SCHAFER AUTISM REPORT "Healing Autism:

No Finer a Cause on the Planet"

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June 26, 2002 CALENDAR LISTING: EVENTS@doitnow.com

ADVOCACY

* Ending Autism Therapy `Wrong'

RESEARCH

* 'Anti-Vaccine' Web Sites Use Emotion To Convey Info

* The Hunger: A Food Allergy Mystery

* Brain Anatomy And Sensorimotor Gating In Asperger's Syndrome

* Nicotinic Receptor Abnormalities In Cerebellar Cortex In Autism

* Spanking May Make Kids Violent, Analysis Finds

* Study Links Complex Partial Epilepsy To Creativity

TREATMENT

* Auricula Training Program For Autistic Kids Receives First Ever

Ethological Approval & Implements Webcam Service To Parents

ADVOCACY

Ending Autism Therapy `Wrong'

Ontario's health minister was confronted yesterday by parents of autistic children who they say are being denied essential medical services in the form of expensive behavioural therapy.

Tony Clement was confronted outside the Legislature by more than a dozen parents and their children. They protested the current policy of funding the Intensive Behavioural Intervention program for only a small number of autistic children and only up until they reach age 6.

Norrah Whitney, a Toronto single mother whose 6-year-old son Luke is autistic, demanded that Clement order the province's health insurance plan to pay for Luke's treatment, which costs an average of $60,000 per year, per child.

In January, Whitney filed a complaint with the Ontario Human Rights Commission arguing that cutting off treatment at age 6 is a violation of human rights.

Clement said the program, also known as Applied Behaviour Analysis, is part of the family and children's services ministry and deferred the issue to Children's Services Minister Brenda Elliott.

Parents say their children's needs are medical and they should be entitled to the expensive one-on-one therapy regardless of their age, and that it should be paid for by OHIP.

"Tell my son that he doesn't deserve medically necessary treatment. You know this is wrong," said Whitney, holding up her son Luke inches from Clement's face.

Clement said he could not talk about the funding given the matter is before the courts. "Do not hide behind court cases, these children's lives are on the line," Whitney said.

The intensive approach involves trained therapists working one-to-one with a child, reinforcing correct behaviour, language and academic skills. Children typically require several years of treatment, but studies show the

therapy can produce significant results nearly half of autistic children

can be taught to function normally. Most of the other half will show some improvement.

NDP critic Shelley Martel called on Clement in the Legislature to fund the program for all of the estimated 900 children between the ages of 2 and 5 who are on a waiting list, in addition to children who have already turned 6 without ever getting access to the treatment.

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RESEARCH

'Anti-Vaccine' Web Sites Use Emotion To Convey Info

Many Web sites that oppose childhood vaccinations appeal to readers' emotions when trying to convey their message, and include claims about vaccination that are not supported by studies from peer-reviewed medical journals, according to researchers.

"The anti-vaccination sites...use heart-rending stories of children allegedly damaged or killed by vaccine reactions, often accompanied by pictures of these children," Dr. Robert M. Wolfe of Northwestern University in Chicago, Illinois, told Reuters Health.

"These sites are emotional because the driving force behind many of these Web sites is the rage of parents who are persuaded that their children were injured or killed by vaccine reactions," he added.

This emphasis on emotion can have a strong effect on the reader, Wolfe emphasized. "Each time parents are exposed to this information, a small number of persons may be influenced by what they read," he said.

Vaccinations have been accused of sparking a variety of illnesses, and some evidence suggests that vaccines may increase the risk of a child developing allergies or asthma.

However, the most common accusations leveled against vaccines--namely, that they cause sudden infant death syndrome (SIDS), autism or Crohn's disease--have not been validated by any scientific studies, Wolfe explained.

In order to evaluate how anti-vaccination Web sites present information, and what type of information they present, Wolfe and his team surveyed 22 Web sites that contained information that appeared to oppose vaccination.

