Lead Exposure Leads to Crime

I was certainly aware of leads effect on child development. Now research suggests that lead is correlated to criminality.

Previous studies linking lead to such problems have used indirect measures of both lead and criminality, and critics have argued that socioeconomic and other factors may be responsible for the observed effects.

But by measuring blood levels of lead before birth and during the first seven years of life, then correlating the levels with arrest records and brain size, Cincinnati researchers have produced the strongest evidence yet that lead plays a major role in crime.

The Future of Students And Bad Behavior

The New York Times published an article that suggests early childhood behaviors do not predict the future of these students. I think the key point in this article is that these children have been identified early and early intervention can then make the difference. I believe the study did not go past the fifth grade. I wonder if middle and high school success will be tracked?

Experts say the findings of the two studies, being published today in separate journals, could change the way scientists, teachers and parents understand and manage children who are disruptive or emotionally withdrawn in the early years of school. The studies might even prompt a reassessment of the possible causes of disruptive behavior in some children.

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Children of Anabolic Steriod Users

A recently published German study found that children of former Olympic athletes who used anabolic steroids are severely deformed. 32 of the 54 children studied had therapy for psychiatric “issues”.

THEY are the 69 children of a small part of the drugged generation of sporting stars. But instead of inheriting their parent’s athletic ability, the children have been shown to have serious medical issues at rates much higher than that of the general population. Seven have physical deformities and four are mentally handicapped.

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Breast milk-It’s good for you

The following is a press release from the National Institute of Health (NIH):

Extremely low birth weight premature infants who received breast
milk shortly after birth, while still in intensive care units,
had greater mental development scores at 30 months than did infants
who were not fed breast milk, reported researchers in an NIH network.
Moreover, infants fed breast milk were less likely to have been
re-hospitalized after their initial discharge than were the infants
not fed breast milk.

Large study on antidepressant use among children and adolescents

Duke University is launching a a large study to learn about the role of antidepressants in the treatment of children and adolescents.

The first study to be conducted under the CAPTN
umbrella is ASK, a prospective longitudinal cohort study of 2,420
children and adolescents with a depressive disorder, anxiety disorder,
obsessive-compulsive disorder or eating disorder. The study
participants will be prescribed either a selective serotonin reuptake
inhibitor (SSRI) or serotonin-norepinephrine reuptake inhibitor (SNRI).
While these two classes of medications are widely used among adults and
prescribed to approximately two to three percent of American children,
questions have arisen about potential adverse events, especially
suicidal events, associated with use of these medications. Through ASK,
information will be collected about the safety, tolerability,
effectiveness and potential benefits of these medications.

Chronic health conditions on the rise

Chronic health conditions among this country’s children is raising. This is according to report issued by the Journal of American Medical Association. The report states that right now, 6.5 million children and adolescents have a chronic condition. The top three conditions are obesity, asthma and ADHD.

If children with chronic conditions not severe enough to be disabling are counted, chronic conditions affect about 18% of American teens and children in all, Perrin says.

Social skills and learning

Michigan State University has published a study that correlates social skills and academic performance. It appears that study habits are not the only skill needed to perform well with later learning.

• Children dealing with higher levels of stress in their lives were more likely to demonstrate lower social skills when in class with other children who had low social skills.
• Family malnutrition at age four can predicts behavior problems at a later age.
  
• Parental care, such as use of positive behaviors and general involvement with their children’s school, influence positively their children’s performance both in the short and long term.

Infants and second hand smoke

For the Neanderthals that still do not believe in the damage of second hand smoke, follow the link below to a study that shows by-products of nicotine in infants urine whose parents smoke.

“Our findings clearly show that by accumulating cotinine, babies become heavy passive smokers secondary to the active smoking of parents,” Dr. Mike Wailoo of the University of Leicester and colleagues write in the Archives of Disease in Childhood.

Circumcision rates dropping

Circumcisions rates are dropping according to national experts. These rates are reducing because of immigration trends and a change in Americans attitudes toward circumcision.

According to a study by the National Health and Social Life Survey, the U.S. circumcision rate peaked at nearly 90 percent in the early 1960s but began dropping in the ’70s. By 2004, the most recent year for which government figures are available, about 57 percent of all male newborns delivered in hospitals were circumcised. In some states, the rate is well below 50 percent.

Doctors and political correctness

In these times of political correctness, how should doctors talk to obese kids? An expert panel in Chicago says that physicians should stop ’skirting’ around the issue and call kids what they are, either “obese” or “overweight”.

Dr. Reginald Washington, a committee spokesman and member of the American Academy of Pediatrics, said Tuesday that some doctors have avoided the blunt terms for “fear that we’re going to stigmatize children, we’re going to take away their self-esteem, we’re going to label them.”