Saturday, March 6, 2010

Sales Booming for Natural Supplement that Treats Symptoms of ADD

Sales up 153% over last year, the natural supplement ADD-care™ has demonstrated the ability to help treat symptoms consistent with Attention Deficit Disorder.


March 5, 2010 -- With sales up 153% over last year, the natural supplement ADD-care™ has demonstrated the ability to help treat symptoms consistent with Attention Deficit Disorder.
The standard and until now most effective treatment for Attention Deficit Disorder is the use of amphetamines and stimulants. These include Ritalin, Adderall, Dexedrine, and the relatively unknown medication Provigil. This is due to the stimulating effect of these drugs on the central nervous system, prefrontal cortex, and hypothalamus which raises dopamine levels in the brain and increases alertness.”

However, Jef Gazley, M.S., is taking an alternative approach. He has developed a product called ADD-care™, which is a completely natural supplement consisting of various amino acids and a homeopathic agent that, according to both client testimonials and SPECT scans, rivals the stimulants with virtually no side effects. “We are excited about the ability of ADD-care™ to address the symptoms consistent with ADHD. It is opening a whole new approach for those wishing to avoid traditional drug-based approaches,” according to Gazley. “We are seeking to avoid the common side-effects of drugs, which include over-stimulation, excessive sweating, bad breath, intense irritability, more confusion and less focus, anxiety, obsessions, compulsions, oppositional behavior, and an addictive potential for people without ADD.”
ADD-care™ has been shown, by SPECT scans to add blood flow and electrical activity to the prefrontal cortex of the brain which increases focusing and is the part of the brain that is positively affected by the stimulants such as Ritalin. ADD-care™ also has been shown to raise Dopamine, Acetylcholine, GABA, and Serotonin. It is the ability to boost and balance these neurotransmitters that make ADD-care™ so effective.
The Attention Deficit Disorder Association says the symptoms of attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) may include:

 
  • Inattention, which is having a short attention span and being easily distracted.
  • Impulsivity, which can cause a person to do inappropriate things without thinking about the consequences.
  • Hyperactivity, which is inappropriate or excessive activity.
These symptoms affect people in all age groups who have ADHD. But typical behavior varies by age. Jef Gazley, M.S. of Phoenix, Arizona developed ADD-care™. It is available online at www.ADD-care.com.

Health board in £3.5m payout to teen brain-damaged at birth

A Co Down teenager who suffered severe brain damage at birth is to receive as much as £3.5 million in compensation, it has been revealed.
The health board sued over a delivery procedure which saw him starved of oxygen has agreed to the payout to settle a 17-year legal fight.
It is believed to be one of the largest settlements of its kind in Northern Ireland. The youth, who cannot be named for legal reasons, was left with cerebral palsy after being born at the Ulster Hospital in Dundonald in 1992.
His parents brought a case against the Eastern Health and Social Services Board by claiming medical negligence during his birth. They alleged he was in a distressed state within his mother's womb and should have been delivered sooner.
Delaying the procedure deprived him of oxygen and caused brain injuries, it was contended.
After his parents pursued their claim for years, an action was due to be heard at the High Court in Belfast.
But following negotiations a settlement was reached by consent with the EHSSB's successor, the regional Health and Social Care Board.
As part of the resolution the authority is to pay a lump sum of nearly £1.5m to the 17-year-old.
The board has also agreed to annual payments of £115,000 to meet care costs for the rest of his life.
The family's solicitor, Ernie Telford of Belfast law firm McCartan Turkington Breen, predicted what the eventual scale of damages would be.
He said: “The two figures together are likely to give a total settlement of around £3.5m.
“The boy's mother and father are absolutely delighted with the outcome.
“This is a vindication for their 17-year legal battle.”

