26 May 2020
TUESDAY, May 26, 2020 (HealthDay News) -- When kids and teens chafe under COVID-19 quarantine, how can parents stop the meltdowns and misbehavior?
Start with understanding: Young people miss their friends and their freedom. Younger kids might respond by throwing tantrums. Teens might isolate themselves, ignore social distancing rules or sneak out to see friends.
To curb negative behavior, experts from Penn State Children's Hospital offer their advice.
It starts with this time-honed tip: If your child has a tantrum, ignore it if it's not endangering anyone.
"It helps a child understand they won't get what they want from having a tantrum," pediatrician Dr. Katherine Shedlock said in a hospital news release.
Ask the child to take quiet time, which is different from a timeout. Pick a...
26 May 2020
TUESDAY, May 26, 2020 (HealthDay News) -- For parents hoping their "picky" eater will grow out of it, a new study may be unwelcome news.
Researchers found that choosy 4-year-olds were still turning their noses up at many foods at age 9 -- suggesting their finicky eating is more of a trait than a phase.
The study, which followed over 300 children, found three patterns: The majority were consistently middle-of-the-road when it came to food fussiness -- sometimes shunning unfamiliar cuisine, but remaining relatively open to trying new foods.
A sizable minority (29%) consistently ate everything their parents offered up.
Then there was the picky 14%. From age 4 to 9, they routinely refused new foods and maintained a limited culinary repertoire.
Still, researchers saw bright spots in...
25 May 2020
MONDAY, May 25, 2020 (HealthDay News) -- Having a child with cancer doesn't appear to affect parents' risk of splitting up or their plans to have more kids.
That's the conclusion of a Danish study that compared more than 12,400 parents of children diagnosed with cancer between 1982 and 2014 to nearly 70,000 parents whose kids were cancer-free.
Parents were followed until 10 years after a child's cancer diagnosis -- or until their separation, divorce, death, emigration or the end of 2017, whichever came first.
Overall, parents of children with cancer had a 4% lower risk of separation and 8% lower risk of divorce than the other parents, the study found.
For parents of kids with cancer, those who were younger, had less education or were unemployed were more likely to separate or...
25 May 2020
MONDAY, May 25, 2020 (HealthDay News) -- Skin-to-skin contact between parents and babies -- often called "kangaroo care" -- provides major benefits to preemies' hearts and brains, Australian researchers say.
They assessed 40 babies born about 10 weeks early with an average weight of 2.9 pounds. Normal birth weight is 6.6 pounds.
One hour a day of kangaroo care significantly improved blood flow to the newborns' brains and hearts, compared to when they were in an incubator, the study found.
Improving blood supply is important because it carries oxygen and nutrients to the brain and other organs, and promotes neurodevelopment, according to the researchers at Monash University in Melbourne.
They said their study, published recently in the Journal of Pediatrics, provides scientific...