News Archive

Quoted As Saying

The West Australian:

Professor Fiona Stanley, Director of the Telethon Institute for Child Health Research, is QAS an Australian-first study will look at the impact of developmental disorders and mental health problems in childhood on educational problems, child abuse, neglect and crime. TICHR and researchers from UWA and Curtin University have been awarded almost $10 million in funding from the National Health and Medical Research Council to conduct a study tracking the early development of thousands of children from the womb to gauge the effect of social, economic and environmental factors on their health and wellbeing. “A new approach is needed because of the increases we’re seeing in a whole range of problems affecting children, from obesity to autism,” Professor Stanley said.

Dr Emma Dove, Research Associate in the School of Medicine and Pharmacology, is QAS that while lupin bread has been shown to help with obesity, a new trial would be the first to look at its impact on diabetes. A study by the WA Institute for Medical Research’s Centre for Food and Genomic Medicine published in January found that overweight people who ate about four slices of lupin bread a day had lower blood pressure than those who ate white bread. The team will now test whether the legume can level blood glucose in people with diabetes. “What generally happens after a person eats or drinks is that their blood glucose level rises, so what we are trying to pinpoint is whether lupins could help stabilise those levels to avoid a spike and help people manage type 2 diabetes more effectively,” Dr Dove said.

Professor John Newnham, Head of the School of Women’s and Infants’ Health, is QAS the link between obesity and birth defects was becoming well-established and the message to women planning children was clear. “Obesity is bad for women and bad for their pregnancies,” he said. He was commenting on a British metaanalysis which found overweight pregnant women were more at risk of having a baby with a heart abnormality or a neural tube defect such as spina bifida.

Dr Linda Slack-Smith, Senior Lecturer in the School of Dentistry, is QAS many hospital admissions of children under five years of age for dental disease were preventable through good diet, basic oral hygiene and fluoridated water. She led a study which found children aged under five in the Bunbury region, where the water is not fluoridated, were twice as likely to have been in hospital because of dental problems.

Australian Doctor:

Mr Stan Wisniewski, Clinical Lecturer in the School of Surgery, is QAS marijuana is known to diminish male fertility through damage to sperm-producing cells. “And it wouldn’t take a big leap from there to speculate that if there’s damage to the spermatogonia, that may trigger a malignant transformation,” he said. He was commenting on a study in the journal Cancer which found that men who smoke marijuana are at higher risk of developing testicular cancer than nonusers.

Emeritus Professor Lou Landau, of the School of Paediatrics and Child Health, is QAS any atopic mother should have an explanation of known risk factors for atopy in her baby, and be told that Caesarean section was one possible risk. However, the reasons for a surgical delivery could be more powerful than any potential risks, he said. He was commenting on a study in the journal Thorax which showed that children born by Caesarean section are more likely to develop asthma later in life. The study of almost 3000 children found the association was strongest among those whose parents were atopic. However, children born by Caesarean section with non-allergic parents still had a 36 per cent increased risk of developing asthma by age eight, compared with children delivered vaginally. Emeritus Professor Lou Landau said the association between children with non-allergic parents and asthma was weak and had other possible explanations, such as the prevalence of babies in the study with no siblings – a factor known to increase asthma risk.