Vitamin D is crucial for several key physiological processes, including brain development, DNA repair, and regulation of many genes. Much evidence indicates prenatal and early postnatal vitamin-D deficiency increases autism risk, probably through multiple effects, including impaired brain development and increased de novo mutations. High autism rates in several genetically based hypomelanotic skin disorders are puzzling, because ultraviolet-B radiation (UVB) in sunlight acting on skin is a key source of vitamin-D, and lighter skin protects against vitamin-D deficiency, especially at high latitudes. We consider two hypotheses to help explain autism’s co-morbidity with hypomelanosis. 1) Because genetic and epigenetic variants that produce hypomelanosis help protect against vitamin-D deficiency, they increase reproductive fitness of individuals who also have other autism risk factors. 2) Hypomelanotic children have increased autism risk because photosensitivity and skin-cancer concerns lead families to excessively reduce children’s sun exposure. Hypothesis testing could involve studies comparing genomes, epigenetic markers, skin pigmentation, and vitamin-D levels in autistic individuals with and without hypomelanosis, their relatives and controls. Conducting such studies in samples from regions that differ widely in UVB availability would provide particularly valuable data. Support for either hypothesis would elucidate vitamin-D’s role in autism and suggest vitamin-D enhancement may aid treatment and prevention of autism.  read more

Effective Treatment for Autism! A New Study

Dear Readers,

Imagine witnessing an authentic medical miracle.

Well, I did — when I saw an autistic girl become verbally normal after receiving an NAET treatment from my wife Laurie Teitelbaum, MS, who practices NAET in Kona, Hawaii.

I was shocked. Thinking it must be a fluke, Laurie and I explored further, and found that autistic children recovering with NAET was the rule rather than the exception. We happily and excitedly decided that our foundation needed to fund a study to explore this!

NAET is short for "Nambudripad's Allergy Elimination Technique." This unique treatment for allergies and sensitivities (to foods, nutrients and other environmental factors) draws from many natural healing modalities, including acupressure, kinesiology, chiropractic and nutrition. It works by positively reprogramming the person's negative responses to allergens/sensitivities — like hitting a "reset" button — and by balancing energies throughout the body.

NAET was discovered in 1983 by Devi S. Nambudripad, MD, PhD, DC, LAc. (Yes, she's an MD, and a chiropractor, and an acupuncturist, and a PhD … and without an ego!) Since then, countless thousands of patients have been helped through NAET. Including me.

I first encountered NAET when my severe hay fever symptoms were eliminated by a 20-minute NAET treatment from Laurie — and they never recurred! And yes, Laurie continues to amaze and inspire me. I tease that if the holistic medicine I do is 25-50 years ahead of standard medicine, then NAET and what Laurie does is 50 years ahead of me!

But the healing power of NAET isn't limited to curing allergies and sensitivities, because many other conditions are caused or complicated by sensitivities. The list includes (but isn't limited to) CFS, fibromyalgia, backache, migraines, arthritis, asthma, hyperactivity, anxiety, depression, addictions … and autism.

Our foundation approached Dr. Devi and her team of researchers at the NAET Research Foundation (NARF) in Buena Park, California, and we all decided to move forward with the study. We hypothesized that food and nutrient sensitivities were major contributors to the development and symptoms of autism — and we tested that hypothesis in a study of 60 autistic children. The study and our resulting findings were recently published in Integrative Medicine — A Clinician's Journal (IMCJ), and the full study report is available online.

Bottom line? 23 of the 30 autistic children in the treatment group were able to return to regular schools after 1 year of treatment, as compared to zero of 30 in the untreated group!

http://www.endfatigue.com

Below is a list of gluten ingredients, many are found in skin care today.

Please add to our community forum for discussions on skin care and gluten free living!

Hydrolyzed Wheat Protein Barley Grass (can contain seeds) Barley Malt Beer (most contain barley or wheat) Bulgur Wheat Common Wheat (Triticum aestivum) Durum wheat (Triticum durum) Fu (dried wheat gluten) Germ Groats (barley, wheat) Hard Wheat Malt Semolina Semolina Triticum Shot Wheat (Triticum aestivum) Vavilovi Wheat (Triticum aestivum) Vital Wheat Gluten Wheat, Abyssinian Hard triticum durum Wheat amino acids Wheat Bran Extract Wheat, Bulgur Wheat Durum Triticum Wheat Germ Extract Wheat Germ Glycerides Wheat Germ Oil Wheat Germamidopropyldimonium Hydroxypropyl Hydrolyzed Wheat Protein Wheat Grass (can contain seeds) Wheat Nuts Wheat Protein The following items may or may not contain gluten depending on where and how they are made, and it is sometimes necessary to check with the manufacturer to find out: Artificial Color4 Coloring4 Dextrins1,7 Dextrimaltose1,7 Dry Roasted Nuts4 Emulsifiers4 enzymes4 Hydrolyzed Plant Protein4 Hydrolyzed Protein4 Hydrolyzed Vegetable Protein4 Hydrogenated Starch Hydrolysate4 Mixed Tocopherols4 Protein Hydrolysates4 Tocopherols4

