Newsbits for Thursday December 21, 2004

No earth shaking news in our field today (everyone is taking an extended Hanukkah or Christmas break I think) so I thought I would just put up some short news bites today.

In The Classroom

I saw a press release today for an interesting looking book that may be useful for schools to introduce into early classrooms or perhaps parents who wish to help their child be streamlined into the classroom could donate. "Why Is He Different" by Kristine Byrnside is a children's book that helps introduce cognitive and learning disabilities into the classroom. I can certainly see the benefit of this. CLICK HERE to read a synopsis and the general press release.

Environmental ADHD Links

Research on the environmental links to ADHD have been controversial but it is still worth keeping up to date on. CLICK HERE to read a synopsis of the latest study that showed a significant link with ADHD and perinatal exposure to smoking and led. It interests me that they frequently use the term " [causes] excess cases" of ADHD. A subtle statement but an important one. I have long felt that we are making a mistake trying to find a silver bullet approach to causal and assessment models for ADHD. There is loads of evidence that shows quite unique symptom profile patterns in ADHD kids. Why should we thus assume that because the outcome is the same (academic difficulties, etc) that the source of these attentional and executive deficits is the same?

An Encouraging Story

I also stumbled today across a short and encouraging story about a doctoral student and her late LD identification. It's always nice to hear about success. CLICK HERE for some feel good news!

Humour: Do I have Asperger's? Nope I'm just a jerk!

I found a satirical article today about people with attitude problems rejoicing in potential Asperger's diagnosis. It reminds me of when I used to work in Mental Health and how often we came across people with M.A.D. (Major A**hole Disorder) who had absolutely nothing wrong with them but a habitual desire to play the system for free drugs, food, and disabled status to get government checks. CLICK HERE but only if you have a sense of humour! (Note: The article does not make fun of actual disabled people in any way).

Stimulant Prescriptions Drop Dramatically With Increase in Tea Bag Sales

Just kidding. I came across an interesting article today discussing a study on the affect of Tea consumption on attention. CLICK HERE to read the article.

It looks like they actually may have used a CPT test to measure the effects ... "The volunteers performed computerized tests that measured their ability to focus attention. This is the ability to ignore distracting information and is synonymous with concentration. In the laboratory, it is measured by presenting more than one piece of information at a time, but with instructions to process and respond to only one. After drinking PG tips tea,there were significant improvements in both the speed and accuracy of their performance." [Quote edited for grammar, typos, and spelling - clearly they did not drink the tea]. At first I thought it would be a caffeine benefit but they did differentiate the results from coffee.

Should be noted the research was carried out by scientists at Unilever's GlobalBeverage Technology Centre. Which means you always have to read the fine print. Clearly the tea-cartels are finally making the moves on the pharmaceuticals!