Down syndrome (DS) is a condition characterized by an additional chromosome, a total of 47, instead of the 46 chromosomes a child should have. This extra genetic material causes physical and cognitive delays, which often lead to varying degrees of mental retardation. One in every 800 babies born is affected; doctors are able to detect Down syndrome before a child is born through diagnostic testing with 99% accuracy. The risk of giving birth to a child with Down... more

I asked my teenage daughter to help me clean for my son’s open house last weekend. She seemed excited to help and went right to work, sweeping off the steps and the sidewalk. An hour later, when I checked on her, she was still sweeping the four steps and the 15 feet of sidewalk. That’s when I realized that she wasn’t just using a broom; she was also using a toothbrush.

She was meticulously removing every speck of dirt and each loose stone. The problem being that the cement has been here for at least as long as we have lived here, 15 years. Therefore, quite a bit of it was loose so she was creating pits, valleys, and holes everywhere. I told her that I appreciated her efforts,... more

Our discussion at Sunday School yesterday veered slightly off topic onto whether children who die go to heaven, then on to exactly what is the age of accountability. My classmates brought up children with mental handicaps as having an extended period of time before they could be accountable for their actions. Of course none of them are living with children with developmental delays, but their point was well-made.

Yet, as I pondered this I was once again reminded that anything taken to an extreme is bound to fail. I read a comment to my... more

It is not routine for pregnant women to be tested for hepatitis C Virus, as they are not at a greater risk to contract the virus than anyone else is. However, if a pregnant woman has HCV infection, then her child has about a four percent chance (i.e. 4 out of every 100 infants) of becoming infected; that percentage can be as high as 19% however, if the mother is co-infected with HIV. The actual infection to the child occurs at the time of birth, and unfortunately, no treatment is... more

Hepatitis C is a disease of the liver caused by the hepatitis C virus (HCV), currently there is not a vaccine to help prevent infection. A person contracts HCV through direct contact with the blood of an infected person. Many people experience no symptoms of Hepatitis C, and may be unaware of the infection. Tests may detect HVC in the blood one or two weeks after infection from the virus.

There is a series of blood tests to determine if a person is infected with the HVC virus. The... more

Faith, author of Hoping to Adopt blog, commented on my What's Not in the DSM post the other day about how it bothers her that Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder is classified as a “disorder” in the same way that BiPolar Disorder, Schizophrenia or Autism are. I see her point that these disorders are different at their root than PTSD. PTSD was “caused”... more

My arrival home this afternoon was somewhat of a surprise to my teenage daughter. Though I’m not sure why, after all, I live here, and I have returned home each time I’ve left. However, when I entered the kitchen it was vacant; apparently, nobody heard me come in.

I began to look into the other rooms, trying to locate my children who were supposed to be doing their schoolwork. Nevertheless, when the cats away, the mice will play, you know. When I glanced into the playroom, which is also our schoolroom, I saw my teenage daughter at my... more

In the past, parents routinely took their children to the doctor for ear infections expecting to receive a prescription for an antibiotic. However, that is no longer the case. Apparently, there is increasing evidence to show that most ear infections will resolve themselves in about the same amount of time, with or without an antibiotic. Therefore, many doctors may be reluctant to treat certain ear infections with antibiotics, especially in children over six months old, because the overuse of antibiotics is leading to antibiotic-resistant strains... more

Babies and children between the ages of four months and five years are the most likely to suffer from middle ear infections (otitis media). By the time children reach three years, they have probably suffered at least one ear infection. Allergies such as hay fever, or an upper respiratory infection, such as a cold caused by a virus, also cause middle ear infection.

Swelling and inflammation, of the sinuses and the eustachian tubes, are caused by both colds... more

Society seems to expect all teenagers to experience a period of rebellion before eventually becoming mature, tax-paying adults. This rebellious transition period is being attributed to a physical change in brain operation that the scientific community has documented through brain scans. The teens' brain scans displayed more activity at the back of the brain in the superior temporal sulcus, while the adults' brain scans displayed more activity in the front of the brain in the medial prefrontal cortex. These brain scan results indicate that during... more