Concussions sending more young athletes to ER
TIME
As the pressure turns on, younger athletes are being sent to the ER. A study published in the journal Pediatrics reveals that childhood concussions have doubled, even though sport participation has decreased. According to the study which looked at concussions in children over a span of 10 years, "Football has the highest incidence of concussion, but girls have higher concussion rates than boys do in similar sports." Of approximately 500,000 ER visits for concussions, more than half were related to sports injuries.More

Upcoming free webinars
NACHRI
Join NACHRI and HealthTeacher on Sept. 21, to learn how to help your hospital make the best use of charitable dollars to serve both your mission and your community.
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And mark your calendar for Sept. 24, to discover the ways nurses can have a positive impact on the childhood obesity epidemic.
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Transforming treatment rooms
NACHRI
Five hospitals. Thousands of votes. One goal. Help the Starlight Children's Foundation in their quest to win a $250,000 Pepsi Refresh grant to transform children's treatment rooms from scary to friendly, improving the hospital experience for the entire family.More

Household products dangerous for young kids
Detroit Free Press
To curious toddlers, household cleaning products can look like delectable treats, cool drinks or fascinating toys instead of poisons or caustic chemicals. Products such as bleach, drain cleaner and swimming pool chemicals landed 267,269 children age 5 and younger in U.S. emergency rooms from 1990 to 2006, according to the study in the September issue of Pediatrics. More

Returning to classrooms, and to severe headaches
The New York Times
For kids around the country it's back-to-school time. But for many of them, it's also the return of headache season. Doctors say frequent headaches and migraines are among the most common childhood health complaints, yet the problem gets surprisingly little attention from the medical community. Many pediatricians and parents view migraines as an adult condition. And because many children complain of headaches more often during the school year than the summer, parents often think a child is exaggerating symptoms to get out of schoolwork.More

US pediatricians decry media's portrayal of sex
HealthDay via Bloomberg Businessweek
The nation's leading group of pediatricians has issued a strong policy statement directed toward pediatricians, parents and the media on the danger of messages American teens and children are getting about sex from television, the Internet and other media outlets. The statement, Sexuality, Contraception, and the Media, was published online Aug. 30 and in the September print issue of the journal Pediatrics. More

2-Year-Old first in US and youngest in world to use artificial lung
MD News
Doctors at St. Louis Children's Hospital say Owen Stark, a 2-year-old from Eldon, Mo., is alive today because of an artificial lung. St. Louis Children's Hospital is the first hospital in the country to use the device, the German-made Novalung® sLA Membrane Lung, as an artificial lung. Owen is the youngest person in the world to receive one. Originally approved to help adults through cardiac surgery for intervals up to six hours, the Washington University physicians on the Children's Hospital medical team requested permission from the FDA to use the sLA for Owen to oxygenate his blood in place of his failing lungs until donor organs became available.More

Study: Even before recession, 14 million kids 'underinsured'
HealthDay via Bloomberg Businessweek
Even prior to the onset of the economic recession in 2008, nearly one in four American parents with health insurance reported that their coverage was so inadequate they were unable to access the medical care their children needed. Parents of kids with health problems or special needs were more likely than others to say their insurance coverage did not meet their needs, the analysis of 2007 survey data showed.More

How young is too young for extreme sports?
The Indianapolis Star
Kids pushing boundaries is nothing new. Mozart was composing music when most children are still mastering their ABCs, and an 8-year-old's paintings are fetching six figures in Britain. Tiger Woods first showed off his golf skills at the grand old age of 2. But several child psychologists said there's a big difference between academic or cultural prodigies — even phenoms in traditional sports — and kids who risk their lives.More

When kids won't grow, doctors keep treating: study
Reuters
When it comes to treating very short kids with growth hormone, some doctors may be just as swayed by their own attitudes about being short as by data, suggests a new study. The authors found that many doctors would keep treating kids with growth hormone, and often increase their doses, if the kids still didn't grow much after a year on the treatment - especially when the doctors had strong feelings about how being short affects a kid's emotional well-being. The pattern was especially true for very short boys.More

School eye exams may miss some conditions
WCVB-TV
New research is showing that while school eye tests almost always catch nearsightedness, almost 50 percent of children who are farsighted or have astigmatisms are going undetected. Massachusetts is one of a handful of states that mandates that pediatricians test a child's eyes before they enter kindergarten, but even that is not always enough.More

School-based intervention successfully cuts drinking rates in at-risk children
Science Daily
The coming weeks mark the return to school for many of our youngest citizens. Sadly the satisfaction of making new friends and obtaining good test scores may be overshadowed by the prospect of substance abuse for some school-aged adolescents. The previous decade has witnessed a two-fold increase in both alcohol consumption and intoxication by adolescents age 12 to 17. In an effort to combat these startling findings, researchers at King's College London's Institute of Psychiatry describe a successful personality-based intervention for substance abuse delivered by teachers in the Sept. 2010 issue of the Journal of the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry.More

Social networks for cancer patients and their families offer hope, inspiration, even treatment
The Dallas Morning News
Dealing with a serious family illness by sharing thoughts and fears online is now the norm. Patients, families and caregivers use blogs and social media to connect with others going through similar experiences. These people agree that social media made their lives easier, the battle less stressful.More