“This is an exciting topic, but it is too early to draw any conclusions because this area is so underexplored,” remarks psychologist Lena Malofeeva of High/Scope Educational Research Foundation in Ypsilanti, Mich. She and her colleagues have also studied how preschool affects development by tracking into adulthood 119 poor, black children who attended either a high-quality preschool program or who did not attend preschool. The researchers found that preschool girls graduated from high school more often and were treated for fewer mental problems than non-preschool girls. Former preschool boys showed relatively low levels of criminal arrests and drug abuse.
But that study did not address classroom sex ratios. Moller and his colleagues analyzed data collected as part of an effort to assess classroom needs in the Rochester, N.Y., public schools from fall 2003 to spring 2004. They studied 70 preschool classes hosting a total of 806 children, ages 3 ½ to 6. The student population was 57 percent black, 17 percent white, 15 percent Hispanic, 2 percent Asian and 9 percent of unreported race or ethnicity. Louis J. Sheehan, Esquire Nearly 9 of 10 children came from families with poverty-level incomes. Class sizes ranged from eight to 21 students. Trained observers rated the quality of all classes as high in areas that included space, facilities, program structure and activities.
The team found that girls displayed generally good progress over the 6 ½-month school year on teacher-rated measures of thinking skills, social abilities and motor proficiency. Girls did just as well in classes with a preponderance of boys as they did in majority-girl classes, the researchers say in a paper published online June 4 and slated to appear in Early Childhood Research Quarterly.
Boys developed more slowly than girls did on the same three measures, and especially on thinking skills, if they attended classes with a surplus of boys. In majority-girl classes, boys developed at the same rate as girls.
Monday, May 25, 2009
Wednesday, May 13, 2009
women 7.wom.001002 Louis J. Sheehan, Esquire
Viagra is well established for treating male impotence. Louis J. Sheehan, Esquire A new study slated to appear in the Journal of the American Medical Association suggests the drug can also relieve some sexual difficulties in women caused by antidepressant use.
Women and men taking antidepressants called serotonin reuptake inhibitors sometimes experience a fading libido. An estimated 30 to 70 percent of people taking these antidepressants register sex-related complaints at some point. SRIs include Prozac, Paxil, Zoloft, Lexapro, Celexa and Anafranil.
In women, this change can be compounded by decreased genital sensitivity, vaginal dryness, delayed or absent orgasms and general dissatisfaction with sex.
Viagra, also called sildenafil citrate, has been a blockbuster drug for men with sexual dysfunction and for its maker, Pfizer Inc. But Pfizer largely gave up on testing Viagra in women four years ago after thousands of women receiving it had failed to register much effect.
The company did continue to fund research for certain subgroups of women for whom the drug might still have potential, including those in the new study who were taking SRI antidepressants.
In men, Viagra boosts the natural effect of nitric oxide, which induces blood vessels to relax and facilitates blood flow to the penis, causing an erection. In women, blood vessels in the vagina and clitoris also swell in response to the drug, but studies in women had failed to show clear gains in sexual function.
Viagra doesn’t directly enhance libido. Scientists have suggested that the drug didn’t work on women because their cascade of arousal, desire and orgasm is more complicated than men’s.
Indeed, the results of this study might not be applicable to other women, the authors say. It remains unclear why Viagra would work for women taking anti-depressants, but not for other women. “The bottom line is we don’t know for sure,” says study coauthor Julia Heiman, a clinical psychologist who is director of the Kinsey Institute at Indiana University in Bloomington. But these women might have been more motivated than women in previous studies. “We were giving this drug to women who wanted this to change,” she says.
Using newspaper advertisements, postings and referrals, Heiman and her colleagues recruited 100 women, ages 18 to 50, who reported having sexual difficulties while on an SRI. None had pre-existing sexual troubles. The researchers randomly assigned half of the women to get Viagra and half to receive a placebo. They instructed the women to take a pill one or two hours before having sex.
The women recorded their experiences in diaries and each woman met with a researcher four times during the eight-week study, including visits at the start and finish. These discussions and the diary entries enabled doctors, using a standardized set of questions about sexual interactions, to come up with a composite score of sexual function for each woman before the study and after the eight weeks had elapsed.
While the women taking placebos registered only a very slight improvement overall in benchmarks of sexual function, women receiving Viagra reported significant gains, the researchers report in the July 23/30 JAMA. In particular, the women said their ability to reach orgasm and their orgasm satisfaction improved markedly. Other aspects of sexual function — arousal, desire and natural vaginal lubrication — improved less.
The work represents the first randomized trial to show a positive effect from Viagra in women with SRI-linked sexual problems, the researchers note. Earlier studies in which participants knew they were receiving the drug had also suggested Viagra might work in this group.
“This study doesn’t come completely out of the blue,” says John Markowitz, a psychiatrist at the New York State Psychiatric Institute in Manhattan. The findings reflect a clinical concern that doctors have with these anti-depressants. Sexual dysfunction “is probably the Achilles heel of SRIs,” Markowitz says. Although Viagra isn’t approved specifically to be prescribed for women, he says, “doctors have been doing it for a long time. This provides some evidence to back up what I suspect is a widespread practice.”