The investigators found that all of the evaluated Web sites said that vaccines cause illnesses that appear to have no cause and arise spontaneously. Most sites also claimed that vaccines weaken a child's immune system. In addition, 95% of the Web sites said that side effects from vaccines are underreported, and another 64% contained information for parents about how they can avoid immunizing a child, such as by seeking a philosophical exemption.

In addition, Wolfe and his colleagues found that 55% of the Web sites included personal stories of parents who suspect that their child was hurt or killed as a result of vaccination, and another one quarter of the sites had pictures of the injured children.

Wolfe explained that claims of vaccine risks often are based on logic that identifies something as a cause of something else, simply because both events occurred during the same time period. "For example, autism often appears in early childhood around the same time vaccinations are given, so many parents blame the autism on the vaccines, especially MMR (measles, mumps and rubella)," Wolfe said.

"Several studies looked at this and found no relationship between MMR and autism," he added.

Wolfe and his team present their analyses of the anti-vaccination Web sites in the June 26th issue of The Journal of the American Medical Association.

Wolfe emphasized that despite his criticism of anti-vaccination Web sites, he is not opposed to the idea of debate. "I have no objection to anti-vaccinationists raising concerns over possible adverse reactions to vaccines, and their activism will almost certainly focus more attention on vaccines to help improve and maintain their safety. I only object to using sensationalism or misinformation," he said.

SOURCE: The Journal of the American Medical Association 2002;287:3245-3248.

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* * *

The Hunger: A Food Allergy Mystery

After Being 'Cured' by a Test and Treatment Most Allergists Ignore or Dismiss, the Author Went Searching for an Explanation

I sit at my desk, staring out the window at blue sky, when flashes of light suddenly appear, phantom pinpoints blinking like stars. When my eyes dart left toward the trees, an opalescent arc flashes -- a moon for the stars, completing the night-during-day hallucination. This surreal state is an aura that for years signaled the onset of one of my migraines, an altogether unnerving experience. Equally unnerving is that after ridding myself of these migraines -- by eliminating certain foods from my diet after a blood test suggested an allergic reaction -- I discovered that the test and diagnosis my doctor gave me are largely dismissed by the medical community.

Also disconcerting is that there may be millions of people with migraines, stomachaches, joint pain and other ailments caused by food allergies who would likely be told by an allergist either that they are imagining their symptoms or that their ills have nothing to do with the food they eat.

Why? Searching for clues in the fractious world of allergy medicine left me feeling like a detective in a mystery novel as dark and unsettling as, well, a migraine.

According to the American Academy of Allergy, Asthma and Immunology (AAAAI), up to 7 million Americans have food allergies. The Foundation for Integrated Medicine (a New York center where modern and ancient healing methods are used) estimates 4 million, but they also say that about 50 percent of Americans experience food intolerances (to such substances as lactose and caffeine). Pick up a dozen books on allergy and you'll find a dozen more divergent statistics. Such discrepancies are indicative of larger issues dividing allergists.

My sleuthing began a few years ago, when a friend suggested that I have my daughter, who had suffered from severe constipation ever since she began eating solid food, tested for food allergies. She cautioned me not to consult a traditional allergist, but to have my daughter's blood sent to a laboratory that would test not only for IgE-mediated allergies, but also IgG.

Huh? As this friend began to describe for me the differences between these two types of allergies, I realized that I'd stepped into foreign territory and that I was going to have to learn another language to find answers. What I didn't know was that learning the terminology would be like deciphering a secret code that has different meanings for different doctors.

IgG, IgE, Me

One issue that doctors agree on is the four types of food allergies. This story focuses on the two most common types, IgE and IgG.

IgE allergies occur when the immune system, in an effort to reject a certain food, creates an antibody to that food, immunoglobulin E. The antibody becomes attached on one side to the food molecule and on the other side to an immune cell called a mast cell. When this happens, histamines and other chemicals are released from the mast cells, causing such immediate responses as runny nose, itchy eyes, skin rashes and indigestion. IgE can cause anaphylaxis, an extreme, sometimes even life-threatening response in which the airways swell, sometimes to the point where the patient cannot breathe.

