JAMA news releases are made available to the public after 3 pm US Central time on the first 4 Tuesdays of each month. The Archives Journals news releases are made available to the public after 3 pm Central time on Mondays. We also provide a list of previous news releases.
THIS WEEK'S CONTENT
JAMA NEWS RELEASES
(Embargoed for Release: 3:00 p.m. CT, Tuesday, July 15, 2008)
JAMA NEWS RELEASES
STATIN DOES NOT APPEAR HELPFUL FOR CHILDREN WITH LEARNING DISABILITIES CAUSED BY GENETIC DISORDER
AMOUNT OF PHYSICAL ACTIVITY BY CHILDREN STEADILY DECLINES AS THEY GET OLDER
JAMA MARKS 125 YEARS OF PUBLICATION
JAMA REPORT (VIDEO SCRIPT)
VIDEO: Windows Media | Quicktime
STUDY FINDS MANY CHILDREN ARE NOT GETTING THE PHYSICAL ACTIVITY THEY NEED
INFORMATION CONTAINED IN THESE NEWS RELEASES IS PROTECTED BY COPYRIGHT. JOURNAL ATTRIBUTION IS REQUIRED.
TV Note: This week’s JAMA Report video is children’s declining physical activity levels. The report will be fed Tuesday, July 8, from 9:00 - 9:30 a.m. ET and 2:00 - 2:30 p.m. ET. Please note new coordinates: Galaxy 25 (C band), Transponder 15, downlink frequency: 4000 vertical, audio 6.2/6.8. For more information, call 312/464-JAMA.
SAVE THE DATE: JAMA will present new research on HIV/AIDS at a media briefing on Sunday, August 3, at the International AIDS Conference in Mexico City. Program information will be included in a future email. To register, go to www.jamamedia.org and click on the Events tab.
Please Note: The FOR THE MEDIA Web site now has a search feature to enable media to find previous JAMA/Archives news releases on specific medical topics. This search feature link is located on the home page at www.jamamedia.org.
JOURNALISTS CAN NOW ACCESS EMBARGOED JAMA/ARCHIVES STUDIES ONLINE
Go to www.jamamedia.org for more information and to apply for access.
Embargoed for Release: 3:00 p.m. CT, Tuesday, July 15, 2008
Media Advisory: To contact corresponding author Ype Elgersma, Ph.D., email:
y.elgersma{at}erasmusmc.nl.
STATIN DOES NOT APPEAR HELPFUL FOR CHILDREN WITH LEARNING DISABILITIES CAUSED BY GENETIC DISORDER
CHICAGO—Use of simvastatin by children with neurofibromatosis type 1 (NF1), a genetic disorder that can cause learning disabilities, did not result in improved cognitive function, according to a study in the July 16 issue of JAMA.
Characteristics of NF1 (incidence 1:3,000) include skin disorders, problems with small and large movement skills as well as the frequent occurrence of cognitive disabilities, such as visual-spatial skills, nonverbal long-term memory and attention span, according to background information in the article. Some NF1 studies involving mice suggested that use of a statin could improve cognitive deficits.
Lianne C. Krab, M.Sc., of Erasmus MC University Medical Center, Sophia Children’s Hospital, Rotterdam, The Netherlands, and colleagues conducted a randomized trial to study the effect of the statin simvastatin on cognitive function of 62 children with NF1. The participants received simvastatin or placebo treatment once daily for 12 weeks.
After the treatment period, there was no significant difference between the simvastatin and placebo groups on several cognitive measures (determined by testing), including assessing nonverbal long-term memory, assessing attention and prism adaptation task (measurement of adaptation of the angle of hand movements in response to prism glass distortion, which is thought to be dependent on cerebellar function).
In the secondary outcome measures, the researchers found a significant improvement in the simvastatin group in object assembly scores, which was specifically observed in children with poor baseline performance. Other secondary outcome measures, such as attention fluctuations and a developmental test of visual-motor integration revealed no significant effect of simvastatin treatment.
“The negative outcome of this trial suggests that simvastatin should not be prescribed to ameliorate the cognitive deficits associated with NF1. Further studies to evaluate a longer treatment period and whether the object assembly finding is spurious may be warranted,” the authors conclude.
(JAMA. 2008;300[3]:287-294. Available pre-embargo to the media at www.jamamedia.org)
Editor's Note: Please see the article for additional information, including other authors, author contributions and affiliations, financial disclosures, funding and support, etc.
For More Information: Contact the JAMA/Archives Media Relations Department at 312/464-JAMA (5262) or email: mediarelations{at}jama-archives.org.
Go back to the top.
Embargoed for Release: 3:00 p.m. CT, Tuesday, July 15, 2008
Media Advisory: To contact Philip R. Nader, M.D., call Kimberly Edwards at 619-543-2707.
AMOUNT OF PHYSICAL ACTIVITY BY CHILDREN STEADILY DECLINES AS THEY GET OLDER
CHICAGO—New research documents the decline in physical activity among children, with less than a third meeting recommended physical activity guidelines by the time they are 15 years old, according to a study in the July 16 issue of JAMA.
