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Renowned journalist and commentator John Stossel joined the Stuttering Foundation at a May 8th gala in New York to celebrate National Stuttering Awareness Week and the Foundation's 65th Anniversary as the world's leading charitable organization helping those who stutter."John has been a long-time friend of the Foundation and a true champion for people who stutter. He readily admits that stuttering is still a concern for him and shows his courage every evening as he faces the camera," said Jane Fraser, ...

The American Speech-Language-Hearing Association (ASHA) has been honored with the Workplace Excellence, Health & Wellness Trailblazer, and EcoLeadership awards for 2011 by the Alliance for Workplace Excellence. ASHA and other winners will be honored during the Alliance's 13th Annual Award Luncheon at noon on Monday, June 11, at the Bethesda North Marriott Hotel & Conference Center. More than 500 attendees are expected at the ceremony honoring 73 Washington-area organizations.The Alliance for ...

Robert Baloh, MD, PhD, director of the Neuromuscular Division at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, in Los Angeles, has received the Commitment to a Cure Award presented by the Golden West Chapter of the Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis Association.Dr. Baloh has published groundbreaking discoveries in genetics and molecular biology and is the principal investigator of five projects examining the molecular and cellular basis of amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) and other neuromuscular disorders. "I am very ...

Identification of a non-traditional pathway points to a possible combination therapy for esophageal cancer (Cancer Cell, March 20, 2012).Esophageal cancer is one of the most aggressive forms of cancer, with fewer than 20 percent of patients surviving for five years. Its frequency in the United States has increased by 5 percent to 10 percent annually since the 1980s. Inflammation and obesity are thought to be driving factors in the higher incidence.Researchers at the University of Texas-MD Anderson Cancer ...

An editorial published today in the journal Environmental Health Perspectives calls for increased research to identify possible environmental causes of autism and other neurodevelopmental disorders in America's children and presents a list of 10 target chemicals, including those considered highly likely to contribute to these conditions.Philip Landrigan, MD, director of the Children's Environmental Health Center (CEHC) at Mount Sinai School of Medicine, co-authored the editorial, titled "A ...

Infants and toddlers who have been treated for cancer tend to reach certain developmental milestones later than their healthy peers, a new study has found. Delays may occur early in the course of treatment, and young children with cancer might benefit from early interventions such as language or physical therapy (Journal of Pediatric Psychology, online, March 9, 2012).Compared to children who had not had cancer, children treated for cancer before age 4 progressed more slowly in vocabulary, cognitive ...

The Michigan Office of Regulatory Reinvention (ORR) has recommended the deregulation of 18 occupations, including speech pathology, and the elimination of nine occupational boards, including the Board of Speech-Language Pathology.The 18 occupations represent more than 17 percent of the occupations regulated by the state. ORR also recommended eliminating five more licensing provisions and exploring the elimination of 11 additional boards."According to a 2007 study, Michigan is the sixth most heavily ...

School-age children whose mothers nurtured them early in life have brains with a larger hippocampus, a key structure important to learning, memory and response to stress [Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences Early Edition, 109 (8): 2854-59].The new research, conducted by child psychiatrists and neuroscientists at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis, is the first to show that changes in the hippocampus are linked to a mother's nurturing."This study validates something that ...

The House Research Institute (HRI) will present Hear the Experts 7:30-9 p.m. on May 1 at the Directors Guild of America Theater in Los Angeles. The entertaining and informative evening is dedicated to educating adults about common hearing health concerns affecting them or their friends and loved ones.Fritz Coleman, a Southern California broadcasting icon and long-time stand-up comic, will serve as emcee for the event, which is free to the public. The program will engage the audience in a dynamic, ...

The Social Security Administration (SSA) is adding Juvenile Onset Huntington's Disease (JHD) as a Compassionate Allowance (CAL) condition, announced Social Security commissioner Michael Astrue. CAL cases receive expedited processing within the context of the existing disability determination process. An individual diagnosed with JHD now can get their disability application approved much more quickly - sometimes within days. "This is an important victory for all families facing JHD," said Louise Vetter, ...

A new study has found significantly lower levels of several cytokines, the messengers and regulators of the immune system, in the plasma of children with autism disorder compared to unrelated healthy siblings from other families who had members with autism spectrum disorders (International Journal of Developmental Neuroscience, April 2012)."The importance of identifying early immunological disturbances that may contribute to autism has implications for identifying risk factors, diagnosis and possibly ...

Costing $172 billion a year for health care and research funding, Alzheimer's disease affects one in three families and has a widespread impact on our economy and aging population. Most notably, the disease plagues women twice as much as men. At a recent congressional briefing held by the Society for Women's Health Research (SWHR), experts in Alzheimer's research discussed the need to examine these gender differences, both for the cause, prevention and treatment as well as the caregiver role.Alzheimer's ...

Using a nicotine patch may help improve mild memory loss in older adults, according to a six-month, double-blind pilot clinical trial (Neurology, 78: 91-101). Nicotine has been shown to improve cognitive performance in smokers who have stopped smoking, and previous short-term studies with nicotine have shown attention and memory improvement in people with Alzheimer's disease. Nicotine stimulates receptors in the brain that are important for thinking and memory skills, and people with Alzheimer's lose some ...

A study of more than 11,000 children followed for over six years has found that young children with sleep-disordered breathing (SDB) are prone to developing behavioral difficulties such as hyperactivity and aggressiveness, as well as emotional symptoms and difficulty with peer relationships. The study is the largest and most comprehensive of its kind (Pediatrics, online, March 5, 2012)."This is the strongest evidence to date that snoring, mouth breathing and apnea can have serious behavioral and ...

Researchers at the Mayo Clinic, in Rochester, MN, have found that multiple exposures to anesthesia at a young age are associated with higher rates of attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). Children exposed to two or more anesthetics before age 3 had more than double the incidence of ADHD than children who had no exposure (Mayo Clinic Proceedings, Feb. 2, 2012).When basic science studies in the medical literature began to suggest anesthesia used in surgery causes changes in the brains of young ...