Less is known about IgG allergies, where the body produces an abundance of immunoglobulin G in response to certain foods. The body normally produces small amounts of IgG antibodies to foods that one consumes regularly. Yet in cases that involve allergic responses, supporters of the theory say, great amounts are released. The IgG antibodies attach directly to the food, but not the mast cells, creating what's called an "immune complex." The allergic responses, which may include constipation, headaches, joint pain and depression, can be immediate or delayed, appearing up to several days after the food is consumed.

The most common tests for food allergies are IgE skin tests, where the skin is scratched or pricked and allergens such as wheat, eggs and milk are applied. Within 15 to 30 minutes, local reactions may occur. When food allergies are suspected, almost all traditional allergists suggest this type of testing -- and only this type of testing. Sometimes they also suggest eliminating certain items from the patient's diet to determine what is causing the reactions.

There are other types of tests (intradermal and patch skin tests, challenge feeding tests and a variety of blood tests), but none seems as controversial as the test my daughter and I took -- because of its inclusion of IgG. We were tested for IgE and IgG responses to 36 foods. While the results indicated no IgE response to any of the foods, they did indicate IgG responses to some (for me, it was aged and fermented foods; for my daughter, it was corn products and eggs). Just days after we took these foods out of our diets -- as instructed by our allergist -- our symptoms virtually disappeared.

A year or so later, when I mentioned this experience to another allergist, he stated, "It is impossible that you or your daughter are allergic to those foods. No one can test for IgG allergies."

Not long after hearing this puzzling comment, I came across an article in Elle magazine about women who suspected that they were allergic to certain foods. After their allergists tested them for IgE-mediated allergies, these women were told that they were imagining their allergies.

While I was tempted to check the century in which this article had been written, I was most concerned with how many people might have been given this "diagnosis." How many people who may be suffering from IgG reactions to foods -- people like my daughter and me -- were now trying to convince themselves it was all in their heads? I donned my overcoat and began creeping down dark alleys to solve the mystery: Why isn't IgG testing routine? And why do some doctors treat it with such contempt?

I, Spy

One of the most difficult tasks for any detective is to distinguish between the good guys and the villains. I found that such distinctions aren't as easy to make as they are in a whodunit. My search might be more appropriately labeled a "whoknowsit," and from the start I realized that I wasn't the only detective on the streets.

My first stop was the online search engine Google, where typing "IgG allergy" called forth more than 12,000 sites. At amazon.com, there were 850 books on allergy. Sitting at my desk, I felt rather like Agatha Christie's Jane Marple on the edge of the Sahara, looking for a weapon said to be located "under a mound of sand." Where to go? Which book to read? Whom to trust?

I first spoke with Vincent Marinkovitch, an allergist in Redwood City, Calif., who helped develop a blood test that looks for immune complexes, and a vocal proponent of IgG testing. Why, I asked, don't allergists believe that people can suffer from IgG-mediated allergies -- nor be tested for them?

"The problem," says Marinkovitch, "is that the allergists who have taken over this field don't want to deal with anything except [IgE] allergy. And, that's because -- you'll think I'm being cynical -- it's very lucrative. It's the only kind of allergy a skin test will show, and by giving skin tests and shots, allergists can make a lot of money. It's an accepted but flawed paradigm. They don't help as many as they could if they were to broaden their visions of how the immune system can be harmful to people."

Another reason for allergists' reluctance to investigate non-IgE-mediated allergies, according to Marinkovitch, is that IgE, which was discovered in 1966, is easier to research. Prior to its discovery, allergists were examining immune complexes -- antigens (in the case of food allergies, the antigen is the food one is allergic to) combined with antibodies (the immune system's response) -- trying to understand the diseases that were produced. He says that after 1966, most researchers shifted their focus to the simpler IgE-mediated response.

"Immune complexes are very difficult to study because they are ever-changing," says Marinkovitch. "They are complicated, so people under pressure for tenure prefer other research. At the end of six months of work, they want to measure something significant. They don't want to take risks."