If you’re worried about breast cancer, don’t burn your bras. Breast cancer risk has been linked to many factors, but the type of bra you wear is not among them. The myth linking bras (usually underwire bras) to breast cancer has persisted for more than a decade. It originated from a book based on studies that did not follow rigorous scientific procedures, such as accounting for other well-documented risk factors for breast cancer. Legitimate studies on the correlation between bras and breast cancer have found no link between bras of any kind—underwire bras or those without underwires—to breast cancer. 

From peri-menopause to post-menopause, women report the most sleeping problems. Most notably, these include hot flashes, mood disorders, insomnia and sleep-disordered breathing. Sleep problems are often accompanied by depression and anxiety. As many as 61% of post menopausal women report insomnia symptoms. Changing and decreasing levels of estrogen cause many menopausal symptoms including hot flashes, which are unexpected feelings of heat all over the body accompanied by sweating. They usually begin around the face and spread to the chest affecting 75-85% of women around menopause. Prior to the hot flash, body temperature rises accompanied by an awakening. Hot flashes last on average three minutes leading to less sleep efficiency. Most women experience these for one year, but about 25% have hot flashes for five years. While total sleep time may not suffer, sleep quality does. Hot flashes may interrupt sleep and frequent awakenings cause next-day fatigue.

Our community offers some great tips on natural solutions for sleep issues.  Please share your experiences on our community forum as well, we'd love to hear from you! 

Posted on March 16

Are you a sexuality or health educator looking to broaden the scope of your knowledge? Are you a self-advocate interested in accessing resources for your organization to approach and discuss sexuality? Join The Sexuality and Intellectual/Developmental Disability Community Forum for a roundtable discussion about sexual health advocacy, talking to families about sexuality, and sharing resources related to sexuality education. Linda Sandman, Clinical Director of the Developmental Disabilities Family Clinics will be presenting on the importance of education for people with intellectual and/or developmental disabilities.

The Sexuality and Disability Consortium (SDC) works to provide advocacy, training, research, and education to support people with disabilities to enhance healthy sexuality and relationships. SDC promotes best practice approaches for people with disabilities, families, professionals, and policy makers.

Registration for this event is $10 and includes lunch and resource packets. For more information, or to register, please contact Katie Arnold (312) 996-1002 or Carli Friedman at cfried6@uic.edu.

Date: Friday April 13th
Time: 12-3pm
Location: University of Illinois-Chicago, 1640 W. Roosevelt Road, Chicago, IL

Halt the Hurt!
Dealing with Chronic Pain

Chronic pain is a huge problem. Over 115 million people nationwide—about 1 in 3 Americans—suffer from some kind of long-term pain. It’s the leading reason that people miss work.

NIH-funded scientists are working to better understand and treat chronic pain. They’re uncovering the intricate pathways that lead to long-term pain. And they’re looking for approaches beyond medication that might help you control your pain.

Chronic pain differs in many ways from acute pain. Acute pain is part of the body’s response to an injury or short-term illness. Acute pain can help prevent more serious injury. For instance, it can make you quickly pull your finger away from a hot stove or keep your weight off a broken ankle. The causes of acute pain can usually be diagnosed and treated, and the pain eventually ends.

But the causes of chronic pain aren’t always clear. “It’s a complex problem that involves more than just the physical aspects of where the hurt seems to be,” says Dr. John Killen, deputy director of NIH’s National Center for Complementary and Alternative Medicine. “There’s a lot of accumulating scientific evidence that chronic pain is partly a problem of how the brain processes pain.”

Chronic pain can come in many forms, and it accompanies several conditions including low-back pain, arthritis, cancer, migraine, fibromyalgia, endometriosis and inflammatory bowel disease. These persistent pains can severely limit your ability to move around and perform day-to-day tasks. Chronic pain can lead to depression and anxiety. It’s hard to look on the bright side when pain just won’t go away. Some experts say that chronic pain is a disease itself.

