Mouse ears

I know there are people who enjoy theme parks, and really I try, but I just returned from the American Academy of Pediatrics National Conference and Exhibition (AAP NCE) in Orlando, Florida, and I still just don’t get it. The AAP actually rented out Disney’s Hollywood Studios for a night, which means we still got to stand in line 50 minutes to experience Toy Story Mania 4D, but with pediatricians!

Digital Vision

There were free passes on the Rock ’n’ Roller Coaster Starring Aerosmith, followed by a short lecture entitled, “Diagnosis and Management of Acute Nausea.” My version of Disney World would be a little different. Attractions would include It’s a Small World, So Why Not Save Money & Stay Home; Plenty of Space on the Couch Mountain; and the Honey, I Shrunk the Kids and Got Them a Tiny Babysitter Adventure.

Regular readers (Mom) will notice that I usually address three studies in each blog, but the AAP dropped so many controversial policies and articles during the meeting that I feel that each one deserves a mention. Hopefully, you’ll come away feeling just like me: overwhelmed and exhausted.

Ahead

Are you terrified that one of your kids will get a concussion? No? Then you were not at the NCE. We started by learning that children who sustained concussions or other head injuries were twice as likely to suffer from depression as were controls. Do you find that depressing? Then wait until you learn that only 11% of children treated for bicycle-related accidents in Los Angeles emergency departments from 2006 to 2011 were wearing bike helmets! The other 89% were waiting to put them on until they were sure they would be in a crash.

Next out was an abstract demonstrating that football helmets are useless in protecting against concussions, regardless of brand. I know your next question: What about mouth guards? Nope, they looked at those, too, and even the really expensive mouth guards marketed to prevent concussions were useless. This study was not without good news. First, football helmets did provide protection against skull fractures and scalp lacerations. Second, the cheapest helmets and mouth guards are just as ineffective as the most expensive ones, so team boosters will have to sell a lot fewer milk chocolate almond bars next year!

Okay, say your bike-riding football player does sustain a concussion and is not too depressed to return to school. When do you send him back? By Sunday, the AAP was ready to tell you: It depends. Not the same day as the injury, that much is clear. The authors stress that cognitive rest is as important as physical rest until symptoms resolve. They suggested that if a child is too impaired to go to school, he’s also not well enough to play video games, then they paused a moment for parents to high-five each other.

Shot across the bow

Concussions were not the most severe injuries to get press at the NCE; that would be gunshot wounds. The conference saw the release of a study correlating children’s incidence of gunshot injury and death with regional rates of gun ownership. Some people seemed surprised to learn that states with higher rates of gun ownership had correspondingly higher rates of childhood gun injuries. These same people were also skeptical of correlations between drowning and pools, obesity and food, and sunburn and daylight.

Media rare

My own little corner of the AAP, the Council on Communications and the Media, got in on the excitement by releasing a long-awaited (by us) updated policy statement on children, adolescents, and the media. Our new statement emphasizes the need for parents to help kids develop healthier media habits by developing a family media use plan. Excited parents immediately wrenched their cell phones out of their toddlers’ hands so they could text the news to their teenagers, all the way across the dinner table. I feel we owe media companies everywhere an apology since, now that we have spoken, kids everywhere will immediately cut back from 7+ hours of electronic entertainment a day to less than 2 hours. Perhaps all those newly unemployed entertainment executives can get together and design a football helmet that prevents concussions.

A half ounce of prevention

At this point, having criticized only high school football, gun ownership, and television, we felt we really hadn’t done anything that would create controversy in middle America. Fortunately, the AAP Committee on Adolescence was ready to release their statement, “Condom Use by Adolescents,” suggesting that prophylactics should be made freely available in schools, doctors’ offices, malls, skate parks, concert venues, orthodontists’ waiting rooms, and anywhere else two or more teens might congregate.

Their logic was impeccable: studies have repeatedly demonstrated that giving teens condoms does not make them more likely to become sexually active, and high-quality comprehensive sex education can even delay the onset of sexual activity. And condoms save lives and prevent pregnancies when used properly and consistently. Despite the clear health advantages of widespread condom use, I can imagine the message going over poorly among some of the parents where I live. I think to make condoms more popular, we should put them behind a big wall, charge people a huge fee just to walk inside, and then sell them for unconscionable prices once they’ve been stamped with the image of a popular cartoon character. It sounds crazy, but based on my recent experience, it works.

David L. Hill, M.D., FAAP is the author of Dad to Dad: Parenting Like a Pro (AAP Publishing, 2012). He is also vice president of Cape Fear Pediatrics in Wilmington, N.C., and  adjunct assistant professor of pediatrics at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. He serves as Program Director for the AAP Council on Communications and Media and as an executive committee member of the North Carolina Pediatric Society. He has recorded commentaries for NPR's All Things Considered and provided content for various print, television, and Internet outlets.