SOCIAL IN BRIEF 6/3

Cholera threats in southern border provinces
Since Tet (Lunar New Year), several cases of cholera and widespread acute diarrhea have been recorded in the Mekong Delta Province of An Giang along its border with Cambodia.
Most of the people with cholera or acute diarrhea are border residents who often travel to Cambodia for businesses, while some are Cambodians, head of the Health Ministry’s Preventive Medicine and Environment Department, Associate Professor Dr Nguyen Huy Nga, said March 3.
Cambodian health agencies said there is a cholera epidemic on the Cambodian side of the border with An Giang Province.
Dr Nga warned that cholera could spread across the southern border provinces of Vietnam as cholera vibrios have been found in water sources.

Jica signs with Cho Ray Hospital for brain injury rehabilitation  
Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA) and Cho Ray Hospital in Ho Chi Minh City signed an agreement on March 1 for a project to improve brain injury rehabilitation services 
Under the “Project for Improving Medical Rehabilitation Service in the Southern Area of Vietnam”, JICA will provide technical assistance to Cho Ray and other Southern hospitals to improve brain injury rehabilitation.
“Rehabilitation is one of most three important tasks of medical institutions besides examination and treatment, but it has received very little attention recently,” Dr. Nguyen Truong Son, Director of Cho Ray Hospital said.
“At provincial level, rehabilitation departments are often integrated in the traditional medicine departments and lack professional staff,” Son said.
The project will also develop a rehabilitation handbook for patients and families following patients’ discharge from hospital.
The project follows the successful completion of a 2005-2008 JICA project at the hospital called “Supporting for people with disabilities”.
According to a survey conducted by Cho Ray Hospital, the current average number of rehabilitation staff is one physical therapist per 108 beds.
Only 10 per cent of cerebra-vascular accident and head trauma patients received rehabilitation treatment when they returned to provincial hospitals, according to data provided by Cho Ray Hospital.
Improvements to such rehabilitation services were urgently needed the survey said.
The three year project will commence in May.

Road accidents kill 940 in Ho Chi Minh City last year 
Traffic accidents killed nearly three people a day in Ho Chi Minh City last year, with 940 people counted dead in the city’s 1,123 road wrecks, along with another 495 injured.
Motorbikes in Ho Chi Minh City caused 783 accidents, killing 649 and injuring 365 in total last year, accounting for most of the traffic accidents and related casualties recorded in the southern hub.
The city’s Traffic Safety Agency’s latest report showed that motorbike-caused accidents made up 69.7 percent of traffic accidents in the city, while the deaths and injuries accounted for 69.6 and 75.1 percent of the city’s total figures, respectively.
HCMC currently has some four million motorbikes out of nearly 4.9 million registered vehicles.
The city has set up objective to cut down on the number of motorbikes for years, yet latest statistics showed that nearly 1,000 motorbikes are registered every day, increasing more than 10 percent year-on-year.
Not to mention that some one million motorbikes from other provinces circulate in the city every day.