The complexities of chronic pain can make it difficult to treat. Many of today’s medications for chronic pain target inflammation. These drugs include aspirin, ibuprofen and COX-2 inhibitors. But if taken at high doses for a long time, these drugs can irritate your stomach and digestive system and possibly harm your kidneys. And they don’t work for everyone.

“With hard-to-treat pain, the opioids are also used, sometimes in combination with the other drugs,” says Dr. Raymond Dionne, who oversees some of NIH’s clinical pain research. Opioids include prescription painkillers such as codeine and morphine and brand-name drugs such as Vicodin, Oxycontin and Percocet. Opioids affect the processes by which the brain perceives pain. If used improperly, though, opioids can be addictive, and increasingly high doses may be needed to keep pain in check.

“As with all drugs, you have to find a balance between effectiveness and side effects,” says Dionne. He and other researchers have studied potential new pain medications to learn more about how they work in the body. But for the most part, pain medications are similar to those used 5 or more decades ago. That’s why some researchers are looking for approaches beyond medications.

“One thing we know is that currently available drug therapies don’t provide all the answers. Many people find that medications don’t fully relieve their chronic pain, and they can experience unpleasant side effects,” Killen says. “Evidence on a number of fronts, for several conditions, suggests that mind and body approaches can be helpful additions to conventional medicine for managing chronic pain.”

Research has shown that patients with chronic low-back pain might benefit from acupuncture, massage therapy, yoga or cognitive-behavioral therapy (a type of talk therapy).

NIH-funded scientists have also found that people with fibromyalgia pain might find relief through tai chi. This mind-body technique combines meditation, slow movements, deep breathing and relaxation.

But how much these approaches truly help is still an open question. Studies of pain relief can be difficult to interpret. Researchers must rely on patients to complete questionnaires and rate their own levels of pain.

One puzzler is that the exposure to the exact same pain-causing thing, or stimulus, can lead to completely different responses in different people. For example, when an identical heat stimulus is applied to different people’s arms, one may report feeling uncomfortable, while another might say that the pain is extreme.

“How do we account for these differences? We’ve now learned that genes play a role,” says Dr. Sean Mackey, who heads Stanford University’s neuroscience and pain lab. “Some differences involve our personality and mood states, including anxiety.”

Mackey and his team are using brain scans to gain insights into how we process and feel pain. One study found that a painful stimulus can activate different brain regions in people who are anxious than in those who are fearful of pain.

In another study, volunteers were taught strategies that could turn on specific brain regions. One technique involved mentally changing the meaning of the pain and thinking about it in a non-threatening way.

“We found that with repeated training, people can learn how to build up this brain area, almost like a muscle, and make its activity much stronger,” says Mackey. “That led to a significant improvement overall in their pain perception.” The researchers also found that different types of mental strategies, such as distraction, engaged different brain regions.

Another study found that intense feelings of passionate love can provide surprisingly effective pain relief. “It turns out that the areas of the brain activated by intense love are the same areas that drugs use to reduce pain,” says Mackay.

“We can’t write a prescription for patients to go home and have a passionate love affair,” says Mackey. “But we can suggest that you go out and do things that are rewarding, that are emotionally meaningful. Go for a walk on a moonlit beach. Go listen to some music you never listened to before. Do something that’s novel and exciting.”

That’s a prescription that should be painless to try.

Toxicity of Pesticides Well-Known

The findings of this study are not surprising. Originally developed for chemical warfare, organophosphates are known to be toxic to the nervous system and pesticides are designed to
kill pests. That they might also have a toxic effect on the nervous system in humans is not a huge leap, and especially in children who are more sensitive to their effects as their nervous systems are still maturing. Most children across the US eat non-organic fruits and vegetables, a large number of which, according to a 2008 report from the U.S. Department of Agriculture cited in the study, have detectable levels of pesticides. And though exposure to pesticides has been linked to learning and behavioral problems in children in the past, previous studies have focused on high-risk populations like farm workers. This study was the first to examine the effects of exposure in the population at large.

Eat Organic

The solution is obvious. People should buy organic fruits and vegetables whenever possible and especially of the "dirty dozen,"or those foods most contaminated with organophosphate pesticides. According to tests by the consumer organization Environmental Working Group (EWG), these would include the following fruits and vegetables: