if the father shows signs of depression. That's smaller than the increased risk associated with depressed moms, but it's still cause for concern, researchers say.

"For years we've been studying maternal depression and how it affects children, but the medical community has done a huge disservice by ignoring fathers in this research," said the study's lead author, Michael Weitzman, a professor of pediatric medicine at New York University, in New York. "These findings reinforce what we already assumed -- that fathers matter, too, and they matter quite a lot."

Health.com: 12 signs of depression in men

The situation is predictably worse if both parents are depressed. Just 6% of children with two mentally healthy parents have serious emotional or behavioral problems, such as feeling sad or nervous, acting out at school, or clashing with family and peers, the study found. But that proportion increases to 11% if the father is depressed, 19% if the mother is depressed and 25% if both parents are depressed -- a strikingly high number, Weitzman says.

Although the study doesn't prove that a parent's depression directly causes problems in children, rather than vice versa, previous research on mothers and children has clearly shown that it's generally mothers who influence kids' mental health, not the other way around.

The idea that parents have an impact on their children's mental health is a "no-brainer," said Michael Brody, a spokesperson for the American Academy of Child Psychiatry and a visiting professor of American Studies at the University of Maryland, in College Park, Maryland.

Genes often play a role in passing depression and other mental-health problems from parent to offspring, Brody said, and the family environment is also important. "We learn how to adapt to situations by looking at our parents as models," he says. "So if either parent is depressed, a kid is going to be influenced by this."

Health.com: How to help someone who's depressed

The study, which appears in the December issue of the journal Pediatrics, included nearly 22,000 two-parent families who participated in federal health surveys between 2004 and 2008. During in-home visits, researchers interviewed one adult in each household -- typically the mother -- about the mental health of all family members (including the interviewee).

The researchers used two separate questionnaires to record the overall mental health and depression symptoms of the parents. These questionnaires were used only for screening purposes, the study notes, and were not equivalent to the official symptom checklists doctors use to diagnose depression.

If the father displayed below-average mental health or depression symptoms, a child's odds of having similar problems increased by 33% and 70%, respectively. The child's odds increased even more -- by as much as 200% -- if the mother had mental-health problems instead.

Health.com: 10 things to say (and not say) to someone with depression

Boys, 12- to 17-year-olds, and white children with depressed dads had higher rates of emotional and behavioral problems than did girls, younger kids, and children of other ethnicities. The study was limited to children who live with both parents, however, so the findings as a whole don't necessarily apply to all households and family situations, the authors note.

Doctors and mental-health professionals have to do a better job of looking at the entire family picture when one member shows signs of depression, and asking about what role the father plays in a child's upbringing, Brody says. "The good news is that dads are participating in their children's lives; they're active and they're interested," he says. "The bad news is that if they're participating in a negative way, it's going to affect the kids."

Men who are feeling depressed should seek treatment, if only for the sake of their children, Brody adds. "Women are more likely to seek medical treatment in general, and psychiatric health, specifically," he says. "This is just another reason for men who are feeling down or know they're experiencing depression...to seek help."

Copyright Health Magazine 2011

Education Information

Technology

Read More

From Nebraska Lab To McDonald's Tray: The McRib's Strange Journey

AppId is over the quota
AppId is over the quota
Enlarge Paul J. Richards/AFP/Getty Images

Fast food giant McDonald's has brought back the McRib until Nov. 14. The sandwich has gained cult acclaim over the past three decades because of its limited availability.

Paul J. Richards/AFP/Getty Images Fast food giant McDonald's has brought back the McRib until Nov. 14. The sandwich has gained cult acclaim over the past three decades because of its limited availability.

Since McDonald's announced the seasonal revival of its popular McRib sandwich last month, there's been a round of reports about what's in the sandwich that have ranged from glib (on its 70 ingredients) to McFib (on the alleged inhumane treatment of the pigs that go into it).

But even though there's not a rib to be found inside the sandwich, that pork patty drenched in barbecue sauce actually represents one of the greater innovations in meat science of the last century.

Roger Mandigo is an emeritus University of Nebraska animal science professor credited with the technology that made the McRib possible. And here's its story, straight from the meat scientist's mouth.

  Courtesy of University of Nebraska Institute of Agriculture and Natural Resources

Roger Mandigo earned induction into the Meat Industry Hall of Fame for his invention of "restructured meats."

Back in the 1970s, Mandigo tells The Salt, he was approached by the National Pork Producers Council (the folks who later brought you "the other white meat") to create a product with pork trimmings that could be sold to the fast food giant.

"The pork producers wanted to see more pork on the menu, and they were targeting McDonald's," Mandigo said.

Mandigo went to work in the lab and came up with a new take on an old-fashioned technology: sausage-making. Instead of just stuffing pork meat inside a casing, Mandigo used salt to extract proteins from the muscle. Those proteins become an emulsifier "to hold all the little pieces of meat together," he says.

"All we did was reuse the technology that had been around for hundreds of years and emphasize that we could shape products to shapes people wanted," he says.

And here is where our story takes an interesting twist: Seems the McRib was not born in the shape of its current pork patty. The original concoction Mandigo made was formed as a faux pork chop.

McChop? Maybe not.

"[McDonald's] chose the shape," Mandigo said. "They wanted it to look like the boneless part of a backrib."

That's why Mandigo is adamant that he was not the father of the McRib, despite getting the credit for it all these years.

"We developed the concepts and technology to make the process work," he said. "They developed the sandwich and the form that it's in. That gets a little touchy and sensitive to people, as you might guess."

Despite his modesty, Mandigo's invention of what's called "restructured meats" was important enough to earn him induction into the Meat Industry Hall of Fame, among big names like Colonel Sanders and Wendy's Dave Thomas in the 2010 class.

The restructured meat technology has since been used to make, among other things, chicken nuggets and many other products you see in the grocery store. The largest buyer of restructured meat is the U.S. military, Mandigo said, as the beef, chicken and pork products are convenient for feeding large numbers of people every day.

Now 30 years after his invention in a Nebraska lab, Mandigo is retired. He's good-natured about all the attention he gets every time the McRib comes back on the McDonald's menu — which this year includes a rogue Twitter account @McRibSandwich.

"It's true. I have 70 ingredients," reads a tweet from Oct. 28. "Ingredient #47 Loch Ness Monster flipper."

Peggy Lowe is a reporter for Harvest Public Media.

Health Management

Education Information

Read More