Center For Eating Disorders

With the number of preschool-age children being prescribed stimulants, antidepressants and other psychiatric drugs on the rise, a group of researchers has suggested a standardized approach to treatment.

"These guidelines emphasize the importance of a family-focused assessment by clinicians with experience working with young children, the use of psychotherapy as the first line treatment for young children with severe psychiatric disorders, and the value of careful monitoring of symptoms and side effects when treating young children," said lead author Dr.

Community Calendar

Individuals with mental illness who are interested in establishing and maintaining wellness. Registration required. 513-458-6670.

Monday: Parenting Education Classes, 7-8:30 p.m., Catholic Social Services of Butler County, 140 N.

Nightmares In Pre-schoolers Are Less Prevalent, Are Trait-Like And ...

Bad dreams in pre-schoolers are less prevalent than thought. However, when they do exist, nightmares are trait-like in nature and associated with personality characteristics measured as early as five months.

The study, led by Valérie Simard, under the direction of Tore Nielsen, PhD, of the University of Montreal, sampled 987 children in the Province of Quebec, who were assessed by their parents at the 29-month, 41-month, 50-month, five-year and six-year mark. Parents were asked in a questionnaire about the frequency of their child's bad dreams without requiring that they attempt to judge whether or not awakenings occurred.

According to the results, proportions of participants in each bad-dreams frequency category were quite stable over time.

For those reporting never, proportions were as follows:

-- 29 months, 31.4 percent
-- 41 months, 29 percent
-- 50 months, 27.7 percent
-- five years, 30.7 percent
-- six years, 31.4 percent

Most fell into the sometimes category:

-- 29 months: 65.2 percent
-- 41 months; 65.5 percent
-- 50 months, 69.3 percent
-- five years, 66.4 percent
-- six years, 66.3 percent)

There were marginal proportions in the often category:

-- 29 months, 1.7 percent
-- 41 months, 3.9 percent
-- 50 months, 2.1 percent
-- five years, 1.8 percent
-- six years, 1.3 percent

Those in the always category:

-- 29 months, 0.7 percent
-- 41 months, zero percent
-- 50 months, 0.1 percent
-- five years, 0.8 percent
-- six years, 0.2 percent

A higher mother's rating of the child's anxiety at 17 months was the best of 10 psychological predictors of bad dreams at 29 months, followed by the father's rating.

The Many Faces of Big Pharma’s Disease Mongering

Most people blame Big Pharma and the docs in its pocket for elevating everyday anxiety to depression, depression to bipolar disease and childhood behavior problems to major psychiatric diseases.

Like Complete Healthcare Communications (CHC) whose phalanx of 40 medical writers, editors and librarians has submitted over 500 manuscripts to journals for clients Pfizer, Sanofi-Aventis, Wyeth, Schering-Plough and AstraZeneca according to its promotional materials, with an acceptance rate of 80 percent.

Editor's Mailbag

We need everyone to talk to kids about the many reasons to not use tobacco.If you do know a young person who is using tobacco then please let them know that there is funding out there available to their school to hold smoking-cessation classes.They can kick the habit. Some of the students who have taken these classes in Cerro Gordo County have then turned around and helped their parents quit.We need your help in making Cerro Gordo County a healthier place to live in.Please talk to your kids.And thank you for not smoking.Choose the best candidateBy ROSALIE BOOZELL, Mason CityAs a woman, I would like to respond to a recent letter to the editor which urged all women to vote for Hillary Clinton "because she is a woman."I, as a woman, choose to vote for the person, not for the gender.Is Hillary the best candidate for president? That is the question we should ask and that is the only standard we should consider when casting our vote.The writer asks rhetorically, what are we teaching our young girls (if we don’t teach them to vote for Hillary)? My answer would be, we should be teaching them to think for themselves.

Anorexia inherited through sex hormones in womb, says study

Sex hormones in the womb could be a cause of the eating disorder anorexia, a study has found. The suspicion is that oestrogen may be overproduced by some mothers, affecting the baby’s brain and making it susceptible to the eating disorder.

Many claims have been made that girls who become anorexic have been influenced by images of stick-thin models.

Filed under: CollegeBasketball

She set out as she had done every Sunday afternoon for years. She locked her door, turned to the weather, and held the hand rail as she stepped carefully down from the porch. Once on the ground she adjusted her hat on her gray head. As this was a winter day in the Christmas season, a cold day, she also adjusted her coat. Had it been raining, she would have pulled a large lawn and leaf bag, as if it were a poncho, over her head and upper body. Most times she shouldered her hand bag. This day she also shouldered a bulging plastic shopping bag. She walked along the dirt road that would lead her to the paved road that would lead her to the highway. Her only company was her shadow, small and indistinct at her feet. She walked without the deliberate care of someone unfamiliar with the terrain, but neither was her gait quick.