1 Eylül 2012 Cumartesi
31 Ağustos 2012 Cuma
New Method Teaches Kids To Remain Still During MRIs
New Method Teaches Kids To Remain Still During MRIs31 Aug 2012-nbsp;-nbsp;-nbsp;
A recent report by Jude Children's Research Hospital and published in Pediatric Radiology says that experts have developed a new method for teaching children to stay still while they are having an MRI done, which makes the scan safer.
MRI scans on children are usually tough because naturally, children don't like to stay still. These scans make it necessary for kids to remain in one place for a long period of time. However, a new technique will help children as young as the age of 5 to have MRIs without being put to sleep.
The children involved the intervention were sickle cell disease patients. They often have to have MRIs performed to analyze their livers and brains to make sure they do not have complications in terms of their medication or disease. The problem here is that sickle cell disease makes anesthesia unsafe for some patients, and therefore, doctors try to use other methods when MRIs are required.
The study, which involved 71 sickle cell disease patients aged between 5 and 12, determined that the intervention given by experts to the children was extremely effective. The patients were 8 times more likely to make it through the entire scan without undergoing anesthesia than those who were not involved in the intervention. 91% of the kids (30 out of 33) who participated in the classes before their MRIs had successful scans without anesthesia. On the other hand, only 71% of the children (27 out of 33) who did not go through the program made it through the scan successfully.
The method, run by the Child Life Program at St. Jude, teaches the children and their parents what they can expect to happen when they are receiving an MRI, as well as giving the children things to think about during their scans, and working to decide onthe most effective way for the children to stay still, as all children are different.
Katherine Cejda, a specialist at St. Jude Life and the lead author of the study commented:
"Some patients chose to listen to music or to squeeze a ball to help them remember not to move. Some patients had the option of watching movies or having parents or other adults in the room with them during the test."
This is the first trial of its kind to focus on kids suffering from sickle cell disease and to determine whether this is an effective way to get them to remain still. Cejda notes that there are other programs available all over the U.S. that help kids get ready for MRIs and other procedures they may have to sit through.
September is National Sickle Cell Awareness Month and St. Jude is working hard to boost the quality of life factors for kids and teens living with sickle cell disease.
Jane Hankins, M.D., an associate member of the St. Jude Department of Hematology and the study's senior author, highlighted the importance of avoiding anesthesia when possible, due to the fact that it is risky for sickle cell disease patients to be sedated.
Sickle cell disease, which is inherited, occurs when a gene for assembling hemoglobin is mutated. Hemoglobin is the protein that carries oxygen through the body. When a person has sickle cell disease, their red blood cells are weaker than normal, sometimes causing the patient severe pain and damaged organs.
Anesthesia often leads to lower body temperature, dehydration, and a drop in blood oxygen levels. Dehydration is dangerous for sickle cell patients, as it can make sickled cells build up, causing harsh pain. This may result in pneumonia-like illness, which causes more pain or acute chest syndrome, leaving the patients hospitalized.
Hankins says that if a sickle cell patient is going to be sedated, it is important that they spend the night before in the hospital to ensure they have adequate amounts of fluids, and in some cases, a blood transfusion.
The new program may also lead to a cut in costs for the hospital. Cost-control is important to St. Jude, regardless of the fact that no family is held responsible for paying for their child's healthcare. It would be beneficial to all health care facilities to start interventions such as this one, and it is now offered to every patient receiving an MRI at St. Jude. Hankins says: "This preparation program offers a real advantage to patients."
Written by Christine Kearney
Copyright: Medical News TodayNot to be reproduced without permission of Medical News Today
Temper Tantrums - Should Parents Be Concerned?
Temper Tantrums - Should Parents Be Concerned?31 Aug 2012-nbsp;-nbsp;-nbsp;
A recent study published in The Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry may have parents and doctors wondering when a temper tantrum their child has may be something more. Could it be an early sign of a serious mental health problem? Researchers from Northwestern Feinberg School of Medicine have decided to look into when parents and pediatricians should worry about temper tantrums or unusual behavior.
A survey developed by experts can help parents determine whether their child is acting like a normal kid or if their outlandish behavior is the result of something more worrying.
With this survey, it will be easier to catch a mental health disorder early on, therefore making treatment options available to the kids when they are young, hopefully avoiding a serious mental break later in the children's lives.
The new method will also help with the misdiagnosis and treatment of normal misbehavior for something more serious.
Temper Tantrums Not As Common As People Believe
Researchers were surprised to find that temper tantrums do not occur among kids as often as many think. Preschoolers are apt throw fits, however, under 10% of young children have a tantrum every day. These results were the same for white, Hispanic, African-American, poor, non-poor, and children of either sex.
Lauren Wakschlag, lead author of the study, a professor and vice chair in the department of medical social sciences at Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine commented:
"That's an 'aha moment. It gives a measurable indicator to tell us when tantrums are frequent enough that a child may be struggling. Perhaps for the first time, we have a tangible way to help parents, doctors and teachers know when the frequency and type of tantrums may be an indication of a deeper problem."
Prior to this study, there were no diagnostic tools to determine behavior problems, other than ones focused on adolescents and teens who displayed more disruptive traits. Now, researchers are focusing on children of the preschool age.
The questionnaire, named the Multidimensional Assessment of Preschool Disruptive Behavior (MAP-DB), was given to 1,500 3 to 5 year old preschooler's parents. The adults answered questions about how often their child had tantrums, how intense the tantrums are and how they managed their anger in the last month.
The findings helped the experts to determine if the preschoolers' behavior was normal or if it was something to be concerned about. This knowledge will make it easier for physicians to tackle the problem before it gets worse, and if the child is somewhere in the middle - parents and doctors can keep a close eye on their behavior to report it if it continues to seem like a problem. The researchers note that the earlier a problem is detected, the more effective treatment is.
Wakschlag continued: "We have defined the small facets of temper tantrums as they are expressed in early childhood. This is key to our ability to tell the difference between a typical temper tantrum and one that is problematic."
The trail found that if a child threw a tantrum when they were tired, for example, at bedtime, this was normal behavior. However, if they threw the tantrum out of nowhere, or it was harsh enough that it made the child exhausted, this may not be normal tantrum behavior.
The authors note that all children may display signs of out-of-the-norm tantrums here and there, but it is when they happen often that parents should be concerned.
The new method differs from the well-known Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM), because unlike the DSM, the new method is age-specific. In DSM, one of the symptoms of problematic behavior is that the patient "often loses temper".
Wakschlag said: "The definition of 'often' may vary substantially for younger and older children and depend on family stress levels and other mitigating factors. Since most preschool children tantrum, this vague criteria make it exceptionally difficult for providers to determine when behavior is of clinical significance in early childhood.
"There's been a real danger of preschool children with normal misbehavior being mislabeled and over-treated with medication. On the other hand, pediatricians are hampered by the lack of standardized methods for determining when misbehavior reflects deeper problems and so may miss behaviors that are concerning. This is why it's so crucial to have tools that precisely identify when worry is warranted in this age group."
To understand how important their findings were, Wakschlag, along with Margaret Briggs-Gowan from the University of Connecticut Health Center and their team are looking into how the tantrum behaviors are associated with the mental health of the children, how they are getting along in school with other children, with their families, and how they act in social situations. Now, the experts are working with Northwestern neuroscientist Joel Voss to being using brain-imaging as a way to find correlations between problematic behaviors in early childhood and brain patterns.
The questionnaire has grown to 118 questions since the experts started using the tool, and 2,200 children have been evaluated. The goal is to eventually have the questionnaire available in waiting rooms at pediatricians' offices for parents to fill out on a computer while they are visiting the doctor with their children.
Written by Christine Kearney
Copyright: Medical News TodayNot to be reproduced without permission of Medical News Today
Beer Glass Shape Influences People's Drinking Speed
Beer Glass Shape Influences People's Drinking Speed31 Aug 2012-nbsp;-nbsp;-nbsp;
The shape of the glass may influence how rapidly we consume an alcoholic drink, researchers from the University of Bristol reported in the journal PLoS ONE. The authors believe that their findings could help towards reducing the prevalence of drunkenness which has become a progressively bigger problem in society today.
Dr Angela Attwood and team gathered and analyzed data on 160 social drinkers. None of them had any history of alcoholism; they were aged from 18 to 40 years and were asked to attend two experimental sessions.
Session 1 - the participants were given drinks in either:
Straight-sided glasses - with alcoholic and non-alcoholic beverages
Curved "beer flutes" - with alcoholic and non-alcoholic drinks
Alcoholic drink consumption was nearly twice as fast in the curved glass session, compared to the straight glass session. However, drinking speeds of non-alcoholic beverages were the same, regardless of what type of glass was used.
An example of a "beer flute" glass. Drinkers find it harder to know when it is half full.
Possibly, because it is much harder to know when you are half-way through your drink in a curved glass compared to a straight one, people drink more rapidly from curved glasses, the authors suggested. However, why there was no difference in soft-drink consumption rates could not be explained.
Session 2 - the researchers wanted to determine how accurate people's perceptions of how much had been consumed so far was, without actually drinking any alcohol when they guess. The participants were asked to look at computer images of alcoholic drinks in straight and curved glasses with different volumes of liquid inside them. They were asked a simple question in each picture "Is the glass less or more than half full?" It would then be possible to gauge their visual accuracy more carefully.
They found that people were considerably more inaccurate when looking at drinks in curved glasses.
There was also an association between the degree of error and speed of drinking when using the curved glass. Those who made the greatest mistakes tended to be the ones who drank the fastest from the curved glasses.
People's speed of drinking will influence how rapidly they get drunk, as well as how many alcoholic beverages they consume in one drinking session. Therefore, if drinking rates can be slowed down, there may be significant benefits for individuals and society as a whole, the authors wrote.
Dr Attwood wrote:
"Due to the personal and societal harms associated with heavy bouts of drinking, there has been a lot of recent interest in alcohol control strategies. While many people drink alcohol responsibly, it is not difficult to have 'one too many' and become intoxicated. Because of the negative effects alcohol has on decision making and control of behavior, this opens us up to a number of risks.
People often talk of 'pacing themselves' when drinking alcohol as a means of controlling levels of drunkenness, and I think the important point to take from our research is that the ability to pace effectively may be compromised when drinking from certain types of glasses."
The more cynical among us may wonder whether the drinks industry might use this data to replace straight glasses with curved ones in order to achieve greater sales.
Written by Christian Nordqvist
Copyright: Medical News TodayNot to be reproduced without permission of Medical News Today
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