I know there are people who enjoy theme parks, and really I try, but I just returned from the American Academy of Pediatrics National Conference and Exhibition (AAP NCE) in Orlando, Florida, and I still just don’t get it. The AAP actually rented out Disney’s Hollywood Studios for a night, which means we still got to stand in line 50 minutes to experience Toy Story Mania 4D, but with pediatricians!

Digital Vision

There were free passes on the Rock ’n’ Roller Coaster Starring Aerosmith, followed by a short lecture entitled, “Diagnosis and Management of Acute Nausea.” My version of Disney World would be a little different. Attractions would include It’s a Small World, So Why Not Save Money & Stay Home; Plenty of Space on the Couch Mountain; and the Honey, I Shrunk the Kids and Got Them a Tiny Babysitter Adventure.

Regular readers (Mom) will notice that I usually address three studies in each blog, but the AAP dropped so many controversial policies and articles during the meeting that I feel that each one deserves a mention. Hopefully, you’ll come away feeling just like me: overwhelmed and exhausted.

Ahead

Are you terrified that one of your kids will get a concussion? No? Then you were not at the NCE. We started by learning that children who sustained concussions or other head injuries were twice as likely to suffer from depression as were controls. Do you find that depressing? Then wait until you learn that only 11% of children treated for bicycle-related accidents in Los Angeles emergency departments from 2006 to 2011 were wearing bike helmets! The other 89% were waiting to put them on until they were sure they would be in a crash.

Next out was an abstract demonstrating that football helmets are useless in protecting against concussions, regardless of brand. I know your next question: What about mouth guards? Nope, they looked at those, too, and even the really expensive mouth guards marketed to prevent concussions were useless. This study was not without good news. First, football helmets did provide protection against skull fractures and scalp lacerations. Second, the cheapest helmets and mouth guards are just as ineffective as the most expensive ones, so team boosters will have to sell a lot fewer milk chocolate almond bars next year!

Okay, say your bike-riding football player does sustain a concussion and is not too depressed to return to school. When do you send him back? By Sunday, the AAP was ready to tell you: It depends. Not the same day as the injury, that much is clear. The authors stress that cognitive rest is as important as physical rest until symptoms resolve. They suggested that if a child is too impaired to go to school, he’s also not well enough to play video games, then they paused a moment for parents to high-five each other.

Shot across the bow

Concussions were not the most severe injuries to get press at the NCE; that would be gunshot wounds. The conference saw the release of a study correlating children’s incidence of gunshot injury and death with regional rates of gun ownership. Some people seemed surprised to learn that states with higher rates of gun ownership had correspondingly higher rates of childhood gun injuries. These same people were also skeptical of correlations between drowning and pools, obesity and food, and sunburn and daylight.

Media rare

My own little corner of the AAP, the Council on Communications and the Media, got in on the excitement by releasing a long-awaited (by us) updated policy statement on children, adolescents, and the media. Our new statement emphasizes the need for parents to help kids develop healthier media habits by developing a family media use plan. Excited parents immediately wrenched their cell phones out of their toddlers’ hands so they could text the news to their teenagers, all the way across the dinner table. I feel we owe media companies everywhere an apology since, now that we have spoken, kids everywhere will immediately cut back from 7+ hours of electronic entertainment a day to less than 2 hours. Perhaps all those newly unemployed entertainment executives can get together and design a football helmet that prevents concussions.

A half ounce of prevention

At this point, having criticized only high school football, gun ownership, and television, we felt we really hadn’t done anything that would create controversy in middle America. Fortunately, the AAP Committee on Adolescence was ready to release their statement, “Condom Use by Adolescents,” suggesting that prophylactics should be made freely available in schools, doctors’ offices, malls, skate parks, concert venues, orthodontists’ waiting rooms, and anywhere else two or more teens might congregate.

Their logic was impeccable: studies have repeatedly demonstrated that giving teens condoms does not make them more likely to become sexually active, and high-quality comprehensive sex education can even delay the onset of sexual activity. And condoms save lives and prevent pregnancies when used properly and consistently. Despite the clear health advantages of widespread condom use, I can imagine the message going over poorly among some of the parents where I live. I think to make condoms more popular, we should put them behind a big wall, charge people a huge fee just to walk inside, and then sell them for unconscionable prices once they’ve been stamped with the image of a popular cartoon character. It sounds crazy, but based on my recent experience, it works.

David L. Hill, M.D., FAAP is the author of Dad to Dad: Parenting Like a Pro (AAP Publishing, 2012). He is also vice president of Cape Fear Pediatrics in Wilmington, N.C., and  adjunct assistant professor of pediatrics at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. He serves as Program Director for the AAP Council on Communications and Media and as an executive committee member of the North Carolina Pediatric Society. He has recorded commentaries for NPR's All Things Considered and provided content for various print, television, and Internet outlets.

