Releases Saturday 22 June 2002
No 7352 Volume 324
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(1) BABYWALKERS DELAY INFANT DEVELOPMENT
(2) NO
LINK BETWEEN EPILEPSY AND
CRIMINALITY
(3) SIMPLE
GUIDE FOR SUNCREAMS WILL HELP
USERS
(4) SLEEP
ATTACKS FROM PARKINSON'S DRUGS
DO EXIST
(5) CLINICAL
SYMPTOMS MAY AID EARLY
DIAGNOSIS OF
VARIANT CJD
(1) BABYWALKERS DELAY INFANT DEVELOPMENT
(Locomotor milestones and babywalkers:
cross sectional
study)
http://bmj.com/cgi/content/full/324/7352/1494
Babywalkers are associated with significant
delay in
achieving normal locomotor milestones
in infants, such as
crawling, standing, and walking, and should
be
discouraged, concludes a study in this
week's BMJ.
Researchers in Ireland surveyed parents
of 190 normal
healthy infants (83 boys and 107 girls),
born at term and
attending registered day care centres.
They asked parents
to record the age at which their child
reached various
developmental milestones including rolling
over, sitting
alone, crawling, and walking alone.
Of the102 infants using babywalkers, achieving
crawling,
standing alone, and walking alone occurred
later than in the
other infants. However, babywalker use
was not
associated with achieving sitting with
support, sitting alone,
standing with support, and walking with
support.
They found strong associations between
the amount of
babywalker use and the extent of developmental
delay.
For example, each aggregated 24 hours
of babywalker use
was associated with a delay of 3.3 days
in walking alone
and a delay of 3.7 days in standing alone.
This study provides additional evidence
that babywalkers
are associated with significant delay
in achieving normal
locomotor milestones, say the authors.
The use of
babywalkers should be discouraged, they
conclude.
Contacts:
Mary Garrett, Director, University College
Dublin School
of Physiotherapy, Mater Hospital, Dublin,
Ireland
Email: m.garrett@ucd.ie
(2) NO LINK BETWEEN
EPILEPSY AND
CRIMINALITY
(Prevalence of epilepsy in prisoners)
http://bmj.com/cgi/content/full/324/7352/1495
It has long been believed that people with
epilepsy are
particularly prone to violence and criminality,
but a study in
this week's BMJ finds that epilepsy is
no more common in
prisoners than in the general population.
Fazel and colleagues reviewed seven surveys
based on
clinical interviews of 3,111 prisoners.
All respondents
were sentenced inmates, with an average
age of 29. Ninety
per cent were men, and 22% had been convicted
of
violent offences.
Only about 1% of the prisoners reported
a history of
chronic epilepsy. The prevalence rate
in general
populations is also approximately 1% for
men aged 25-35
years.
"These findings reinforce our conclusion
that the available
evidence provides no good support for
the alleged link
between epilepsy and criminality," conclude
the authors.
Contact:
Seena Fazel, Research Fellow, Department
of Psychiatry,
University of Oxford, Warneford Hospital,
Oxford, UK
Email: seena.fazel@psych.ox.ac.uk
(3) SIMPLE GUIDE
FOR SUNCREAMS WILL HELP
USERS
(Letter: Simple dosage guide for
suncreams will help users)
http://bmj.com/cgi/content/full/324/7352/1526/a
Studies have shown that consumers apply
much less
sunscreen than is required to achieve
the sun protection
factor (SPF) stated on the product. In
this week's BMJ,
researchers suggest a simple guide to
ensure that people
are protected according to their expectations.
The "rule of nines" divides the body's
surface area into 11
areas, each representing roughly 9% of
the total.
Sunscreen can be applied to the recommended
thickness if
two strips of sunscreen are squeezed out
onto both the
index and middle fingers from the palmar
crease to the
fingertips. The application of this "two
fingers" of sunscreen
will provide a dose of the product that
approximates to
that used during the laboratory determination
of the SPF.
Users in fact are unlikely to be willing
to cover themselves
or their families with such a copious
layer of sunscreen and
would prefer to apply half this amount,
say the authors.
They therefore suggest applying one finger
of sunscreen,
with the corollary that the resultant
protection would only
be about half that stated on the product.
Users should then
be encouraged to reapply one finger's
worth within half an
hour of the initial application in order
to achieve optimum
protection, they conclude.
Contacts:
Steve Taylor, General Practitioner, Sunset
Road Family
Doctors, Mairangi Bay, Auckland, New Zealand
Email: steve@dox.co.nz
or
Brian Diffey, Professor of Medical Physics,
Regional
Medical Physics Department, Newcastle
General Hospital,
Newcastle, UK
Email: b.l.diffey@ncl.ac.uk
(4) SLEEP ATTACKS
FROM PARKINSON'S DRUGS
DO EXIST
(Sleep attacks in patients taking
dopamine agonists:
review)
http://bmj.com/cgi/content/full/324/7352/1483
Car crashes in patients with Parkinson's
disease have been
associated with sudden sleep attacks caused
by dopamine
drugs, but the concept of sleep attacks,
and their
connection with dopamine drugs, has been
disputed.
In this week's BMJ, researchers in Austria
aim to
determine whether sleep attacks do exist,
whether
dopamine drugs are implicated, and whether
attacks are
predictable, preventable, and treatable.
They reviewed 124 patients and found that
sleep attacks
do exist in up to 30% of patients. They
are associated with
all dopamine drugs and occur at both high
and low doses
of the drugs. However, their prediction,
prevention, and
treatment are yet to be solved.
Despite the potential danger from driving,
experts believe
that sleep attacks are too infrequent
to recommend that
patients taking dopamine drugs for Parkinson's
disease
stop driving, say the authors. Recommendations
for
driving, other than informing patients
of a potential risk,
should be made with caution until more
data are available,
they conclude.
Contact:
Carl Nikolaus Homann, Head of Department
and Medical
Superintendent, Klinik Maria Theresia
Hospital for
Neurological and Orthopedic Rehabilitation,
Bad
Radkersburg, Austria
Email: nik.homann@klinik-maria-theresia.at
(5) CLINICAL SYMPTOMS
MAY AID EARLY
DIAGNOSIS OF VARIANT CJD
(First hundred cases of variant Creutzfeldt-Jacob
disease:
retrospective case note review of
early psychiatric and
neurological features)
http://bmj.com/cgi/content/full/324/7352/1479
The possibility of a large epidemic of
variant
Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease cannot be excluded,
and
doctors may see patients who are worried
about the
possibility of this diagnosis. A study
in this week's BMJ
provides a comprehensive description of
the early
psychiatric and neurological features
of variant
Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease to aid early
recognition of this
condition.
Researchers analysed the case notes of
the first 100
patients diagnosed with variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob
disease
in the UK.
They found that the early stages of variant
Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease are dominated
by psychiatric
symptoms, such as dysphoria, withdrawal,
anxiety, and
insomnia. A significant proportion of
patients also exhibit
neurological symptoms within four months
of clinical onset,
including poor memory, pain, sensory symptoms,
and
unsteadiness of gait.
The early clinical features of variant
Creutzfeldt-Jakob
disease described in this paper are consistent
with previous
descriptions, say the authors. "We hope
that the detailed
analysis of the early psychiatric and
neurological features of
variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease in this
paper may help
with early and accurate recognition of
this condition."
Contact:
Richard Knight, Consultant Neurologist,
National CJD
Surveillance Unit, Western General Hospital,
Edinburgh,
Scotland
FOR ACCREDITED JOURNALISTS
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London WC1H 9JR
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(http://www.eurekalert.org)
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