child and adolescent

Birth – 18 years.

Our child and adolescent Blogs

Many children taking ADHD drugs say that it helps them control their behaviour and make better decisions, according to new survey

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The ADHD Voices (Voices On Identity, Childhood, Ethics and Stimulants) report was published yesterday and received a significant amount of press coverage. The outcomes of this work are a 46-page report and 18-minute video, that aim to inspire a fresh public conversation about the ethics of Attention Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) diagnosis and stimulant drug treatments [read the full story…]

Cochrane review inconclusive about the impact of music education on the reading skills of children with dyslexia

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Dyslexia is a specific learning disorder characterised by difficulty with spelling and decoding words. The NHS Choices website explains that people with dyslexia typically have trouble with: phonological awareness (the ability to identify the units of sound within words) verbal memory (the ability to remember a sequence of verbal information for a short period of [read the full story…]

New BMJ RCT finds that preventing depression in adolescents, with classroom-based CBT, may do more harm than good

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The prevalence of depression goes up sharply in mid-adolescence and it’s estimated that by age 19 up to 20% of people will have suffered from at least one episode of clinical depression. So it makes sense that prevention programmes should be targeted at young people in schools, and indeed, published research has shown that classroom-based [read the full story…]

Social skills groups are of some benefit for children with Autistic Spectrum Disorders

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Autistic Spectrum Disorders (ASD) cover a range of developmental disorders, including Autism, Asperger Syndrome and Rett’s Syndrome. ASD can involve a variety of symptoms, which fall into 3 main categories: Difficulties with social interaction Impaired language and communication Unusual patterns of behaviour and thought Social interactions can be extremely difficult for children with ASD, and [read the full story…]

Can ADHD symptoms help predict early-onset substance use?

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The relationship between attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) and substance use in children is hotly debated. ADHD symptoms include inattention, hyperactivity/impulsivity and conduct disorders, and there’s considerable interest in finding out which of these predicts early substance use. If we have reliable evidence that answers this question we can make informed decisions about treating ADHD and [read the full story…]

The ‘Gifted and Talented’ conundrum. Where do we go from here for highly able pupils?

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International comparisons of school systems have been widely reported. The results of the international PISA test in 2009 highlighted some troubling statistics about the performance of highly able students in England, when compared to pupils from other countries. In maths, only 1.5% of English 15 year olds achieved the highest level of attainment, compared with [read the full story…]

Mental health disorders in young people with learning disabilities still under-recognised and often untreated in clinical practice

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How important is social support in preventing depression?

In 2002, the Foundation for People with Learning Disabilities produced a landmark report on the issue of mental health and emotional well-being in young people with learning disabilities ‘Count Us In’, which looked at ways of supporting young people to be emotionally strong, through education, support, friendships and advocacy. The report followed a year long [read the full story…]

Measures of Children’s dental anxiety

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Dental anxiety is still a relatively common problem. It usually develops in childhood an early adolescence. The aim of this review was to identify and evaluate self-report measures of dental anxiety that have been used to assess children’s dental anxiety since the 1998 review by Newton and Buck. The authors were planning to Provide:- a [read the full story…]

Probably a benefit in prescribing preoperative analgesics prior to orthodontic separator placement

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Pain is not uncommon after dental procedures. This can be linked with an increase in fear of dental procedures and the possible avoidance of treatment. This is of particular importance in children and adolescents and the use of pre-operative analgesics had been suggested as a way of reducing peri-operative pain. The aim of this Cochrane [read the full story…]

How is alcohol misuse affecting the children of parents who drink?

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We don’t have accurate statistics on the numbers of children living with alcohol misusing parents. It’s estimated that 79,000 babies in England are living with a parent who is classified as a ‘problematic’ drinker (‘hazardous’ or ‘harmful’). The Office of the Children’s Commissioner has published a Rapid Evidence Assessment about the impact that alcohol misuse [read the full story…]