Central highlands to review fatal dog attack investigation  
The People's Procuracy in the central highlands town of Buon Ma Thuot will thoroughly review the controversial investigation into a dog attack that killed a woman last month, local newswire VnExpress reported Saturday.
Nguyen Hong Nam, deputy head of Buon Ma Thuot People's Procuracy, said the police had been slow to inform the judicial agency of their decision to drop the investigation, which was finalized February 11 yet only sent to the agency 15 days later.
Such decisions by law must be sent to the judicial agency immediately following their issuance, the official said in the newswire.
"The institution has asked police to hand over all related documents for a thorough review," Nam said.
The dropping of charges in the case had drawn harsh criticism and unanswered questions from the victim's family members.
According to police reports, on January 21 victim Pham Thi Ngan and two other women, Giang Thi Diep and Nguyen Thi Thanh Tram, entered Pham Ngoc Thanh's farm in Ea Kao Commune's H'drat Village to collect coffee seeds without permission.
They were then attacked by Berger dogs raised by Thanh on his farm. While Diep and Tram managed to climb up trees, Ngan was killed by the animals.
Thanh had erected a signboard warning of fierce dogs before the incident, police said, rejecting accusations that Thanh let the dogs fatally attack Ngan on purpose.
They also denied the accusation that Nguyen Dinh Son, who was believed to manage the dogs and the farm, didn't help Ngan when she was attacked.
Son asked the women to get out of the farm when seeing them enter before he left the area, investigators said. When he returned, he found Ngan had been killed by the dogs, police said.
However, witnesses, including Diep and Tram, insisted that Son was present when the dogs were attacking Ngan, but he left without offering the 55-year-old woman any aid despite her cries for help.
Vu Thi Hue, who lives behind Thanh's farm, said warning signboards were only set up on the day Ngan was buried.
Although Thanh paid Ngan's family VND120 million (US$6,495) for her burial, Nguyen Van Khoi, the victim's son, said he was puzzled by police's conclusions, as witnesses had told them many times that Son didn't help his mother when she was in danger. He said there was obvious evidence supporting the claim.
Many local people also found the decision depressing, according to VnExpress.
"If the case is dropped suddenly, heartrending deaths caused by dogs like Ngan's will continue," a man who lives near Thanh's farm told the newswire.

Poppy fields destroyed in central Vietnam      
Border guards in the central province of Nghe An have destroyed three opium fields covering thousands of square meters in total this year, local newswire Vietnamnet reported on Saturday.
One was part of a 1.5-million-square-meter field that included other crops, one covered 400 square meters, and the other covered 300 square meters.
The flowers were found near the province's western border, Colonel Nguyen Truong Thi, head of Drug Crimes Prevention Office at the Nghe An Border Guard, told the newswire.
Local ethnic minority peoples often used opium poppies as food, not necessarily drugs.
The Nghe An agency so far had identified Moong Van Khoa, 51, as the owner of one of the fields, according to the news source.
Khoa was fined and disciplined in public.
Under Vietnamese regulations, those who plant opium poppy could be sentenced to seven years in prison.
However, the punishment is only imposed when the person continues planting the cash crops despite warnings from authorities. After issuing such warnings, local governments often provide poppy farmers with support to plant other crops.

Residents want to shut down polluting steel plant  
Dozens of people Friday gathered in front of a steel plant in the southern province of Ba Ria-Vung Tau demanding that it be shut down for pollution violations.
The demonstrators also tried to prevent trucks carrying materials from entering the plant of Thep Viet Company at Phu My Industrial Park, local news website VietNamNet reported.
They came to the plant carrying a sign that read "Thep Viet Plant causes pollution and needs to be shut down. Save us."
Following the gathering, the authorities came to the plant for inspections.
Thep Viet Company Friday explained that strong winds blew dust from the plant into the residents' houses. The company promised to solve the problem soon.
The residents, however, did not agree. They asked authorities to close the plant or relocate them to other areas unaffected by the pollution.
They said the plant had affected their lives for three years. Although its managers promised to eliminate the noise and air pollution by the end of last year, the situation had yet to improve, they said.
Local authorities have yet to make a decision on the case.

Van Mieu steles endangered by human touch  
Eighty-two stone steles at Van Mieu – Quoc Tu Giam (Temple of Literature – first National University) in Hanoi are in danger of being irreparably damaged because of the large number of people who are touching them.
Temple official Nguyen Hai said last Thursday that more than 70,000 people visited the place over four days of the Tet (Lunar New Year) festival from February 14-17.
"People visiting the Temple of Literature during Tet has for long been a cultural feature.
"Recently, however, many people have come to touch the stone steles and stone tortoises to wish for good luck and this can damage the precious structures," Hai said.
The situation has developed over the past few years and this year, the temple built an iron fence to prevent visitors from touching the stone tortoises and steles, but a large number of people broke the fence on Lunar New Year's Day, he added.
Last December, the cultural activity center at Van Mieu – Quoc Tu Giam sent documents to UNESCO for recognition of the stone steles of doctoral candidates in the Le – Mac dynasties (1442- 1779) as a world cultural heritage.
However, the damage being caused currently to the structures will soon destroy them, experts have cautioned.