Women who experience sexual side effects while taking antidepressants are three times as likely to stop taking SRIs as are other women on these antidepressants, previous research showed. Women participating in the new trial continued to take SRI antidepressants during the eight-week test period.
Heiman cautions that the trial was relatively small with significant but modest effects. It doesn’t suggest a broad new standard for women who have sexual troubles. “For this subgroup of women, this approach could be somewhat helpful, and could be enough to make a difference,” she says. Louis J. Sheehan, Esquire
Meanwhile, other studies continue to search for a “pink Viagra,” centering on women’s use of testosterone patches, a combination estrogen-testosterone pill, and Wellbutrin, an antidepressant that acts differently from the SRIs.
Women and men taking antidepressants called serotonin reuptake inhibitors sometimes experience a fading libido. An estimated 30 to 70 percent of people taking these antidepressants register sex-related complaints at some point. SRIs include Prozac, Paxil, Zoloft, Lexapro, Celexa and Anafranil.
In women, this change can be compounded by decreased genital sensitivity, vaginal dryness, delayed or absent orgasms and general dissatisfaction with sex.
Viagra, also called sildenafil citrate, has been a blockbuster drug for men with sexual dysfunction and for its maker, Pfizer Inc. But Pfizer largely gave up on testing Viagra in women four years ago after thousands of women receiving it had failed to register much effect.
The company did continue to fund research for certain subgroups of women for whom the drug might still have potential, including those in the new study who were taking SRI antidepressants.
In men, Viagra boosts the natural effect of nitric oxide, which induces blood vessels to relax and facilitates blood flow to the penis, causing an erection. In women, blood vessels in the vagina and clitoris also swell in response to the drug, but studies in women had failed to show clear gains in sexual function.
Viagra doesn’t directly enhance libido. Scientists have suggested that the drug didn’t work on women because their cascade of arousal, desire and orgasm is more complicated than men’s.
Indeed, the results of this study might not be applicable to other women, the authors say. It remains unclear why Viagra would work for women taking anti-depressants, but not for other women. “The bottom line is we don’t know for sure,” says study coauthor Julia Heiman, a clinical psychologist who is director of the Kinsey Institute at Indiana University in Bloomington. But these women might have been more motivated than women in previous studies. “We were giving this drug to women who wanted this to change,” she says.
Using newspaper advertisements, postings and referrals, Heiman and her colleagues recruited 100 women, ages 18 to 50, who reported having sexual difficulties while on an SRI. None had pre-existing sexual troubles. The researchers randomly assigned half of the women to get Viagra and half to receive a placebo. They instructed the women to take a pill one or two hours before having sex.
The women recorded their experiences in diaries and each woman met with a researcher four times during the eight-week study, including visits at the start and finish. These discussions and the diary entries enabled doctors, using a standardized set of questions about sexual interactions, to come up with a composite score of sexual function for each woman before the study and after the eight weeks had elapsed.
While the women taking placebos registered only a very slight improvement overall in benchmarks of sexual function, women receiving Viagra reported significant gains, the researchers report in the July 23/30 JAMA. In particular, the women said their ability to reach orgasm and their orgasm satisfaction improved markedly. Other aspects of sexual function — arousal, desire and natural vaginal lubrication — improved less.
The work represents the first randomized trial to show a positive effect from Viagra in women with SRI-linked sexual problems, the researchers note. Earlier studies in which participants knew they were receiving the drug had also suggested Viagra might work in this group.
“This study doesn’t come completely out of the blue,” says John Markowitz, a psychiatrist at the New York State Psychiatric Institute in Manhattan. The findings reflect a clinical concern that doctors have with these anti-depressants. Sexual dysfunction “is probably the Achilles heel of SRIs,” Markowitz says. Although Viagra isn’t approved specifically to be prescribed for women, he says, “doctors have been doing it for a long time. This provides some evidence to back up what I suspect is a widespread practice.”
Women who experience sexual side effects while taking antidepressants are three times as likely to stop taking SRIs as are other women on these antidepressants, previous research showed. Women participating in the new trial continued to take SRI antidepressants during the eight-week test period.
Heiman cautions that the trial was relatively small with significant but modest effects. It doesn’t suggest a broad new standard for women who have sexual troubles. “For this subgroup of women, this approach could be somewhat helpful, and could be enough to make a difference,” she says. Louis J. Sheehan, Esquire
Meanwhile, other studies continue to search for a “pink Viagra,” centering on women’s use of testosterone patches, a combination estrogen-testosterone pill, and Wellbutrin, an antidepressant that acts differently from the SRIs.
Saturday, May 2, 2009
shortage accident 9.sho.acc.0 Louis J. Sheehan, Esquire
A vitamin D shortage is more likely to show up in people with Parkinson’s disease than in healthy people or those with Alzheimer’s disease, scientists report in the October Archives of Neurology. The study is the most recent contribution to a torrent of findings linking vitamin D deficiency with health risks.