Physical inactivity is associated with an increase in obesity and associated illness and chronic diseases among youth. Expert opinion and studies suggest that children need a minimum of 60 minutes of moderate-to-vigorous physical activity (MVPA) per day, according to background information in the article. How many youth meet this standard is unclear.
Philip R. Nader, M.D., of the University of California San Diego, La Jolla, and colleagues collected physical activity data on 1,032 children when they were 9 years old until they were age 15. Physical activity was measured by the children wearing an accelerometer, a monitor worn on a belt that records minute-by-minute movement counts. The children would wear this monitor for one week a year at ages 9,11,12 and 15. The study took place in 10 geographic locations from 2000-2006. Participants included boys (517 [50.1 percent]) and girls (515 [49.9 percent]); 76.6 percent white (n = 791); and 24.5 percent (n = 231) lived in low-income families.
The researchers found that both the average minutes of MVPA and the range of minutes spent in MVPA decreased as children moved into adolescence. At 9 years, children engaged in MVPA approximately 3 hours per day on both weekdays and weekends. By 15 years, adolescents were only engaging in MVPA for 49 minutes per weekday and 35 minutes per weekend day. At 9 and 11 years, almost all children met the guidelines (of 60 minutes of MVPA per day), but by 15 years, only 31 percent and 17 percent met guidelines on weekdays and weekends, respectively. Both weekday and weekend MVPA showed significant decreases in MVPA between 9 and 15 years, with decreases of 38 and 41 minutes per year, respectively.
The estimated age at which girls crossed below the recommended 60 minutes of MVPA per day was approximately 13.1 years for weekday activity compared with boys at 14.7 years, and for weekend activity, girls crossed below the recommended 60 minutes of MVPA at 12.6 years compared with boys at 13.4 years.
“More research is … needed to understand the reasons for such substantial decreases in youth activity. Further study and more precise descriptions of the immediate activity environment, such as whether youth are located in urban, suburban, or rural areas; availability of safe places to be active; and quality of school-based physical education may explain some of the individual and regional differences noted in this and other studies.”
“This decrease augurs poorly for levels of physical activity in U.S. adults and potentially for health over the course of a lifetime. Consequently, there is a need for program and policy action as early as possible at the family, community, school, health care, and governmental levels to address the problem of decreasing physical activity with increasing age,” the authors conclude.
(JAMA. 2008;300[3]:295-305. Available pre-embargo to the media at www.jamamedia.org)
Editor's Note: Please see the article for additional information, including other authors, author contributions and affiliations, financial disclosures, funding and support, etc.
For More Information: Contact the JAMA/Archives Media Relations Department at 312/464-JAMA (5262) or email: mediarelations{at}jama-archives.org.
Go back to the top.
Embargoed for Release: 3:00 p.m. CT, Tuesday, July 15, 2008
Media Advisory: To contact Catherine D. DeAngelis, M.D., M.P.H., call Jann Ingmire at 312-464-2499.
JAMA MARKS 125 YEARS OF PUBLICATION
CHICAGO—To celebrate 125 years of publication, JAMA will republish online groundbreaking studies that have appeared in the Journal, along with Commentaries on the studies, throughout the coming year.
The first issue of JAMA was published on July 14, 1883, and covered a wide range of topics, including tobacco smoking in children, blunt chest trauma and neurological disorders. Other articles in that issue described therapeutic interventions, such as treatment of otorrhea (an ear disorder) and diabetes and surgical techniques.
“Over the past 125 years, JAMA has published many important groundbreaking and practice-changing articles, some of which we now refer to as JAMA Classics. To celebrate our quasquicentennial, over the next year we will republish 24 of those classic articles online accompanied in print by a JAMA Classics Commentary that provides a brief summary of the original article and an update of the topic covered in the classic article. Whenever possible the Commentary will be written by individuals from the same institution as the authors of the classic article,” writes Catherine D. DeAngelis, M.D., M.P.H., Editor-in-Chief, and Phil B. Fontanarosa, M.D., M.B.A., Executive Deputy Editor, JAMA, in an editorial in the July 16 issue of JAMA.
To start this series, with this issue JAMA is publishing online the full text of the classic article “The Surgical Treatment of Malformations of the Heart in Which There Is Pulmonary Stenosis or Pulmonary Atresia”, authored by Alfred Blalock, M.D., and Helen B. Taussig, M.D. The accompanying Commentary in this issue of JAMA is authored by Anne Murphy, M.D., and Duke Cameron, M.D. All four authors are from Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine.
(JAMA. 2008;300[3]:331. Available pre-embargo to the media at www.jamamedia.org)
Editor's Note: Please see the article for additional information, including financial disclosures, funding and support, etc.
For More Information: Contact the JAMA/Archives Media Relations Department at 312/464-JAMA (5262) or email: mediarelations{at}jama-archives.org.
Go back to the top.