Sutphins take to the airwaves

C.J. THE D.J.: Contributed photo
C.J. THE D.J.: Well, not exactly, but C.J. Sutphin is scheduled to be interviewed at noon today on WFLS-FM 93.3 during the station’s Children’s Miracle Network Radiothon. C.J., 7, is battling tumors on his brain and spinal cord.

Sutphins take to the airwaves
The local family of a resilient little boy who’s battling brain tumors will be on the radio today in support of children’s hospitals.
Kathy Sutphin of Culpeper and her father, James Arthur of Madison, will be on Fredericksburg’s 93.3 WFLS Real Country for a noon interview as part of the station’s Children’s Miracle Network Radiothon being broadcast from Spotsylvania Towne Centre.
Farmington Elementary School second grader C.J. Sutphin will be there too. The 7-year-old recently started his fourth round of weekly chemotherapy at Children’s National Medical Center in Washington, D.C., where he receives ongoing care to combat tumors on his brain and spine.
C.J.’s grandfather and mother take him to the weekly appointments, fighting northern Virginia traffic and long hours on a road toward wellness and hope. As previously featured in the Star-Exponent, the Sutphin clan does not get down.
“God takes care of us,” said Kathy Sutphin. “Sometimes you don’t understand why things happen, but there is a reason.”
For today, the family looks forward to a day at the mall and on the radio.
C.J. continues to enjoy school more than anything, waking up at 4 a.m. most days raring to go. Friday, he was especially excited about spending time with his schoolmates on a field trip to Dominion Skating Center. 

They call it the professional's pill

Why more middle-class people are taking a drug they believe will make them smarter

