When to see a sleep specialist

While I am on maternity leave, the station is airing a series of sleep stories I recorded before I left. Some of them we have discussed on the blog before, some are new. I will just post all of them when they air in case you missed them the first time around.

-NewsAnchorMom Jen

Are you having an Acne Emergency? Call Soderstrom Skin Institute at 674 – SKIN… we treat acne seriously. With over 35 years of experience, Soderstrom Skin Institute will provide a personalized program to help you get your acne under control. Untreated acne can result in permanent scarring. Don’t suffer any longer! Evening and weekend appointment are available and in most cases you’ll be seen within one week.

Autistic Service Dogs at School?

Should children with autism who have service dogs be allowed to take those dogs to school with them? A kindergartner with autism in Illinois was granted permission to bring his dog with him to school, but the district is appealing.

A Monroe County judge last month entered a preliminary injunction to let the boy bring his dog into his elementary school, but the district is appealing. The district says allowing the dog would harm at least one other student who is allergic to animals. The Columbia school district will pay for 5-year-old Carter Kalbfleisch's (KAHLB'-flyshz) transportation to the Illinois Center for Autism in Fairview Heights. That move came after the district claimed it couldn't provide the pre-kindergarten services at the school the boy wanted to attend with his dog.(Picture courtesy of stltoday.com)

I think this is a tough call. The dog could be a huge asset to the little boy's learning. However, it is setting a precedence. If this was your child's school, what would you say?

-NewsAnchorMom Jen

Are you having an Acne Emergency? Call Soderstrom Skin Institute at 674 – SKIN… we treat acne seriously. With over 35 years of experience, Soderstrom Skin Institute will provide a personalized program to help you get your acne under control. Untreated acne can result in permanent scarring. Don’t suffer any longer! Evening and weekend appointment are available and in most cases you’ll be seen within one week.

Older Moms

I think this is interesting. The U.S. has the highest rate of young mothers, but the average age of new mothers is 25 years old because women are waiting longer to start a family. I am 32 years old and this is my third baby. I feel like I am old, but some people haven't even started having kids at my age. So, I guess I just need to get over myself! 35-years-old seems to be the cut off for when most OBs send you to a specialist during pregnancy solely based on your age.

FROM HEALTH DAY NEWS: U.S. women delaying motherhood

(HealthDay News) — New mothers are getting older.

In the United States, the average age of women giving birth for the first time rose from 21.4 years in 1970 to 25 in 2006, according to a new report from the National Center for Health Statistics (NCHS).

Births to older women are partly responsible for the upward trend.

"In 1970, just 1 percent, or one in 100, [of] births were to women 35 and over," said study author T.J. Mathews, a demographer with the NCHS, which is part of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. "In 2006, it was one in 12 births. It's a dramatic transition."

On the other hand, the United States still has the youngest age of first-time mothers in the developed countries studied. In Britain, Switzerland and other nations, the average woman now has her first baby at nearly 30 years of age.

"The U.S. is only now caught up to where other countries were in 1970 [for average age of first-time mothers]," Mathews said. Despite the surge in older moms, a high, but improving, teen birth rate keeps the U.S. figures down.

"We still do have a good number of unplanned and teen pregnancies," said Dr. Jennifer Wu, an obstetrician/gynecologist with Lenox Hill Hospital in New York City.

This new data is somewhat different from past analyses.

"We hadn't really looked at the component of average age of first births," Mathews said. "In the past, we looked at all births." And first births are an important gauge of future trends, such as how many children a woman has, which affects population, as well as birth weight and birth defects.

The trend toward later motherhood was seen in all racial and ethnic groups and in all states plus the District of Columbia, but some areas saw larger gains than others.

The biggest jumps were 5.5 years in DC, 5.2 years in Massachusetts and 5.1 years in New Hampshire.

New Mexico, Mississippi and Oklahoma had the smallest increases: 2 years, 2.3 years and 2.4 years, respectively.