It's a compelling argument. But sensing that I'd begun my search with someone residing in one of the field's more distant ideological alleys, I want to hear from someone at the center. I contact Hugh Sampson, professor of pediatrics and biomedical sciences and chief of pediatric allergy immunology at Mount Sinai Medical Center in New York. He tells me flat-out that the validity of IgG tests hasn't been proven.

"IgG is not going to have any specific effect in allergy," he says. "We all make IgG antibody when we eat food." In light of Marinkovitch's argument, this statement sounds suspect, so I turn to Leo Galland, director of the Foundation for Integrated Medicine. I've been told he is considered the leading physician among environmental illness doctors -- a branch of medicine that considers possible negative effects of air, water, food and chemicals on our health.

But when I ask Galland his point of view on testing for IgG-mediated allergies, his answer is hardly what I expect: "It's not clear what the significance of IgG antibodies to foods are," says Galland.

Two different camps, that of the orthodox allergist and that of the environmental illness doctor, providing the same answer. It seems I've encountered what mystery writers refer to as a classic inversion, where the good guy might not be what he seems -- or is that it at all?

Marinkovitch acknowledges that everyone produces IgG antibodies to foods they eat regularly, but says that he tests for extraordinarily elevated levels of IgG, which indicate an allergic response.

"What I know is that when patients come to me with symptoms and their tests show elevated levels of IgG, when they take the identified foods out of their diets, their symptoms usually go away."

According to Sampson, there are no data to support Marinkovitch's argument. "What he says is just anecdotal. Anyone with inflammatory bowel disease, such as celiac or Crohn's disease, will have elevated levels of IgG -- but it's not a cause-and-effect relationship. Marinkovitch's statement is based only on history, and studies have shown that in making such assumptions you're going to be wrong half the time."

All Tests Suspect?

IgG testing is not the only diagnostic tool to be questioned. A report in a recent issue of AAAAI's Allergy Report suggests that there are situations where blood testing for food allergies provides more reliable results than skin testing.

According to Sampson, skin tests for IgE are problematic because of their tendency to yield false positives. These tests simply reveal when IgE antibodies are produced in response to a food, which doesn't necessarily mean that the patient is going to experience allergic symptoms. He says many people who show low levels of IgE antibodies to a particular food can eat that food with no difficulties.

"We always want to caution people," says Sampson. "Sometimes when they get large panels of either skin or blood tests, some of which come out positive, they think they can't eat the food. As a matter of fact, probably only about 30 percent of positive skin tests actually indicate clinical reactivity to a food. More often than not, they'd be able to eat it."

Time to trace my steps back to the environmental illness alley, where Galland deepens the case against some tests -- including the one my daughter and I took. A problem in using the commercially produced antigens used in skin or blood tests, he says, is that they contain preservatives, which can affect test results.

"I recall one study," says Galland, "where people were tested with fresh extracts of potatoes and eggs and soy. They were allergic, but when the commercial extract with those foods was used, there was no reaction. If somebody has allergies, generally they'll have a fair number of positive results, but the foods that they test positive to and the foods that they actually react to in life may be different."

But doesn't this put IgE testing in question as well?

It appears that the efficacy of all allergy testing is under suspicion. Personal anecdote, on the other hand, remains a powerful persuader: I know that my daughter and I were not imagining our symptoms. I also know that our dietary changes were successful in eliminating them. If we do not have "allergies" as most allergists define them, what do we have?

Semantics Sleuth

"Allergy" is not a scientific term, according to Galland. "All that 'allergy' really means is altered reactivity," he says. While allergists agree that when IgE is involved, one's sensitivity to food is called an allergy, Galland says, everything else is up for grabs. "If it involves some other immune mechanism, which might be IgG or something else, some people would call it an allergy and some wouldn't. And if there's no way to measure what the mechanism of the reaction is, it's called an intolerance."