Sandra is an air steward. She pops a tab every time she crosses the Atlantic to make sure she's perky on landing. Gerry uses them during exams to give his concentration a boost. Simon, a junior doctor, takes one during the night shift to keep sleep at bay and his brain sharp.
You won't find their pill of choice on the shelves of your local head shop but there's growing evidence that high-flying professionals and stressed-out students are relying on brain-boosting drugs to quicken their thinking and keep them awake.
This week in Britain, scientists urged the government to bring the closet phenomenon of so-called smart drugs into the open, claiming their use is spreading across all sectors of society from surgeons to soldiers.
Researchers from Cambridge University warned that the drugs, which were designed to help people with neurological disorders like attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder, Alzheimer's and brain injury, are now being used for reasons far beyond their original purpose by uptight executives, multi-tasking mothers and exhausted shift-workers who need a chemical pick-me-up.
No self-respecting GP would prescribe these powerful brain-changing drugs to a patient suffering from poor concentration or tiredness, so users are turning to the internet, where a multitude of websites offer them for sale.
In Ireland, customs officers are at the coalface of this new craze, with increasing quantities of cognitive-enhancement drugs such as Modafinil and Ritalin being shipped into the country illegally every year.
In 2008, 1,250 tablets of Modafinil, a sleep inhibitor, were seized at ports and airports, rising to 1,920 last year.
In the first two months of this year, 170 tablets were found. Seizures of Ritalin, dubbed 'kiddie cocaine' in the US where it is doled out like candy to school-going children, have been lower but significant all the same with more than 612 units found since 2007.
Here, Modafinil is sold under the trade name Provigil. In November, its manufacturers Cephalon were granted permission by the Irish Medicines Board to market the drug for the treatment of excessive daytime sleepiness associated with sleep apnoea.
Taoiseach Brian Cowen is among those who suffer from this condition, which periodically causes breathing to stop during sleep.
Originally developed in France, Modafinil, which is also licensed to treat narcolepsy -- a disorder marked by sudden uncontrollable attacks of daytime sleep -- is the first of a new generation of wake-promoting drugs which targets the sleep/wake centres in the brain. It works by activating sleep-suppressing neurons fooling the mind into believing it is time to be alert.
This pharmaceutical prototype has the power to keep a person awake and focussed for up to 90 hours running, without the jitteriness or poor concentration that other stimulants like amphetamines or caffeine are known to produce.
Proponents say it works without causing a crash after its effects have worn off and does not create any sense of euphoria in the brain thereby limiting its potential for abuse.
The use of Modafinil within the American military is well-documented where it has been approved for use on air force missions, allowing troops to stay awake for days at a time and complete operations as quickly as possible.
In Britain, the drug was approved for use in 2002, and since then has surged in popularity. The number of prescriptions for stimulants like it has nearly doubled in recent years, rising from 458,000 in 2004 to 751,000 in 2008. A Nature magazine poll of 1,400 respondents, mostly scientists and academics, suggested that one in five had used 'smart drugs'.
Fears that stay-awake pills are increasingly being used as 'lifestyle drugs' are strengthening, especially since their long-term effects on the brain are still unknown.
Some neuroscientists also worry that drugs like this will turn humans into mechanistic beings who pop a pill when they need a brain boost rather than opting for a brisk walk or a good night's sleep.
Pharmaceutical advances like this could make cosmetic neurology as popular as beauty enhancements, they claim. And there are ethical concerns about the unfair advantage such drugs give to users over their peers in academic settings. In the US, surveys show that an estimated 16-20pc of US college students take smart drugs to help their memory and keep them alert. The drugs may especially help in subjects like mathematics and science by aiding students to complete puzzles and remember long chains of digits.
Last week, one of Britain's leading psychologists called for an official university-wide strategy to tackle student misuse of prescription drugs like Modafinil.
Barbara Sahakian, professor of clinical neuropsychology at Cambridge University, whose work is at the forefront of research into cognitive enhancement drugs, has even raised the prospect of dope testing of exam students as a possible safeguard against their use.
"This is something that universities really have to discuss," she says.
"It has enormous implications. The coercion aspect is a strong one. Some students say they feel it is cheating and it puts pressure on them to feel they have to use drugs when they don't really want to.
"You have to consider there are things that could be beneficial about such drugs because we have an ageing population: people will have to work for longer and their pensions may not be performing.
"The big question is, are we all going to be taking drugs in the next 10 years and boosting our brain power in this way? And if we are, will we use them to have a shorter working week, so we can go home, spend more time with our families and have a good work/life balance? Or will we go headlong into a 24/7 society were we work all the time because we can work all the time?"
Improving brain power and its ability to stay awake is certainly where drug companies think the future lies as the market for treatments for neurological and psychiatric illnesses continues to outstrip that for painkillers and cardiovascular drugs in the western world.
Dozens of neuro-enhancing drugs are currently in the research pipeline and their use in the coming years is expected to soar.
Advocates argue that smart drugs will remove disparities in society and give those who are mentally challenged a better chance of self-improvement and success.
They also claim it is better for high-risk professionals like surgeons and pilots to take a medically-controlled tablet rather than dosing themselves up on caffeine and ending up with a shaky hand and a twitchy disposition But for those dealing with the downside of chemical consumption, the advent of smart drugs is a worrying prospect.
"As with any stimulant that alters the central nervous system, you have to stop and think of the long-term consequences of using these drugs," says Dr Fiona Weldon, clinical director of the Rutland Centre, Dublin's leading addiction therapy centre.
"We are unsure about the extent to which these drugs are being used in Ireland but it would be naive to think it isn't happening and it is something we should be very worried about," she says.
"I've seen students become reliant on the likes of Ritalin. They claim it makes them work better but before you know it there is a dependency.
"There is such a tendency now to seek out a quick chemical fix as the solution to our stresses but if you over-stimulate the brain in a false way, the system will eventually crash and the side effects are incredible."