Three-and-a-half decades ago, Arkansas had the youngest average age (20.2 years) while the eastern states of Connecticut, Massachusetts and New York had the highest (22.5 years). In 2006, Massachusetts' first-time moms were the oldest (27.7) and Mississippi's the youngest (22.6).

Among racial/ethnic groups in the United States, Asian and Pacific Islander women now have the highest average age at 28.5 years, while American Indian/Alaska Native women have the youngest at 21.9 years.

The average age for first births in non-Hispanic white women is 26 years, 22.7 years for non-Hispanic black women and 23.1 years for Hispanic women.

The upward slope was most pronounced in the 1970s and 1980s and seems to be leveling off with differences between 2006 and 2007 appearing minor.

Some reasons for delaying starting a family might include younger women choosing to focus on advanced education and careers earlier in their lives, Wu said.

-NewsAnchorMomJen

Are you having an Acne Emergency? Call Soderstrom Skin Institute at 674 – SKIN… we treat acne seriously. With over 35 years of experience, Soderstrom Skin Institute will provide a personalized program to help you get your acne under control. Untreated acne can result in permanent scarring. Don’t suffer any longer! Evening and weekend appointment are available and in most cases you’ll be seen within one week.

Importance of Recess

FROM CNN: Recess is sometimes the only opportunity some students have to get exercise during the school day. Dr. Sanjay Gupta takes a look at why recess is disappearing in some communities in tonight's medical minute. Monkey bars, kickball — we all remember recess.

But according to a recent study from the centers for disease control, in some communities, those memories are all that's left. Nationwide, we know that 67% offer recess every single day for all students in their schools for at least 20 minutes.

CDC researcher Sarah Lee says that leaves more than a third of schools offering recess to just some students, or not at all. And the reason may surprise you. One of the biggest reasons is because of the pressures for improving test scores within core academic subjects. But along with higher test scores may come higher obesity rates.

So, in an effort to bring attention to the problem, lee has joined with the Cartoon Network's "Get Animated" program to spread the word — and, she's starting to get some Major League help. Recess is where everything started for me when it came to loving sports, and just wanting to be active and wanting to get out there with the rest of the kids. Lee and Dwyane Wade agree — recess can do as much for a child's brain as it does for their bodies. There is evidence that shows recess can actually improve classroom attentiveness, concentration and time on task.

Personally, I am into the balancing act between activities and academics. And it really depends on the child. I introduce the kids to math or reading or whatever and see if they are ready. I am not into the whole teach my baby to read at 8 months old thing or potty training an 8 month old. I have no problem with parents who choose to do that. I think it's great. It's just not my thing. Daily life is demanding enough!

-NewsAnchorMom Jen

Are you having an Acne Emergency? Call Soderstrom Skin Institute at 674 – SKIN… we treat acne seriously. With over 35 years of experience, Soderstrom Skin Institute will provide a personalized program to help you get your acne under control. Untreated acne can result in permanent scarring. Don’t suffer any longer! Evening and weekend appointment are available and in most cases you’ll be seen within one week.

Breastfeeding and Cancer

FROM NBC: A woman with a family history of breast cancer might lower her own risk for the disease if she breastfeeds her children. University of North Carolina researchers reviewed data on about 60-thousand women. For women who had family members with breast cancer, nursing led to a 59-percent decreased risk for developing pre-menopausal breast cancer themselves.

That's similar to taking the cancer drug Tamoxifen for 5 years. And researchers say it didn't matter how long women breastfed -- 3 months or 3 years yielded the same results. Interestingly -- doctors said that protective effect did not apply to women without a family history of breast cancer.

So I am a nursing machine right now. It is stories like this that give me some perspective. He was eating about every 3-4 hours. Now it's every two hours! However, his little face is filling out and he surpassed his birth weight by 7 oz at just one week old! Plus, according to this article, it's good for me too! It makes it all worth it, doesn't it? I just love being a new mom!

-NewsAnchorMom Jen

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