“Your daughter has schizophrenia,” I told the woman. “Oh, my God, anything but that,” she replied. “Why couldn’t she have leukemia or some other disease instead?” “But if she had leukemia she might die,” I pointed out. “Schizophrenia is a much more treatable disease.” The woman looked sadly at me, then down at the floor. She spoke softly. “I would still prefer that my daughter had leukemia.” “This book is a product of a thousand such conversations,” writes research psychiatrist and schizophrenia specialist E. Fuller Torrey, M.D., in Surviving Schizophrenia: A Manual for Families, Patients And Providers. Getting a diagnosis of schizophrenia can be devastating. Families and patients alike think there’s no hope. What follows may be shock, shame and confusion. ...MedWorm Message: Get the very latest Swine Flu news via the MedWorm Swine Flu RSS news feed - updated hourly from thousands of authoritative health and news sources.

Children’s research made the Huffington Post’s Top 10 Medical Research Trends to Watch in 2010. We find out exactly how dangerous secondhand smoke is to children. Are American destined to be obese? Two studies show how important a good night’s sleep for your children is. A gene for a devastating kidney disease is discovered. Do you know the dangers of leaving your child in the car alone? Dr. Rich responds to comments on his Call of Duty post. Have Americans finally hit an obesity plateau? The Flu Fighters invade Facebook. Children’s sends a team into Haiti and we offer advice on how to talk to your children about this devastating event. (Source: Thrive, Children's Hospital Boston)

Did you know that hearing certain sounds while you sleep could improve your memory? A few years ago, scientists discovered that being exposed to particular smells during sleep helps the brain retain new memories. So they they wondered if sounds could do the same thing. To test the idea, researchers at Northwestern University designed a memory test. 12 subjects were shown 50 images appearing .... (Source: Sound Medicine)

There's a new theory that suggests dreaming is a sort of warm-up exercise for the brain -- preparing it for the sights and sounds of the next day. J. Allan Hobson is a psychiatrist and sleep researcher at Harvard. He tells Sound Medicine's Dr. Kathy Miller that he considers dreaming sort of like a morning jog. He explains that dreams are an important type of "proto-consciousness" that begin.... (Source: Sound Medicine)

By all accounts, medical school is a slog. Really long hours, a lotta grunt work. Tons of pressure to perform on no sleep. But what I was really surprised to learn is that one of the worst things about medical training is getting stuck by needles. Evidently, medical and nursing students get jabbed all the time. According to a recent study, something like 800,000 needlestick injuries are repo.... (Source: Sound Medicine)

Tonsillectomy and adenoidectomy (T&A) is the first-line surgical treatment for the management of pediatric obstructive sleep apnea/hypopnea syndrome (OSAHS). However, contrary to the initial reports, recent studies demonstrated higher rates of persistence of OSAHS after T&A. It was emphasized that T&A for pediatric OSAHS patients with smaller tonsils, narrower epipharyngeal airspace, and more poorly developed maxillary and mandibular protrusion had poorer response. Therefore, different and advanced surgical approaches, such as uvulopalatopharyngoplasty and orthognatic surgeries (maxillomandibular expansion, distraction osteogenesis, etc.), were offered. (Source: Otolaryngology - Head and Neck Surgery)MedWorm Message: Get the very latest Swine Flu news via the MedWorm Swine Flu RSS news feed - updated hourly from thousands of authoritative health and news sources.

Conclusions: These preliminary results allow us to infer that sedation with propofol changes sleep architecture but permits respiratory evaluation, because the main respiratory parameters evaluated in OSA are maintained. These preliminary results support the view that nasoendoscopy under propofol sedation is a promising examination for management of this disease. (Source: Otolaryngology - Head and Neck Surgery)

Conclusions. The prevalence and incidence of anxiety are high in UK primary care and are almost twice as high in women than in men. Anxiety is associated with other psychiatric morbidity as well as frequent health care use. Antidepressants are the most commonly used pharmacological treatment. (Source: Family Practice)

Johnson and Johnson has expanded its recall of products contaminated with 2,4,6-tribromoanisole to include additional Tylenol products, Motrin, Benadryl, St. Joseph's aspirin, Rolaids, and Simply Sleep. The additional recalls come less than a month after the initial recall of select Tylenol products, yet two months after the company was made aware of the contamination. In addition to leading many consumers to become unnecessarily sick, the delayed action has brought Johnson and Johnson some FDA scrutiny. The company's McNeil Consumer Healthcare Products division has 15 days to respond to the FDA explaining why it did not take action sooner.A full list of recalled products can be found here. The contaminated drugs may have a moldy odor characteristic of the tribromoanisole. Symptoms of expo...

