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Autism Vox

Archive for the ‘Psychiatry’ Category

July 31st, 2008

The Truth Is Out There, But Smallpox?

The truth, as Mulder and Scully would put it, is out there. I’ll confess to never having watched The X-Files—we did have a TV then (Charlie, and I, had to watch all those videos of Barney, the Teletubbies, and the Wiggles on something)—but the years The X-Files were on (1993-2002) overlapped with the years in […]

By Kristina Chew, PhD -- 20 comments

July 29th, 2008

The Dangers of DIY Doctoring

Here’s a familiar one for parents of autistic kids:
Doctors and Patients, Now At Odds, the July 29th New York Times’s trumpets. Jim and I  do have our arsenal of just really terrible, not happening, not helpful, stories with pediatricians, child psychiatrists, neurologists, an immunologist, the psychologist who was on the team that diagnosed Charlie, and […]

By Kristina Chew, PhD -- 10 comments

June 21st, 2008

Autism Neighborhood: New Online Films

For your Saturday afternoon viewing: Autism Neighborhood offers a number of autism-related movies, all viewable online and offering thoughtful,and  hopeful, insights about autism. Interviewed are: Stephen Shore, an adult with autism, self-advocate, and author; Larry and Sharon Ceresi, the parents of Ryan Ceresi, who is 10 years old and autistic; faculty of the Yale Child […]

By Kristina Chew, PhD -- 8 comments

June 19th, 2008

Psychiatric Genetics

The earlier part of this year saw the publication of a number of studies about the genetics of autism, with one scientist speculating about a unified theory of autism.
The July 2008 Nature Genetics has a review of psychiatric genetics that considers progress and controversy. Here is the abstract:
Several psychiatric disorders — such as bipolar disorder, […]

By Kristina Chew, PhD -- 3 comments

June 8th, 2008

So Goeth the Autism Epidemic

The autism epidemic commeth — or, more accurately, it goeth. The threat of such a terrible scourge—–lots of children with autism—is behind the calls for “safer vaccines” and “change the schedule!” by anti/pro-safe vaccine rallyers at Wednesday’s Green Our Vaccines (which acronyms nicely into GOV) rally. Get out those toxins, change that schedule, flush […]

By Kristina Chew, PhD -- 15 comments

June 7th, 2008

This Week’s Top Posts

Some will remember last week for June 4th and “Green Our Vaccines” rally.
I remember it as Charlie’s last full week of elementary school.

Low Birth Weight and Preterm Birth: Autism Risk Factors?A new study in Pediatrics links low birth weight (less than 5.5 pounds) and preterm birth to an increased risk for autism in infants by […]

By Kristina Chew, PhD -- 0 comments

June 6th, 2008

Panic, Emotions, and No Words To Explain It All

Panic disorder and the inability to express emotions (alexithymia) may be related, according to a new study:
In patients with panic disorder (PD), the difficulty to identify and manage emotional experience might contribute to the enduring vulnerability to panic attacks. Such a difficulty might reflect a dysfunction of fronto-temporo-limbic circuits.
Moments of extreme panic—catastrophic thinking, anxiety—-in Charlie […]

By Kristina Chew, PhD -- 0 comments

May 21st, 2008

What About Myrrh?

A new study has found that burning incense—as in frankincense, the resin from the Boswellia plant—
“activates poorly understood ion channels in the brain to alleviate anxiety or depression. This suggests that an entirely new class of depression and anxiety drugs might be right under our noses anxiety and causes other antidepressant activity in the […]

By Kristina Chew, PhD -- 5 comments

May 18th, 2008

This and Last Weeks Top Posts: Life on the Road with Charlie Means You Have to Pay Attention

I never got around to making a list of last week’s top posts last week so here’s two weeks of “top posts” about autism. Rather than arrange them in chronological order, I’ve arranged them by topic:
My son Charlie turned 11 last Thursday, on May 15th. Life on the road with Charlie is my constant theme […]

By Kristina Chew, PhD -- 3 comments

May 13th, 2008

Stigma and Pride

Sunday’s New York Times had an article about “Mad Pride”: More people with “severe forms of mental illness such as schizophrenia and bipolar disorder” are now speaking out about “their demons”:
About 5.7 million Americans over 18 have bipolar disorder, which is classified as a mood disorder, according to the National Institute of Mental Health. Another […]

By Kristina Chew, PhD -- 32 comments