JAMA REPORTS
VIDEO: Windows Media | Quicktime
STUDY FINDS MANY CHILDREN ARE NOT GETTING THE PHYSICAL ACTIVITY THEY NEED
INTRO:
There is new information about your children and the exercise they need but may not be getting. According to the U.S. Department of Agriculture children should have a minimum of sixty minutes of moderate to vigorous physical activity a day. But a recent study finds as children grow older they are becoming less active and many do not meet the recommended guidelines. Jennifer Mitchell explains in this week’s JAMA Report.
VIDEO:
B-ROLL
Kids playing video game
Girl on computer
Kids outside on bikes
AUDIO:
JUST ASK KIDS WHAT THEY LOVE TO DO AND YOU’LL FIND MANY ARE OFTEN INSIDE ON A SUMMER DAY RATHER THAN OUTSIDE RIDING BIKES OR DOING SOMETHING PHYSICALLY ACTIVE.
VIDEO:
SOT/FULL
Super @:12
Danielle Pupa
15 year old
Runs: 07
AUDIO:
“My friends and I like to go to the movies and we also like to go on myspace together and we’ll spend hours at a time on the computer talking to each other.”
VIDEO:
B-ROLL
Kids at park (no faces)
Dr. Nader walking
AUDIO:
CHILDREN SHOULD BE GETTING A MINIMUM OF SIXTY MINUTES OF MODERATE TO VIGOROUS EXERCISE A DAY BUT ACCORDING TO DOCTOR PHILIP NADER (nay-der), A PEDIATRICIAN WITH THE UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, SAN DIEGO, SOME ARE NOT.
VIDEO:
SOT/FULL
Philip Nader, M.D.
University of California, San Diego
Runs: 06
AUDIO:
“The bad news is that it is bad news.”
VIDEO:
B-ROLL
Nader at desk
Kids standing around
Activity monitor
Kids in park
AUDIO:
DOCTOR NADER LED A TEAM OF RESEARCHERS WHO FOLLOWED MORE THAN ONE THOUSAND CHILDREN FROM 2000 THROUGH 2006. THE CHILDREN WORE AN ACTIVITY MONITOR SIMILAR TO THIS ONE AROUND THEIR WAIST. IT TRACKED THEIR LEVEL OF USUAL ACTIVITY FOR ABOUT A WEEK A YEAR AT AGES NINE, ELEVEN, TWELVE AND FIFTEEN.
VIDEO:
SOT/FULL
Super @ :49
Philip Nader, M.D.
University of California, San Diego
Runs: 10
AUDIO:
“I was kind of surprised at the sharpness of the decline and how the amount of activity just kept getting smaller and smaller as the children got older.”
VIDEO:
B-ROLL
GRAPHIC:
Kids & Physical Activity (title)
9 years old: 3 hours activity
Activity decreased
49 minutes: weekdays
35 minutes: weekends
GXF/JAMA COVER
AUDIO:
AT NINE YEARS OLD CHILDREN ENGAGED IN THREE HOURS OF MODERATE TO VIGOROUS ACTIVITY PER DAY ON BOTH WEEKDAYS AND WEEKENDS. BUT EACH YEAR THAT ACTIVITY DECREASED. BY THE TIME THEY WERE FIFTEEN PARTICIPANTS ONLY ENGAGED IN ABOUT FORTY-NINE MINUTES OF MODERATE TO VIGOROUS ACTIVITY ON WEEKDAYS AND ABOUT THIRTY-FIVE MINUTES A DAY ON THE WEEKEND, BOTH BELOW THE RECOMMENDED GUIDELINES. THE STUDY APPEARS THIS WEEK IN JAMA, JOURNAL OF THE AMERICAN MEDICAL ASSOCIATION.
VIDEO:
SOT/FULL
Philip Nader, M.D.
University of California, San Diego
Runs: 05
AUDIO:
“I think it’s probably due to the environment that’s not supporting activity.”
VIDEO:
B-ROLL
Kid on bike with traffic
Girls standing around
Girl on computer
AUDIO:
RESEARCHERS BELIEVE FACTORS SUCH AS INCREASED TRAFFIC, NEIGHBORHOODS WITH FEWER PARKS AND CUTS IN SCHOOL RECESS CAN HAVE AN IMPACT.
VIDEO:
SOT/FULL
Super @1:37
Nick Pupa
Enjoys playing video games
Runs:04
AUDIO:
“We like to play video games about four or five hours a day.”
VIDEO:
B-ROLL
Screen pan to kids video game
Tight hands on game
End on kids biking away
AUDIO:
THE CONCERN IS THE POTENTIAL FOR CHILDHOOD OBESITY AND A HOST OF HEALTH PROBLEMS CHILDREN COULD POSSIBLY FACE INTO ADULTHOOD IF THE TREND IS NOT REVERSED. JENNIFER MITCHELL THE JAMA REPORT.
TAG:
Both boys and girls dropped below the recommended guidelines for physical activity by the time they were about twelve or thirteen. Researchers say the findings should be a call to action for parents, physicians and healthcare providers to do their part to make sure children are meeting the guidelines for physical activity. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention website, activities such as playing tag, jumping rope, swimming or a brisk walk are examples of activities children can choose as long as the activity adds up to at least an hour a day. For more information about this study you can log on to www.jama.com.