A robust new technique for screening drugs' effects on zebrafish behavior is pointing scientists toward unexpected compounds and pathways that may govern sleep and wakefulness in humans. Among their more intriguing findings: Various anti-inflammatory agents in the immune system, long known to induce sleep during infection, may also shape normal sleep/wake cycles. (Source: ScienceDaily Headlines)

90 percent of teens aren’t getting enough sleep. Here’s how to help them. (Source: U.S. News - Health)MedWorm Message: Get the very latest Swine Flu news via the MedWorm Swine Flu RSS news feed - updated hourly from thousands of authoritative health and news sources.

90 percent of teens aren’t getting enough sleep. Here’s how to help them. (Source: U.S. News - Health)MedWorm Message: Get the very latest Swine Flu news via the MedWorm Swine Flu RSS news feed - updated hourly from thousands of authoritative health and news sources.

Untreated obstructive sleep apnea may impact the health of people with type 2 diabetes, a new study shows. (Source: WebMD Health)

Tens of thousands dead, even more left homeless and scenes of chaos; this is the picture coming out of the Caribbean island of Haiti. The catastrophe continues to unfold and ShelterBox are working round the clock to ensure emergency shelter reaches the island as quickly as possible. Reports from Haiti say thousands of people have been sleeping in the open air for the second night running, with some people even being forced to sleep among dead bodies... (Source: Health News from Medical News Today)

Hersi Ahmad SalahAnnals of Thoracic Medicine 2010 5(1):10-17Sleep-disordered breathing (SDB), which includes obstructive sleep apnea (OSA) as its most extreme variant, is characterized by intermittent episodes of partial or complete obstruction of the upper airway, leading to cessation of breathing while asleep. Cardiac arrhythmias are common problems in OSA patients, although the true prevalence and clinical relevance of cardiac arrhythmias remains to be determined. The presence and complexity of tachyarrhythmias and bradyarrhythmias may influence morbidity, mortality and quality of life for patients with OSA. Although the exact mechanisms underlying the link between OSA and cardiac arrhythmias are not well established, they could be som...

As a result of misinformation or a lack of knowledge about healthy infant sleep, many parents and their babies suffer needlessly—and no one gets enough sleep. A baby’s sleepwake cycles are likely to appear unpredictable to new parents. This, coupled with conflicting advice about infant sleep, can lead to parents simply letting the baby sleep “whenever.” In such a situation, the baby often ends up with chronically insufficient sleep, which, if left unchecked, can spiral into persistent night awakenings and bedtime resistance. (Source: Consultant Live)

Summary: Bariatric or weight loss surgery is the only treatment for morbid obesity that confers definitive weight loss at long-term follow-up. In addition to weight reduction there is a strong possibility of amelioration or even cure of various co-morbid conditions associated with obesity such as Type II diabetes mellitus, obstructive sleep apnoea, hypertension, asthma, osteoarthritis and gastro-oesophageal reflux disease.Laparoscopic bariatric surgery is now the gold standard technique in weight loss surgery with the Roux-en-Y Gastric Bypass, Adjustable Gastric Band and Sleeve Gastrectomy being the commonly performed surgeries in Europe, United States and Australia.This review aims to outline the technique, efficacy and complications of these procedures as well as outline the less commonl...MedWorm Message: Get the very latest Swine Flu news via the MedWorm Swine Flu RSS news feed - updated hourly from thousands of authoritative health and news sources.

This article will focus on the common types of sleep-disordered breathing and investigation of these patients. It will discuss the issues around anaesthetising patients with these conditions, and suggest solutions to the problems that these patients present. (Source: Current Anaesthesia and Critical Care)

A robust new technique for screening drugs' effects on zebrafish behavior is pointing Harvard University scientists toward unexpected compounds and pathways that may govern sleep and wakefulness in humans... (Source: Biology / Biochemistry News From Medical News Today)

A robust new technique for screening drugs' effects on zebrafish behavior is pointing Harvard University scientists toward unexpected compounds and pathways that may govern sleep and wakefulness in humans. Among their more intriguing findings, described this week in the journal Science: Various anti-inflammatory agents in the immune system, long known to induce sleep during infection, may also shape normal sleep/wake cycles. The new research identifies several compounds with surprising effects on sleep and wakefulness in zebrafish... (Source: Health News from Medical News Today)