Sampson's definition of "intolerance" is more specific: It means an enzyme is involved and the immune system is not. So, for example, lactose intolerance -- the inability to break down lactose sugar, causing bloating, cramping and diarrhea -- is an intolerance because the enzyme lactase, which breaks down that sugar, is missing.

When a reaction is not IgE-mediated, Sampson says, he refers to it as a "hypersensitivity" or "non-IgE-mediated response."

Galland suggests that if we use the term "allergy" in the broadest sense, there are a number of non-allergic diseases in which allergy to food may nevertheless play a role.

"Controlled studies have shown that something like 40 to 45 percent of patients with rheumatoid arthritis are affected by specific individual foods. This is not an IgE type of reaction, so it might not be called a food allergy, but it's an intolerance of the food and it acts to cause inflammation, so I think it's reasonable to call it a food allergy. Any disorder that's chronic, fluctuates in its intensity and appears to involve inflammation may have an allergic component to it. It may involve IgG or other mechanisms."

So while Galland believes that the test for IgG-mediated allergies isn't valid, he acknowledges that IgG may play a role in allergy. If so, what else may be involved? And how will it be defined?

Shadow of a Doubt

Is it 2 percent or 8 percent of the U.S. population that suffers from food allergies? And 10 percent or 50 percent who have food intolerances? If most allergists are testing only for IgE, what should be done with the people who have reactions labeled intolerances or hypersensitivities? If patients are told, based on IgE tests, that food is not causing their symptoms, they are subject to misdiagnosis, failure to explore the problem further and prolonged ill health.

In 1998, the New England Journal of Medicine reported on a study conducted at the University of Palermo in Sicily showing that non-IgE-mediated allergic reaction to cow's milk was a cause of severe constipation in children. "So, if it can happen with milk," suggests Sampson, "there's no reason it couldn't happen with another food or more than one food.

"I'll be honest with you. When I started . . . I didn't believe that food was an issue. I was mainly looking at atopic dermatitis [eczema] because there were people who said food allergy was a factor, but I wasn't really convinced it was. So I set up methods to do double-blind challenges. I very quickly found, although I had a hard time believing, that, yes, food was a very significant cause. We now know that with moderate to severe atopic eczema in children, food affects 40 percent [of the cases]. And if we look at children and asthma, it's probably around 10 percent. These are primarily driven by IgE."

If there are reputable studies and prominent physicians saying that there's more to allergy than IgE, why isn't this more broadly acknowledged? "I've written textbook chapters on these topics," says Sampson. "I mean, we're trying to get the word out, but most allergists deal with IgE and don't deal with the other types of allergies."

All in Your Head

In March, I was sent a press release from London, the first line of which was, "Nearly one in three people think they have a food allergy yet only 2 percent actually do." The reporter defined food allergy solely as a life-threatening immunological response. All other allergies and sensitivities were, in essence, labeled food intolerance. Muriel Simmons, chief executive of the British Allergy Foundation, said, "I have no doubt that 30 percent of people are feeling something, but it's just not as strong as an allergy." The definition of allergy, it seems, is growing narrower.

As a detective, I was not able to uncover scientific proof to support my or my daughter's test results and successful treatments. Neither was I able to find proof of any allergy test's being completely accurate.

Much about allergies is unknown. The crime, as it were, is reluctance among allergists to acknowledge this and move forward. The migraine sufferers or snifflers -- or patients with any number of difficult-to-diagnose symptoms -- whose IgE tests come back negative will, if lucky, find an allergist who believes they are experiencing symptoms and question their test results. Unfortunately, it seems more likely that they will be told that it's all in their heads and, by the allergist's refusal to look beyond narrow definitions of allergy, that it -- the migraines, the stuffiness -- may indeed remain quite literally in their heads. Allison Hoover Bartlett is a San Francisco-based writer. (c) 2002 The Washington Post Company

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Brain Anatomy And Sensorimotor Gating In Asperger's Syndrome

ds=12077008&dopt=Abstract <- - address ends here.

