http://medicalxpress.com/ en-us Medical Xpress internet news portal provides the latest news on Health and Medicine. As parents, physicians and policymakers look for ways to curb childhood obesity, they may need to look no further than a child's own backyard. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2013-05-childhood-obesity-home.html Overweight and Obesity Sat, 04 May 2013 05:20:01 EST news286860678 New research from the Children's Outcomes Research Program at Children's Hospital Colorado shows that timely reminders by state or local health departments are more effective at increasing immunization rates among preschool children than those from primary care practices. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2013-01-boost-childhood-immunizations.html Health Mon, 07 Jan 2013 12:27:03 EST news276784012 (Medical Xpress)—A study conducted by University of Connecticut researchers finds more than one-third of Hartford preschoolers are overweight or obese with rates far above the national average for children of the same age. The report's findings were released during a news conference at Hartford City Hall today. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-11-uconn-one-third-hartford-preschoolers-overweight.html Overweight and Obesity Thu, 29 Nov 2012 08:50:01 EST news273399076 In a sobering study published in the journal Environmental Health, researchers at UC Davis and UCLA measured food-borne toxin exposure in children and adults by pinpointing foods with high levels of toxic compounds and determining how much of these foods were consumed. The researchers found that family members in the study, and preschool children in particular, are at high risk for exposure to arsenic, dieldrin, DDE (a DDT metabolite), dioxins and acrylamide. These compounds have been linked to cancer, developmental disabilities, birth defects and other conditions. However, the study also points to dietary modifications that could mitigate risk. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-11-high-exposure-food-borne-toxins.html Health Tue, 13 Nov 2012 14:00:10 EST news272037536 (Medical Xpress)—Latest research from the University of Otago, Christchurch (UOC) shows the Early Start home visiting programme halved rates of physical abuse against children and lowered non-accidental hospital visits by a third over a sustained period. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-11-home-programme-child-abuse-longer.html Pediatrics Tue, 13 Nov 2012 06:50:03 EST news272009422 (HealthDay)—A brief primary care intervention for preschool-aged children and their parents reduces the number of meals eaten in front of the television but does not reduce overall screen time or body mass index (BMI), according to research published online Nov. 5 in Pediatrics. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-11-meals-eaten-front-television-intervention.html Pediatrics Mon, 05 Nov 2012 18:00:01 EST news271358579 (Medical Xpress)—The Triple P positive parenting programme has been hailed as a success around the world and invested in heavily by public bodies in Scotland, the UK and beyond. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-11-evidence-success-flagship-parenting-programme.html Other Mon, 05 Nov 2012 07:32:06 EST news271323100 (HealthDay)—Preschool children with fetal alcohol spectrum disorder (FASD) display delays in auditory processing, which may serve as a useful neural marker of information processing difficulties, according to research published in the October issue of Alcoholism: Clinical & Experimental Research. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-10-auditory-fetal-alcohol-syndrome.html Addiction Fri, 05 Oct 2012 12:52:35 EST news268660347 (Medical Xpress)—Pretend play can be fun for preschool children, but a new University of Virginia study, published in a recent online edition of the journal Psychological Bulletin, finds that it is not as crucial to a child's development as currently believed. Pretend play is any play a child engages in, alone, with playmates, or with adults, that involves uses of the imagination to create a fantasy world or situation, such as making toy cars go "vrrooooom" or making dolls talk. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-08-crucial-child-believed.html Psychology & Psychiatry Tue, 28 Aug 2012 14:43:40 EST news265383809 Parents of young children hope for a successful kindergarten experience that will set their youngsters on the right path of their educational journey. Some worry about their kids not adapting to the school environment, particularly when the children are talkative and overactive. Yet, a new study by the University of Miami (UM) shows that overly shy preschool children are at greater academic risk than their chatty and boisterous peers. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-08-kindergarten-readiness-shy-kids-academic.html Psychology & Psychiatry Tue, 28 Aug 2012 14:37:35 EST news265383449 (Medical Xpress) -- Preschool children exposed to domestic violence and additional traumatic events are at increased risk for developing traumatic stress disorder, a new University of Michigan study shows. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-08-preschool-children-stress-domestic-violence.html Psychology & Psychiatry Mon, 20 Aug 2012 08:03:05 EST news264668579 (Medical Xpress) -- In a recently published study, researchers have shown that mothers who are overinvolved or overprotective during the early stages of a child’s development – often referred to as helicopter parents – can increase the risk for anxiety later in life. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-08-helicopter-parenting-anxious-children.html Psychology & Psychiatry Wed, 15 Aug 2012 09:30:07 EST news264241793 Young children who are able to pay attention and persist on a task have a 50 percent greater chance of completing college, according to a new study at Oregon State University. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-08-preschool-children-attention-finish-college.html Psychology & Psychiatry Mon, 06 Aug 2012 15:25:33 EST news263485470 Teaching new mums about healthy eating and active play can help cut the risk of their child being overweight or obese, a study published today in the British Medical Journal finds. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-06-healthy-advice-mothers-child-obesity.html Overweight and Obesity Tue, 26 Jun 2012 18:30:03 EST news259944471 Young children with allergies to milk and egg experience an unexpectedly high number of reactions to these and other foods, according to researchers at National Jewish Health. More than 70 percent of preschool children with documented or suspected food allergies suffered a significant reaction during the three-year period. Researchers also found that caregivers failed to administer the medication epinephrine in 70 percent of the severe and potentially life-threatening reactions. The study, conducted by the NIH-funded Consortium of Food Allergy Research, is published in the June 25, 2012, issue of the journal Pediatrics. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-06-severe-reactions-food-common-thought.html Pediatrics Mon, 25 Jun 2012 03:00:01 EST news259811457 Cerebral damage and retinopathy of prematurity appear to be independently associated with visual impairment among preschool children who were born extremely premature, according to a report published Online First by Archives of Ophthalmology. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-06-factors-visual-impairment-preschool-children.html Ophthalmology Mon, 11 Jun 2012 15:58:29 EST news258649093 (Medical Xpress) -- Preschool children who are more physically active are more likely to show behavioural problems, a study has found. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-05-children.html Psychology & Psychiatry Mon, 07 May 2012 09:30:02 EST news255600727 A new book by Barbara Rolls, professor of nutritional sciences and Helen A. Guthrie Chair in Nutrition at Penn State, aims to help people control their hunger while also losing weight. "The Ultimate Volumetrics Diet" will be available in stores and online on April 10. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-03-ultimate-volumetrics-diet-people-weight.html Health Mon, 26 Mar 2012 11:34:02 EST news251980438 Parents who feel guilty about letting their young children watch too many fantasy movies on TV can relax. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-03-harry-potter-creativity-children.html Psychology & Psychiatry Thu, 22 Mar 2012 19:09:49 EST news251662182 Children who started eating fish before nine months of age are less likely to suffer from pre-school wheeze, but face a higher risk if they were treated with broad spectrum antibiotics in the first week of life or their mother took paracetamol during pregnancy. Those are the key findings from a large-scale Swedish study published in the December issue of Acta Paediatrica. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2011-11-babies-fish-months-pre-school-wheeze.html Health Tue, 22 Nov 2011 10:55:11 EST news241181703 (Medical Xpress) -- A study published in the British Journal of Nutrition indicates that orange sweet potato (OSP) is effective in providing vitamin A to malnourished women and children in Mozambique, where the prevalence of vitamin A deficiency (VAD) is very high. VAD can lead to impaired immune defenses and eye damage that can lead to blindness and even death. Annually, 250,000 to 500,000 preschool children go blind from VAD and about two-thirds will die within months of going blind. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2011-11-orange-sweet-potato-vitamin-deficiency.html Health Tue, 22 Nov 2011 09:43:52 EST news241177415 Canada should establish a vaccine seroepidemiology surveillance network to better understand the effectiveness of vaccination programs, according to an analysis in CMAJ (Canadian Medical Association Journal). http://medicalxpress.com/news/2011-11-canada-vaccine-seroepidemiology-surveillance.html Medications Mon, 14 Nov 2011 12:29:42 EST news240496171 Preschool children who hear their parents describe the size and shape of objects and then use those words themselves perform better on tests of their spatial skills, researchers at the University of Chicago have found. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2011-11-spatial-terms-children-skills.html Psychology & Psychiatry Wed, 09 Nov 2011 12:48:45 EST news240065302 Adults and adolescents often adjust their behaviour and opinions to peer groups, even when they themselves know better. Researchers from the Max Planck Institutes for Evolutionary Anthropology in Leipzig, Germany, and for Psycholinguistics in Nijmegen, Netherlands, studied this phenomenon in four-year-olds and found that preschool children are already subject to peer pressure. In the current study, the researchers found that children conformed their public judgment of a situation to the judgment of a majority of peers in spite better knowledge. (Child Development, October 25, 2011). http://medicalxpress.com/news/2011-10-peer-pressure-preschool-children.html Psychology & Psychiatry Tue, 25 Oct 2011 08:50:13 EST news238751392 (Medical Xpress) -- How well adults can detect if children are lying or reporting misinformation is no better than the odds of chance, reports a new Cornell study. The findings have implications for physical and sexual abuse investigations, which often rely heavily on children's eyewitness reports. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2011-10-adults-children-intentionally-lying-misinformed.html Psychology & Psychiatry Wed, 19 Oct 2011 05:26:04 EST news238220752 Updated guidelines from the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) offer new information on diagnosing and treating Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) in younger children and in adolescents. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2011-10-aap-ages-diagnosis-treatment-adhd.html Attention deficit disorders Sun, 16 Oct 2011 04:04:38 EST news237956635 Eating and physical activity habits for a lifetime can develop at an early age. As the use of preschool child care increases and the prevalence of childhood obesity is at an all-time high, the opportunity to positively impact eating and exercise habits within this setting presents itself. A review in the September 2011 issue of the Journal of the American Dietetic Association describes and evaluates research addressing opportunities and strategies for the prevention of obesity among preschool children in child-care settings. It examines the current status of state regulations, practices and policies, and interventions for promoting healthy eating and physical activity. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2011-08-child-care-facilities-healthy-physical-preschoolers.html Health Fri, 26 Aug 2011 04:35:50 EST news233552139 Preschool children consumed nearly twice as many vegetables and 11 percent fewer calories over the course of a day when researchers Penn State added pureed vegetables to the children's favorite foods. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2011-07-vegetables-kids-foods-vegetable-intake.html Health Mon, 25 Jul 2011 13:23:14 EST news230818986 Preschool children seem to grasp the true concept of counting only if they are taught to understand the number value of groups of objects greater than three, research at the University of Chicago shows. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2011-06-easy-larger.html Psychology & Psychiatry Tue, 14 Jun 2011 14:45:15 EST news227281493 A recent study has shown that cognitive impairment is evident early on in preschool children with epilepsy, consistent with results of similar studies in older children. Age of onset of first seizure is a significant predictor of cognitive impairment according to this study—the first to evaluate cognitive impairment in children age three to six. The report is available in Epilepsia, a journal published by Wiley-Blackwell on behalf of the International League Against Epilepsy (ILAE). http://medicalxpress.com/news/2011-06-cognitive-impairment-preschool-children-epilepsy.html Diseases, Conditions, Syndromes Thu, 02 Jun 2011 10:14:31 EST news226228463