I know there are people who enjoy theme parks, and really I try, but I just returned from the American Academy of Pediatrics National Conference and Exhibition (AAP NCE) in Orlando, Florida, and I still just don’t get it. The AAP actually rented out Disney’s Hollywood Studios for a night, which means we still got to stand in line 50 minutes to experience Toy Story Mania 4D, but with pediatricians!

Digital Vision

There were free passes on the Rock ’n’ Roller Coaster Starring Aerosmith, followed by a short lecture entitled, “Diagnosis and Management of Acute Nausea.” My version of Disney World would be a little different. Attractions would include It’s a Small World, So Why Not Save Money & Stay Home; Plenty of Space on the Couch Mountain; and the Honey, I Shrunk the Kids and Got Them a Tiny Babysitter Adventure.

Regular readers (Mom) will notice that I usually address three studies in each blog, but the AAP dropped so many controversial policies and articles during the meeting that I feel that each one deserves a mention. Hopefully, you’ll come away feeling just like me: overwhelmed and exhausted.

Ahead

Are you terrified that one of your kids will get a concussion? No? Then you were not at the NCE. We started by learning that children who sustained concussions or other head injuries were twice as likely to suffer from depression as were controls. Do you find that depressing? Then wait until you learn that only 11% of children treated for bicycle-related accidents in Los Angeles emergency departments from 2006 to 2011 were wearing bike helmets! The other 89% were waiting to put them on until they were sure they would be in a crash.

Next out was an abstract demonstrating that football helmets are useless in protecting against concussions, regardless of brand. I know your next question: What about mouth guards? Nope, they looked at those, too, and even the really expensive mouth guards marketed to prevent concussions were useless. This study was not without good news. First, football helmets did provide protection against skull fractures and scalp lacerations. Second, the cheapest helmets and mouth guards are just as ineffective as the most expensive ones, so team boosters will have to sell a lot fewer milk chocolate almond bars next year!

Okay, say your bike-riding football player does sustain a concussion and is not too depressed to return to school. When do you send him back? By Sunday, the AAP was ready to tell you: It depends. Not the same day as the injury, that much is clear. The authors stress that cognitive rest is as important as physical rest until symptoms resolve. They suggested that if a child is too impaired to go to school, he’s also not well enough to play video games, then they paused a moment for parents to high-five each other.

Shot across the bow

Concussions were not the most severe injuries to get press at the NCE; that would be gunshot wounds. The conference saw the release of a study correlating children’s incidence of gunshot injury and death with regional rates of gun ownership. Some people seemed surprised to learn that states with higher rates of gun ownership had correspondingly higher rates of childhood gun injuries. These same people were also skeptical of correlations between drowning and pools, obesity and food, and sunburn and daylight.

Media rare

My own little corner of the AAP, the Council on Communications and the Media, got in on the excitement by releasing a long-awaited (by us) updated policy statement on children, adolescents, and the media. Our new statement emphasizes the need for parents to help kids develop healthier media habits by developing a family media use plan. Excited parents immediately wrenched their cell phones out of their toddlers’ hands so they could text the news to their teenagers, all the way across the dinner table. I feel we owe media companies everywhere an apology since, now that we have spoken, kids everywhere will immediately cut back from 7+ hours of electronic entertainment a day to less than 2 hours. Perhaps all those newly unemployed entertainment executives can get together and design a football helmet that prevents concussions.

A half ounce of prevention

At this point, having criticized only high school football, gun ownership, and television, we felt we really hadn’t done anything that would create controversy in middle America. Fortunately, the AAP Committee on Adolescence was ready to release their statement, “Condom Use by Adolescents,” suggesting that prophylactics should be made freely available in schools, doctors’ offices, malls, skate parks, concert venues, orthodontists’ waiting rooms, and anywhere else two or more teens might congregate.

Their logic was impeccable: studies have repeatedly demonstrated that giving teens condoms does not make them more likely to become sexually active, and high-quality comprehensive sex education can even delay the onset of sexual activity. And condoms save lives and prevent pregnancies when used properly and consistently. Despite the clear health advantages of widespread condom use, I can imagine the message going over poorly among some of the parents where I live. I think to make condoms more popular, we should put them behind a big wall, charge people a huge fee just to walk inside, and then sell them for unconscionable prices once they’ve been stamped with the image of a popular cartoon character. It sounds crazy, but based on my recent experience, it works.

David L. Hill, M.D., FAAP is the author of Dad to Dad: Parenting Like a Pro (AAP Publishing, 2012). He is also vice president of Cape Fear Pediatrics in Wilmington, N.C., and  adjunct assistant professor of pediatrics at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. He serves as Program Director for the AAP Council on Communications and Media and as an executive committee member of the North Carolina Pediatric Society. He has recorded commentaries for NPR's All Things Considered and provided content for various print, television, and Internet outlets.