McAlonan GM, Daly E, Kumari V, Critchley HD, Amelsvoort Tv T, Suckling J, Simmons A, Sigmundsson T, Greenwood K, Russell A, Schmitz N, Happe F, Howlin P, Murphy DG. Departments of Psychological Medicine and Neuroimaging and Social Genetic Developmental and Psychiatry Centre, Institute of Psychiatry, Kings College, Functional Imaging Laboratory, Institute of Neurology, Department of Psychology, St George's Hospital Medical School, London, UK and Department of Psychiatry, University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong SAR China.

Asperger's syndrome (an autistic disorder) is characterized by stereotyped and obsessional behaviours, and pervasive abnormalities in socio-emotional and communicative behaviour.

These symptoms lead to social exclusion and a significant healthcare burden; however, their neurobiological basis is poorly understood.

There are few studies on brain anatomy of Asperger's syndrome, and no focal anatomical abnormality has been reliably reported from brain imaging studies of autism, although there is increasing evidence for differences in limbic circuits.

These brain regions are important in sensorimotor gating, and impaired 'gating' may partly explain the failure of people with autistic disorders to inhibit repetitive thoughts and actions. Thus, we compared brain anatomy and sensorimotor gating in healthy people with Asperger's syndrome and controls.

We included 21 adults with Asperger's syndrome and 24 controls.

All had normal IQ and were aged 18-49 years.

We studied brain anatomy using quantitative MRI, and sensorimotor gating using prepulse inhibition of startle in a subset of 12 individuals with Asperger's syndrome and 14 controls.

We found significant age-related differences in volume of cerebral hemispheres and caudate nuclei (controls, but not people with Asperger's syndrome, had age-related reductions in volume).

Also, people with Asperger's syndrome had significantly less grey matter in fronto-striatal and cerebellar regions than controls, and widespread differences in white matter.

Moreover, sensorimotor gating was significantly impaired in Asperger's syndrome.

People with Asperger's syndrome most likely have generalized alterations in brain development, but this is associated with significant differences from controls in the anatomy and function of specific brain regions implicated in behaviours characterizing the disorder.

We hypothesize that Asperger's syndrome is associated with abnormalities in fronto-striatal pathways resulting in defective sensorimotor gating, and consequently characteristic difficulties inhibiting repetitive thoughts, speech and actions.

PMID: 12077008 [PubMed - as supplied by publisher]

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Nicotinic Receptor Abnormalities In The Cerebellar Cortex In Autism.

ds=12076999&dopt=Abstract <- - address ends here.

Lee M, Martin-Ruiz C, Graham A, Court J, Jaros E, Perry R, Iversen P, Bauman M, Perry E. MRC/University of Newcastle Upon Tyne Development in Clinical Brain Ageing and Department of Neuropathology, Newcastle General Hospital, Newcastle upon Tyne, UK, Cure Autism Now, Los Angeles, CA and Children's Neurology Service, Harvard Medical School, Massachusetts's General Hospital, Boston, MA, USA.

Autism is a common developmental disorder associated with structural and inferred neurochemical abnormalities of the brain.

Cerebellar abnormalities frequently have been identified, based on neuroimaging or neuropathology. Recently, the cholinergic neurotransmitter system has been implicated on the basis of nicotinic receptor loss in the cerebral cortex.

Cerebellar cholinergic activities were therefore investigated in autopsy tissue from a series of autistic individuals.

The presynaptic cholinergic enzyme, choline acetyltransferase, together with nicotinic and muscarinic receptor subtypes were compared in the cerebellum from age-matched mentally retarded autistic (eight), normal control (10) and non-autistic mentally retarded individuals (11).

The nicotinic receptor binding the agonist epibatidine (the high affinity receptor subtype, consisting primarily of alpha3 and alpha4, together with beta2 receptor subunits) was significantly reduced by 40-50% in the granule cell, Purkinje and molecular layers in the autistic compared with the normal group (P < 0.05).

There was an opposite increase (3-fold) in the nicotinic receptor binding alpha-bungarotoxin (to the alpha7 subunit) which reached significance in the granule cell layer (P < 0.05).

