Blog

By Nadia Akseer, Arjumand Rizvi, Zaid Bhatti, et al., JAMA Network Open, November 8, 2019 Key Points Question: Is conflict severity associated with the performance of health systems and population health outcomes in Afghanistan during the 2003 to 2018 reconstruction period? Findings: In this survey study of 64 815 women in Afghanistan, notable health and health system improvements were made despite increasing conflict after 2010. However, regions with greater conflict had lower gains in...

Laws that punish women who abuse drugs during a pregnancy are often billed as a way to protect unborn babies from addiction. But new research finds they have the opposite effect: After states enact laws treating pregnant drug users as unfit mothers or criminals, the number of newborns who contend with drug withdrawal jumps significantly. The new findings suggest that laws that criminalize a mother’s drug use during pregnancy or threaten to remove newborns from their mothers’ care discourage...

Clinical Keynote: Pilyoung Kim, Ph.D. Motherhood and the Brain Pilyoung Kim, Ph.D., is an associate professor in the department of psychology and the Director of Family and Child Neuroscience Laboratory at the University of Denver . She and her team investigate the roles of prenatal and postnatal exposure to poverty and stress in (1) neural adaptation to parenthood in new mothers and (2) brain development in infants and young children. Her primary research method is pediatric neuroimaging...

By Jen Juneau, November 5, 2019, for People Magazine. In a candid interview with Romper , mother of two Tia Mowry-Hardrict talks the harsh realities of mom guilt, postpartum depression, breastfeeding and more. Tia Mowry-Hardrict is an accomplished actress, food vlogger and much more, but her most important role is Mom. The former Sister, Sister actress, 41, posed alongside her daughter Cairo Tiahna , 18 months, and son Cree Taylor , 8, in a recent photo spread for Romper , in which she...

By Andrea Barber, November 6, 2019, Time Magazine I can’t exactly pinpoint one thing that led to my ultimate breakdown. Rather, I believe it was a collection of stressors that slowly eroded away my ability to cope. My son Tate, like most preschoolers, went through a period of one illness after another: fevers, double ear infections, respiratory problems, stomach pain that we feared was a ruptured appendix. Illness on top of illness led to a trip to the ER. And then an overnight stay at the...

Do you keep hearing the term epigenetics and know it has something to do with DNA, but you're not sure how they connect? Check out this 2.4 minute video! This fast-paced video will take you one step closer to understanding epigenetics! Once upon a time in the world of genetics, two identical twins were born. The two baby boys were named Jim and Tim Van Horn. .... Link to video

By Erica L. Green, The New York Times, November 6, 2019 Nakiya Wakes could not understand how her wiry, toothy-grinned 6-year-old had gone from hyperactive one school year to what teachers described as hysterical the next. Then, in 2015, the state of Michigan delivered a diagnosis of sorts: Ms. Wakes’s neighborhood’s water — which her son, Jaylon, had been drinking and bathing in for more than a year — was saturated with lead, at some of the highest levels in the city. Jaylon would cycle...

By Linda Carroll, Reuters, October 22, 2019 Women are often mistreated during labor and delivery at hospitals in low-income countries, a new study suggests. During in-person observations of births at urban hospitals in Ghana, Guinea and Nigeria, researchers found that more than 40 percent of women experienced physical or verbal abuse, stigmatization or discrimination related to race or ethnicity, according to a report in The Lancet. Surveys of women who had recently given birth in those...

By Jackie Botts and Felicia Mello, Cal Matters, November 6, 2019 A college student in Fresno who struggles with hunger has applied for food stamps three times. Another student, who is homeless in Sacramento, has applied twice. Each time, they were denied. A 61-year-old in-home caretaker in Oakland was cut off from food stamps last year when her paperwork got lost. Out of work, she can’t afford groceries. While picking up a monthly box of free food, a 62-year-old senior in San Diego told...

By Tara Duggan, San Francisco Chronicle, November 4, 2019 Most people think of people lining up at food pantries and soup kitchens as an urban phenomenon. But in Alameda County, which has one of the highest rates of food insecurity in the Bay Area, an increasing number of people living in the suburbs are also having trouble affording food. That includes Livermore, a city in the Tri-Valley area that’s better known for its wineries. “When people think of homelessness and poverty, they don’t...

By Melissa T. Merrick, Derek C. Ford, Katie A. Ports, et al., Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, November 5, 2019 Summary What is already known about this topic? Adverse childhood experiences are common and are associated with many poor health and life outcomes in adulthood. What is added by this report? Nearly 16% of adults in the study population reported four or more types of adverse childhood experiences, which were significantly associated with poorer health outcomes, health...

21st Annual Families and Fathers National Conference February 24-27, 2020 Hilton Los Angeles Airport 5711 West Century Boulevard Los Angeles, California 90045 I am honored to announce The Family First Scholarship supported by the Annie E. Casey Foundation as a Title Sponsor and State of California First 5 as a Co-Sponsor for the 21 st Annual Families and Fathers Conference, Next Level 2020! the terms "putting family first" and "it takes a village to raise a child" parallels with why we have...