Berkeley - Although boys with Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) greatly outnumber girls, girls have been underdiagnosed and their condition is greatly underappreciated, according to a pair of studies in the October issue of the Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology. The lead author is Stephen Hinshaw, professor of psychology at University of California, Berkeley. These new studies contradict earlier findings about girls with ADHD. But Hinshaw's explanation is simple: Unlike the six-to-12-year-old girls in his studies, girls in several previous studies were taking ADHD medication. Hinshaw's work also included a much larger sample than nearly all earlier studies and was conducted over a longer period of time. "These girls, compared to a matched comparison group, are very impaired, academically and socially," said Hinshaw, an expert in child clinical psychology and developmental psychopathology, who continues to study them.

Keyword: ADHD; Development of the Brain
Link ID: 2740 - Posted: 10.01.2002

Gene finding may shed light on normal brain development Bethesda, Maryland — An international team, led by researchers from the National Human Genome Research Institute (NHGRI), has discovered the genetic cause for a rare form of microcephaly, a devastating brain disorder that has stricken infants among the Older Order Amish for nine generations. The study, published in the September issue of Nature Genetics, describes the gene mutation that underlies Amish microcephaly (MCPHA), a birth defect marked by a profoundly small head and brain size. Over the past 40 years, 61 babies with MCPHA have been born to 23 nuclear families in the Old Order Amish community in Lancaster County, Pa. None of the children has lived beyond the age of 14 months, and most die between 4-6 months. In their study in Nature Genetics, the NHGRI team found the gene defect causes developing cells to lose their normal ability to transport the building blocks of DNA, called base pairs, across the inner membrane walls of the mitochondria, which are tiny structures that function as the cells’ metabolic power houses. Researchers believe that without this carrying ability, called mitochondrial deoxynucleotide transport, the cell’s mitochondria cannot make DNA properly, causing the brain of the unborn child to develop abnormally. The NHGRI data also indicate that mitochondrial deoxynucleotide transport may play a crucial role in normal prenatal brain growth.

Keyword: Development of the Brain; Genes & Behavior
Link ID: 2739 - Posted: 06.24.2010

Study Suggesting Risk of Brain Damage Questioned by Critics of Methodology By Rick Weiss Washington Post Staff Writer New research has escalated a decades-old scientific and political battle over the risks inherent in the popular street drug known as Ecstasy. A synthetic chemical cousin of "speed," Ecstasy already had a rap sheet as long as its chemical name: 3,4-methylenedioxymethamphetamine, or MDMA. Studies in animals have suggested it may be toxic to brain cells that help regulate mood. It's been linked to memory impairment in some users. And rarely the drug triggers a mysterious reaction in which the body becomes radically overheated, causing sudden death. If that weren't enough to make potential users think twice, Ecstasy is highly illegal. The Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) has placed it in its most restrictive "schedule 1" category, meaning it has no medical value and carries serious risks. © 2002 The Washington Post Company

Keyword: Drug Abuse
Link ID: 2738 - Posted: 06.24.2010

Drug-related deaths have soared in recent years Thousands of lives could be saved each year if addiction services were improved, experts have said. The charity Action on Addiction estimates that 150,000 people die as a result of an addiction every year. According to the charity, one in three British adults has an addiction which damages their health because they are hooked to alcohol, smoking or drugs. The charity has launched a campaign called Angels Against Addiction in an effort to improve services and boost research. It believes that current services are failing people with an addiction. And it has warned that the problem is increasingly affecting women and young people. (C) BBC

Keyword: Drug Abuse
Link ID: 2737 - Posted: 09.30.2002

The whites of a cow's eyes could be a measure of its welfare. CHARLOTTE WESTNEY Want to know how a cow is feeling? Look into its eyes. The more stressed a cow is, the bigger the whites of its eyes, say researchers in Norway1. Farmers and inspectors might use the difference as a measure of cattle welfare. Agnethe Sandem and colleagues of the Agricultural University of Norway, Ås, gave one group of 12 Norwegian Red cows an open box of fresh grass and gave another 12 a similar box with a transparent perforated lid that stopped them eating the grass they could see and smell. The team video-d the animals' reactions. The eye-whites of the frustrated group - even animals showing no other signs of stress - were over twice normal size. Stressed cows might open their eyes more to take in extra visual information that may help them deal with their situation, the researchers speculate. © Nature News Service / Macmillan Magazines Ltd 2002

Keyword: Stress
Link ID: 2736 - Posted: 06.24.2010

Even the best baseball players dither more than an archer fish. CHARLOTTE WESTNEY Archer fish are better than the best baseball players at predicting where plummeting prey will land, suggests a new study. They need only one glance. The fish (Toxotes jaculatrix) shoot water jets from their mouths at insects perched overhead. After a hit, they have to guess where their lunch will land, and get to it before it's gobbled by fellow fish. "It's very important for them to be quick," says Stefan Schuster of Albert Ludwigs University in Freiburg, Germany. He took high-speed videos of the fish and found it takes them just a tenth of a second to judge when and where in the water their food will fall. They then flip towards their target and swim there without looking back1. © Nature News Service / Macmillan Magazines Ltd 2002

Keyword: Vision
Link ID: 2735 - Posted: 06.24.2010

EVANSTON, Ill. -- Northwestern University scientists have made a key molecular discovery that has implications for a wide range of diseases characterized by the loss of nerve function, including Huntington's, Parkinson's, Alzheimer's and Lou Gehrig's diseases, cystic fibrosis and Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease, the human form of mad cow disease. The findings, which will be published in the Oct. 1 issue of Nature Cell Biology, could lead to an understanding of how to prevent these diseases and to the development of effective drugs. All human neurodegenerative diseases have two things in common. First, misfolded and damaged proteins clump together to form toxic species that aggregate, destroy cell function and cause disease. Second, studies have shown that special protective proteins, called molecular chaperones, can suppress these toxic effects. This question remained: How do the chaperones and aggregates interact with each other?

Keyword: Huntingtons; Parkinsons
Link ID: 2734 - Posted: 09.30.2002

Scientists prove that cleaning is bad for you By Sarah-Kate Templeton Health Editor SCOTTISH researchers have proved what housewives always knew: the more housework women do, the more depressed they become. Washing dishes, pounding the floor with the vacuum cleaner and scrubbing the bath really do get you down -- and that's official. Anecdotal experience previously led doctors to recommend physical activity as a means of raising the spirits. Scientists later confirmed their observations by proving that exercise causes the body to release feel-good chemicals called endorphins which have a positive effect on the brain. But a closer analysis of the theory has found that not all physical activity cheers you up, and housework actually makes you feel worse. ©2002 smg sunday newspapers ltd

Keyword: Depression
Link ID: 2733 - Posted: 06.24.2010

By ALESSANDRA STANLEY When Nancy Reagan received the Presidential Medal of Freedom at the White House last summer, she cast her eyes demurely downward as President Bush praised her 1980's "Just Say No," campaign against teenage drug use. Mr. Bush did not cite Mrs. Reagan's current and far more divisive cause — federal financing for embryonic stem cell research, which anti-abortion groups oppose. Last year Mr. Bush sharply limited such research. At 81, the former first lady is obliquely but persistently campaigning — through friends, advisers, lawmakers and her own well-placed calls and letters — to reverse the president's decision. Mrs. Reagan believes that embryonic stem cell research could uncover a cure for Alzheimer's, the disease that has wiped out her husband's memory. She was dismayed, friends say, when the White House took issue on Monday with a new California law that encourages embryonic stem cell research. Copyright The New York Times Company

Keyword: Alzheimers; Stem Cells
Link ID: 2732 - Posted: 06.24.2010

By The Associated Press WASHINGTON — The epilepsy drug topiramate appears to prevent migraine headaches — and unlike some other migraine medications that seem to attract pounds, its main side effect is weight loss, said a study released yesterday. About 28 million Americans suffer from migraines. A number of drugs to prevent migraines are sold, but they don't work for everyone, so scientists are seeking new medications. In recent years that search has included epilepsy drugs — after scientists discovered that migraines are caused not by abnormal blood vessels but by an electrical disorder of brain cells. Copyright © 2002 The Seattle Times Company

Keyword: Epilepsy; Obesity
Link ID: 2731 - Posted: 06.24.2010

Electronic sensors explain how being sick can stink By Brendan A. Maher Volatile odorants spewing forth from every living thing reveal a hidden trove of factors like diet, health, and genetic composition. With astonishing acuteness, most animals can read these olfactory messages and model their behaviors accordingly. "Odors are their windows on the world," one researcher says of mice. Others have noted that some honeybees recognize illness in hives and avoid them.1 Dogs have alerted their owners to such maladies as melanoma2 and epileptic seizures.3 For years, the industrial and defense arenas have used electronic sensors to detect toxic gases. Now, life scientists want to know if similar instruments, dubbed 'E-noses,' could be designed to make accurate medical diagnoses: A clinician might simply wave a wand over a patient and check for olfactory signatures. The future for such technologies evokes images more familiar to Star Trek fans, but throughout history doctors have relied on their noses to assess patients.4 Physicians have associated scrofula with a beer odor, typhoid with a brown-bread aroma, and diabetes with a chewing gum (Juicy Fruit) scent on the breath. The Latin fetor hepaticus describes malodor associated with severe liver disease--even kidney failure has a reported reek. Despite the historical associations between disease and smell, most authors of medical handbooks have ignored the sniff test, because the nose is subjective but diagnostic technologies are not. Clinical results are promising so far, researchers say. The growing complexity and usability of these E-noses keeps churning up new applications both within and outside the medical arena. The devices now monitor food quality, and applications are blooming for various infections, environmental hazards, explosives, and even innocuous odors in the home. ©2002, The Scientist Inc.

Keyword: Chemical Senses (Smell & Taste); Robotics
Link ID: 2730 - Posted: 06.24.2010

There are plenty of genes to work with when treating epilepsy, but real therapeutic results lie in the distant future By Laura DeFrancesco Treating people who have seizure disorders is a little like playing roulette. Place a bet on a drug from column A and hope for a hit. If that drug doesn't work, try one from column B. This process can drag on for months or years, and for many people with epilepsy--between 25% and 30%--relief from seizures never comes. With 40 to 50 million people experiencing seizures worldwide, this means that huge numbers of people receive no benefit from treatment. One might think that epilepsy would be the poster child for pharmacogenomics. Steering people to the right personal drug would save billions in medical costs, plus reduce their pain and suffering. An Epilepsy Foundation study found that this disease costs the United States $12.5 billion annually, mostly stemming from loss of productivity borne largely by those with intractable or poorly controlled epilepsy.1 But what makes epilepsy so difficult to treat is that more often than not, the seizure's cause is unknown. Familial forms exist, and certain injuries and conditions such as head trauma or a brain tumor can cause it, but these cases are the exception. Most people who have seizures don't know why, and physicians cannot predict whether another will occur, and whether patients need treatment. ©2002, The Scientist Inc.

Keyword: Epilepsy; Genes & Behavior
Link ID: 2729 - Posted: 06.24.2010

ST. PAUL, MN – Researchers analyzing the records of 1,378 patients from three clinical trials of mitoxantrone as a treatment for multiple sclerosis (MS) reveal a small, but significant risk for developing diminished left ventricular ejection fraction (LVEF), which is a decrease in function of the left ventrical, and a lesser risk for congestive heart failure following treatment. The study is reported in the latest issue of Neurology, the scientific journal of the American Academy of Neurology. Mitoxantrone (MITO) is approved in the United States for the treatment of worsening relapsing-remitting, secondary-progressive, and progressive-relapsing MS. Unlike patients with leukemia and solid tumors who most often receive MITO in combination with other drugs, patients with MS are treated with MITO as a single drug to alleviate disease symptoms, said study author Donald Goodkin, MD, medical affairs director with Amgen Corp., a U.S. marketer of mitoxantrone in the United States. Cardiac toxicity, which may cause tachycardia and arrhythmia, LVEF, or congestive heart failure, has already been observed and reported in cancer patients who receive mitoxantrone as a chemotherapeutic agent.

Keyword: Multiple Sclerosis
Link ID: 2728 - Posted: 06.24.2010

ST. PAUL, MN – Have researchers found yet another reason to take an aspirin a day? Aspirin has been found to benefit cardiac patients. Now a new study reported in the current issue of Neurology, the scientific journal of the American Academy of Neurology, presents additional evidence that regular use of aspirin and other non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (NSAIDs) may reduce the incidence of dementia in elderly people, but only when taken for more than two years. Researchers assessed 5,092 elderly (aged 65+) residents of Cache County, Utah, for dementia, while noting their current and former use of NSAIDs, aspirin compounds or histamine H2 receptor antagonists (including cimetidine, ranitidine, famitidine and nizatidine). Three years later they obtained interval medication histories and identified 104 participants with Alzheimer's disease among the 3,227 living participants. “Our results suggest that long-term NSAID use may reduce the risk of AD, provided the use occurs well before the onset of dementia,” said John Breitner, MD, VA Puget Sound Health Care System, Seattle, WA, and one of 22 investigators who conducted the study. Breitner added that recent use of NSAIDs and aspirin appears to offer little protection.

Keyword: Alzheimers
Link ID: 2727 - Posted: 06.24.2010

A method of detecting CJD on scalpels and other surgical instruments has been developed by UK scientists. Scientists have found a way to spot even minute amounts of the prion protein which causes it on the metal surface of the instruments. Fears remain that many thousands of people are harbouring prion proteins in their body, even if they have not yet developed the symptoms of vCJD. When these people go in for routine operations, it is theoretically possible, although highly unlikely, that traces of the proteins could persist on re-useable surgical implements, even after they have been sterilised in the normal way. Prion proteins can resist the conventional methods of decontamination, cleaning and sterilisation used for surgical instruments. While the government has introduced new, higher standards of decontamination and cleanliness for these items, until now there was no effective way of checking to see whether these are truly working. (C) BBC

Keyword: Prions
Link ID: 2726 - Posted: 09.28.2002

NewScientist.com news service The controversial do-it-yourself medicine that inspired the heart-rending movie Lorenzo's Oil has finally been proved to work. The new research ends years of uncertainty about the treatment and demolishes the claims of experts who repeatedly said it was a worthless quack remedy. New Scientist has learned that Hugo Moser, the neurologist and doctor played by Peter Ustinov in the film, will on Saturday unveil the positive conclusions of a 10-year investigation into the oil's effects on a group of boys affected with the same genetic condition as Lorenzo. Normally carriers of the genetic defect are at high risk of developing adrenoleukodystrophy, causing them to progressively lose the ability to move, hear, speak and - finally - breathe. Some victims, like Lorenzo Odone portrayed in the film, get the childhood form which usually kills within just two years. Others get the adult form of the disease, which strikes people in their late twenties and acts more slowly. © Copyright Reed Business Information Ltd.

Keyword: Glia; Movement Disorders
Link ID: 2725 - Posted: 06.24.2010

WINSTON-SALEM, N.C. – Symptoms of depression, irritability, and apathy are common among people with mild memory loss, known to doctors as "mild cognitive impairment," and often can be successfully treated, according to researchers who analyzed data from the massive Cardiovascular Health Study. The researchers from five medical centers including Wake Forest University Baptist Medical Center reported in the current Journal of the American Medical Association that their study, based on participants followed for more than 10 years, was the first to show that the appearance of psychiatric symptoms correlate with the development of mild cognitive impairment. While psychiatric symptoms occur in the majority of persons with outright dementia, "these are the first population-based estimates for neuropsychiatric symptoms in mild cognitive impairment," the group reported. "These symptoms have serious adverse consequences and should be inquired about and treated as necessary."

Keyword: Depression; Learning & Memory
Link ID: 2724 - Posted: 06.24.2010

It hurts dopamine neurons, could raise Parkinson's risk, ape study says Carl T. Hall, Chronicle Science Writer Even a few hits of the mood-altering drug MDMA, popularly known as ecstasy, taken during a single night out can cause long-lasting brain damage, scientists warn in a new study. But some researchers were skeptical that the results from the animal study translate to humans and said such studies discourage research that might lead to medical uses for ecstasy. Scientists at Johns Hopkins University injected two or three doses of MDMA, each spaced a few hours apart, into monkeys and baboons in an attempt to mimic the typical drug-taking patterns seen at all-night raves or dance parties. ©2002 San Francisco Chronicle.

Keyword: Drug Abuse; Parkinsons
Link ID: 2723 - Posted: 06.24.2010

By Donna Leinwand, USA TODAY An increasing number of American youths who use the club drug Ecstasy are mixing it with the anti-impotency drug Viagra, leading drug-abuse specialists to warn about the health risks of a combination that users say fuels all-night dancing and marathon sex. The combined drugs — known in the club scene as "sextasy" — began as a fad among youths in England and Australia. About a year ago, officials of the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration began hearing reports that the mixture had become popular in this country's gay party culture. Now, drug-abuse analysts say, anecdotal reports from across the USA indicate that sextasy has become one the most recent products of a dangerous trend: Young clubgoers taking "cocktail pills" that can include as many as a half-dozen drugs. © Copyright 2002 USA TODAY, a division of Gannett Co. Inc.

Keyword: Drug Abuse; Sexual Behavior
Link ID: 2722 - Posted: 06.24.2010

By DONALD G. McNEIL Jr. The amount of the drug Ecstasy that some recreational users take in a single night may cause permanent brain damage and lead to symptoms like those of Parkinson's disease, a study in primates has found. But critics say that the monkeys and baboons in the study were given huge overdoses of the drug and that the kind of damage the researchers found has never been found in autopsies or brain scans of humans who took large amounts. Dr. George A. Ricaurte of the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, who led the study, said its most disturbing finding was that just two or three Ecstasy tablets can damage the cells that produce dopamine, a brain chemical that helps control movement, emotions and the ability to feel pleasure. Copyright The New York Times Company

Keyword: Drug Abuse
Link ID: 2721 - Posted: 09.27.2002