These receptor changes were paralleled by a significant reduction (P <

0.05) and non-significant increase, respectively, of alpha4 and alpha7 receptor subunit immunoreactivity measured using western blotting. Immunohistochemically loss of alpha(4 )reactivity was apparent from Purkinje and the other cell layers, with increased alpha7 reactivity in the granule cell layer.

There were no significant changes in choline acetyltransferase activity, or in muscarinic M1 and M2 receptor subtypes in autism.

In the non-autistic mentally retarded group, the only significant abnormality was a reduction in epibatidine binding in the granule cell and Purkinje layers.

In two autistic cases examined histologically, Purkinje cell loss was observed in multiple lobules throughout the vermis and hemispheres.

This was more severe in one case with epilepsy, which also showed vermis folial malformation.

The case with less severe Purkinje cell loss also showed cerebellar white matter thinning and demyelination.

These findings indicate a loss of the cerebellar nicotinic alpha4 receptor subunit in autism which may relate to the loss of Purkinje cells, and a compensatory increase in the alpha7 subunit.

It remains to be determined how these receptor abnormalities are involved in neurodevelopment in autism and what is the relationship to mental function.

Since nicotinic receptor agonists enhance attentional function and also induce an elevation in the high affinity receptor, nicotinic therapy in autism may be worth considering.

PMID: 12076999 [PubMed - as supplied by publisher]

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Spanking May Make Kids Violent, Analysis Finds

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Reuters - Spanking may get a child's attention right away, but it can also cause children to become aggressive and possibly even abusive adults, researchers reported on Tuesday.

Spanking has become controversial in recent years, but in the United States, especially, remains a widely used form of discipline. Many studies on the effects of spanking have been done, but the findings vary.

Psychologist Elizabeth Thompson Gershoff, of the liberal National Center for Children in Poverty at New York's Columbia University, analyzed 88 different studies on spanking and smacking.

Spanking was strongly linked with immediate compliance, but also with 10 negative behaviors such as aggression, antisocial behavior and abuse of children and spouses in adulthood, she reports in the July issue of Psychological Bulletin, published by the American Psychological Association.

"There is general consensus that corporal punishment is effective in getting children to comply immediately, while at the same time there is caution from child abuse researchers that corporal punishment, by its nature, can escalate into physical maltreatment," Gershoff writes.

But she said physical punishment does not automatically mean a child will grow up to be hostile or violent.

"The act of corporal punishment itself is different across (the spectrum of) parents--parents vary in how frequently they use it, how forcefully they administer it, how emotionally aroused they are when they do it, and whether they combine it with other techniques," according to Gershoff.

The more often or more harshly a child was hit, the more likely he or she was to grow up to become aggressive or to have mental health problems, Gershoff found.

Spanking is not the best form of discipline, Gershoff said, because it does not teach children right from wrong. Although it makes children afraid to disobey when parents are present, they feel free to misbehave if they believe they can get away with it, according to the researcher.

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Study Links Complex Partial Epilepsy To Creativity

People with a specific type of epilepsy tend to do better on tests of creativity, Turkish researchers said on Monday. Their findings could lend support to a theory that links the genius of people such as van Gogh and Lewis Carroll to epilepsy.

Dr. Erdem Togrol, of the Guelhane Military Medical Academy's training hospital, and colleagues assessed the creativity of 30 epileptic men and 36 men without the condition using a standard test. The test asks patients to use fragmented parts of a drawing to create a picture of their own.

While there were no significant differences between the two groups overall, the researchers did find a possible link between creativity and epilepsy in a subset of seven men with complex partial epilepsy (CPE). Togrol's team reported the findings here at the 12th meeting of the European Neurological Society.

"What we found was not so disappointing," said Togrol. "The fact that a general epileptic population was not so different from the normal population, and should not be treated so, was welcomed."

But, he added, "some epileptics seemed to be more creative"--namely, those with CPE, a type of epilepsy in which seizures affect just one part of the brain and involve a change in or loss of consciousness. People having this type of seizure may show repetitious behaviors such as blinking, twitching or mouth movements.

