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Courier-Journal (Louisville, Kentucky): Harmful workplace chemicals increase risk of neurological damage

The fourth installment of a four-part Courier-Journal series on the effects of exposure to chemical solvents in the workplace used information provided by Robert G. Feldman, BUSM professor of neurology, pharmacology, and environmental health and chairman emeritus of the department of neurology at the BU School of Medicine. Feldman, author of the medical textbook Occupational and Environmental Neurotoxicology, says in the May 16 article, entitled "Solvents: Society at Risk," that a toxic encephalopathy diagnosis is made, in part, by a number of specialists who have been trained in neurology. But, he says, "the area of work that is neglected in many neurologists' training are those things that are not based on pathology that you can see in the slices of the brain or in radiology, but in fact are neurobehavioral."

About 10 million Americans face health risks from solvent exposure in the workplace, in businesses as diverse as neighborhood dry cleaners and the $205 billion computer chip industry.

Channel 5, WCVB-TV: Stutterers find new hope in SAR program

For the estimated three million Americans who stutter, communicating is a constant battle. But in a June 7 Health Beat feature, NewsCenter 5 reporter Rhonda Mann focused on BU's New England Fluency Program, a four-week, seven-hour-a-day therapy program that dramatically reduces stuttering in weeks by combining two kinds of treatment. It first changes the way people physically speak, working on their motor skills. Then it looks at the emotional aspects of stuttering.

"There's a great deal of shame that develops over the fact that the person stutters," says Adriana DiGrande, a speech pathologist and lecturer in the communications disorders department at Sargent College of Health and Rehabilitation Sciences. "In our program, people are asked to talk openly about their stuttering." Participants also learn relaxation techniques and spend plenty of time practicing their new skills.

Of those who go through the program, which costs $4,100 for the four weeks, 80 percent develop speech that's categorized as normal.

Boston Herald: America's newest sweetheart is female action hero

From sword-carrying warriors in Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon to fistfighting femmes in Charlie's Angels to keister-kicking Croft in Lara Croft: Tomb Raider, tough women are breaking box office records, reports the June 24 Boston Herald. Tom Cottle, SED professor of special education, comments on the public fascination with tough leading ladies. "We've always loved female action figures," he says. "The animal part of us loves the lioness mother who will protect us, shoo away evil, let us live happily ever after, and make us forget that life is imperfect and unfair."

New Scientist: Hair today, skin tomorrow

By plucking out a few hairs, the June 30 issue of New Scientist reports, doctors can grow skin grafts from a patient's own cells. This technique could replace the painful method of taking skin from another part of the body for grafts or tissue culturing and compares very favorably with other tissue culture techniques that are available, says Tania Phillips, a professor of dermatology at BU's School of Medicine. "If you can do it by pulling out a few hair follicles, that's wonderful," she says. "It's a great development because to get cultured keratinocyte grafts from individual patients, you must take at least one centimeter of skin. With the hair cells, it sounds like you can provide skin coverage without hurting the patient."

The Independent (London): Sexual links may be close encounters

Scientists in Sweden who studied the sexual contacts of 2,810 men and women have concluded that the number of sexual links needed to connect any two people could be closer than the small-world network described in the film Six Degrees of Separation, where it was postulated that everyone in the world could be linked to everyone else through, at most, six others. The implications of the findings, say Frederick Liljeros of Stockholm University and Luis Amaral, research associate in the GRS Center for Polymer Studies, in the June 22 Independent, are that health campaigns against sexually transmitted diseases should target the most sexually active members of society. "Any two people might only be two or three connections apart," says Amaral.

Boston Herald: BMC battles malnutrition in children

While many of her pediatric colleagues are busy treating ear infections or ankles sprained during soccer practice, Deborah Frank, BUSM associate professor of pediatrics, who works at the Grow Clinic at Boston Medical Center, is waging a daily battle against starvation in Boston children. According to Joe Sciacca's column in the June 25 Boston Herald, last year BMC saw 60 new cases. This year, the number is already 55. If the trend continues, says Frank, the number of malnourished kids referred to the clinic will double. "That is panicking me," says Frank. "Our families are playing the shell game. Do I spend the two bucks on bus fare for my child's doctor's appointment or do I buy two quarts of milk? Do I fill my child up with french fries and bubbly soda because it stops him from crying or do I buy the food the doctor says I should buy and the lights go off?"

The clinic is a safety net for malnourished children, writes Sciacca, thanks to Mayor Thomas Menino, the work of the BMC staff led by Elaine Ullian, BMC president, and the generosity of donors.

"In The News" is compiled by Mark Toth in the Office of Public Relations.

29 June 2001
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