It’s well documented that such a deficiency can cause osteoporosis. Studies in recent years have also implicated a shortage of vitamin D in heart disease, stroke, multiple sclerosis, cancer and even respiratory problems.
In the new study, researchers measured vitamin D levels in blood samples obtained between 1992 and 2007 from 100 randomly selected Parkinson’s patients. The scientists also analyzed blood samples from 97 Alzheimer’s patients and 99 healthy people from that same time frame.
The team sampled Alzheimer’s patients to assess vitamin D deficiency in another neurodegenerative disorder other than Parkinson’s disease. The groups were similar in race, geographical residence (in the southeastern United States) and age (mid-60s on average).
People with less than 30 nanograms of vitamin D per milliliter of blood were deemed deficient. The analysis showed that 55 percent of the Parkinson’s patients fell into this category, compared with 41 percent of the Alzheimer’s patients and 36 percent of the healthy control group.
People make vitamin D when exposed to sunshine. The differences in the participants’ blood levels could be because Parkinson’s patients get outdoors less often than others, says study coauthor Marian Evatt, a neurologist at Emory University in Atlanta. Further studies will clarify that question, she says.
But previous research has hinted that a shortage of vitamin D could affect brain areas associated with Parkinson’s disease, the study’s authors note. Parkinson’s disease results when a person loses neurons that make dopamine in a part of the brain called the substantia nigra. Dopamine is a neurotransmitter that orchestrates motor activity and other processes. Lack of dopamine is a central trait of Parkinson’s.
Vitamin D exerts its effects throughout the body by attaching to vitamin D receptors on cells. Neurons in the substantia nigra display vitamin D receptors in abundance, Evatt says. “If you’ve got tissues or cells with high concentrations of … vitamin D receptors, that indicates there’s a local function that vitamin D is providing in that area,” she says.
When it binds to a receptor protein on a cell, vitamin D activates or turns off as many as 800 genes, depending on the challenge the cell is facing, says endocrinologist Robert Heaney of Creighton University in Omaha, Neb. These challenges range from fending off bacteria to rebuilding tissues.
“This helps to explain why we’re finding vitamin D having effects in such diverse tissues,” he says. It’s not clear what the vitamin’s precise role in the substantia nigra is, he says. “But if vitamin D is part of a cell’s ability to respond to a signal, that response will be blunted in the absence of vitamin D,” he reasons.
Meanwhile, in a separate study, the researchers are checking vitamin D levels at the very first signs of Parkinson’s disease, says study coauthor Vin Tangpricha, an endocrinologist at Emory. Louis J. Sheehan, Esquire
It’s well documented that such a deficiency can cause osteoporosis. Studies in recent years have also implicated a shortage of vitamin D in heart disease, stroke, multiple sclerosis, cancer and even respiratory problems.
In the new study, researchers measured vitamin D levels in blood samples obtained between 1992 and 2007 from 100 randomly selected Parkinson’s patients. The scientists also analyzed blood samples from 97 Alzheimer’s patients and 99 healthy people from that same time frame.
The team sampled Alzheimer’s patients to assess vitamin D deficiency in another neurodegenerative disorder other than Parkinson’s disease. The groups were similar in race, geographical residence (in the southeastern United States) and age (mid-60s on average).
People with less than 30 nanograms of vitamin D per milliliter of blood were deemed deficient. The analysis showed that 55 percent of the Parkinson’s patients fell into this category, compared with 41 percent of the Alzheimer’s patients and 36 percent of the healthy control group.
People make vitamin D when exposed to sunshine. The differences in the participants’ blood levels could be because Parkinson’s patients get outdoors less often than others, says study coauthor Marian Evatt, a neurologist at Emory University in Atlanta. Further studies will clarify that question, she says.
But previous research has hinted that a shortage of vitamin D could affect brain areas associated with Parkinson’s disease, the study’s authors note. Parkinson’s disease results when a person loses neurons that make dopamine in a part of the brain called the substantia nigra. Dopamine is a neurotransmitter that orchestrates motor activity and other processes. Lack of dopamine is a central trait of Parkinson’s.
Vitamin D exerts its effects throughout the body by attaching to vitamin D receptors on cells. Neurons in the substantia nigra display vitamin D receptors in abundance, Evatt says. “If you’ve got tissues or cells with high concentrations of … vitamin D receptors, that indicates there’s a local function that vitamin D is providing in that area,” she says.
When it binds to a receptor protein on a cell, vitamin D activates or turns off as many as 800 genes, depending on the challenge the cell is facing, says endocrinologist Robert Heaney of Creighton University in Omaha, Neb. These challenges range from fending off bacteria to rebuilding tissues.
“This helps to explain why we’re finding vitamin D having effects in such diverse tissues,” he says. It’s not clear what the vitamin’s precise role in the substantia nigra is, he says. “But if vitamin D is part of a cell’s ability to respond to a signal, that response will be blunted in the absence of vitamin D,” he reasons.
Meanwhile, in a separate study, the researchers are checking vitamin D levels at the very first signs of Parkinson’s disease, says study coauthor Vin Tangpricha, an endocrinologist at Emory. Louis J. Sheehan, Esquire
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