"Although from our sample of 30 epileptic sufferers we only had seven with CPE, there was a tendency for them to have higher scores," Togrol said. "There was no difference in IQ of any of those tested."

Epilepsy involves episodes of abnormal electrical activity in the brain, and some researchers have proposed a link between the condition and creative thinking and exceptional talent.

Togrol noted that people such as Vincent van Gogh and Lewis Carroll have posthumously been diagnosed as having CPE, as well as others such as Alexander the Great and Vladimir Lenin.

However, he said other factors--such as van Gogh's drinking and Carroll's use of now-illegal drugs--must be taken into consideration, along with the difficulty of correctly diagnosing a person long after death.

Togrol also pointed out that not only was the study small, but also included only men. He said he would like to conduct a larger, more representative study.

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* * *

TREATMENT

Auricula Training Program For Autistic Children Receives First Ever Ethological Approval And Implements Webcam Service To Parents Worldwide

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Bern, Switzerland - After a two year study (1999-2000), conducted by the ethological expert, Dr. A.K. Dixon and his assistant, Dr. Christoph Meier from the Martin Moser Unit for Clinical Ethology and Neurobiology

(MMUCEN) in conjunction with the Bern University Hospital, Switzerland; the first study findings have been released to Auricula for distribution in April 2002. The results of the ethological study confirm that the Auricula Training Method is an effective method in treating Autistic children.

The Moser Institute selected 41 children from around Europe and followed strict ethological scientific guidelines in the treatment and control of the sample groups. The children ranged in age from 3 to13 years of age and they were divided into two groups, while attending the 2 1/2 week

training:

- Group 1: The test group, received the Auricula Auditory

training with specially modified music.

- Group 2: The control group, received the Auricula Auditory

training without modified music.

All the children did, during both sessions, the Auricula Home Program which is a program of exercises for the stimulation of the five senses (hearing, feeling, sight, touch, smell), individually developed for each child. In order to capture the changes in the behavior of the children, the research team created specific play situations at several periods of the training.

These play situations were structured following strict ethological scientific rules and principles and the children were filmed by four strategically placed video cameras as part of the study. This procedure allowed for the accurate translation of the period and frequency of the different behaviors by each child to be placed into statistical values necessary for scientific analysis.

The conclusion by Dr. A. K. Dixon was, "Overall, the total Auricula Therapy procedure as examined so far, exerts a significant, positive effect on the social behavior of the children who, after therapy, show an enhanced tendency to focus their attention on the therapist." The following are quotes from several parents and professionals:

- "During these past two years you have provided us with a new

method of treating underprivileged families with a need to

help their children who are Autistic and some severely

handicapped to a better quality of life."- Anna Johansson,

General Coordinator of Pina Palmera Center, Mexico

- " The Auricula Training Program has benefited our child in

ways we never imagined: it was impossible to go to a

restaurant or shopping - now we can."

- " Our child learned to hear without suffering from sounds -

and it was made possible by Auricula."

- " Ms. Nyffenegger and her staff helped my son out of his

isolation."

What makes Auricula a unique autism training program is the vast experience that the team has, working in different countries, (Austria, Germany, Israel, Jordan, Turkey, Poland, Hungary, and Mexico), with over 1,500 children in the past thirteen years. This worldwide experience and Auricula's overall sensory stimulation training, gives our program the quality of a multi-disciplinary approach that parents are looking for when seeking help with their autistic children.

Additionally, Auricula is reaching out to parents in a different manner by initiating what is believed to be the first ever webcam connection for an Autism treatment center in the world. This new and exciting service is meant to help the parents we support throughout the world, financially by reducing the cost in some patient cases on follow-up visits, provide a faster response to their concerns, and also in cases where parents may deam it necessary to have direct contact with Ms. Nyffenegger. The Auricula Training Program is a customized training for each and every child we see in our Auricula Program. As our founder, Ms. Claudia Nyffenegger, is quoted as saying, "We make a difference, one child at a time."

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