How the Assoc. Press Reports the Secretin Studies / Morning Sickness Means Girl?

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How the Assoc. Press Reports the Secretin Studies / Morning Sickness Means

Girl?

December 9, 1999

" Autism Studies Show No Benefit From Enzyme Hailed As Cure "

An enzyme hailed as a possible cure for autistic children worked no

better than a placebo in its first two rigorous studies, researchers

reported today in the New England Journal of Medicine.

" There seems to be a significant placebo effect, but no difference

between secretin and placebo, " said Dr. Sandler, lead author of the

study.

The findings " strongly suggest that secretin should not be recommended

to treat autism until the results of our other ongoing studies are known, "

said Dr. Duane , director of the National Institute of Child Health

and Human Development, which sponsored that study.

Still, just being part of a study helped some of the children greatly.

Thousands of parents have hunted for doctors willing to give their

autistic children intravenous doses of secretin - a digestive enzyme that

costs $180 per vial - since a New Hampshire woman said in 1997 that one dose

given during a diagnostic test had brought her son out of autistic

isolation. There were reports of a black market and exorbitant prices.

That prompted a series of studies to test secretin against a placebo,

since it has long been known that simply being treated can help many people,

whether or not the treatment has any medical effect.

Only two of the studies are complete. One study, involving 60 children,

is detailed in the New England Journal of Medicine. A study of 20 children

was described by Dr. Edwin Cook of the University of Chicago in an article

published on the Medscape Internet site in October.

Neither found any benefit from secretin. The larger study, though,

found that both children who got the enzyme and those who got a placebo

improved markedly and by about the same amount.

Autism is marked by profound social withdrawal and sometimes aggressive

or repetitive behavior. Sandler, of the Olson Huff Center for Child

Development in Asheville, N.C., found that children in both groups

interacted more with other people, talked more and had slightly less trouble

sleeping.

Dr. Fred Volkmar, head of the Yale Developmental Disabilities Clinic,

said the children on placebos were responding to all the attention from

doctors, parents and others. He and Sandler both noted that several

treatments - most of them involving long, painstaking work with behavior or

speech problems - have been proven to help autistic children.

Both of the secretin studies were small, short-term and single dose -

limits the researchers themselves noted.

The patent to secretin's use with autistic children is held by Bernard

Rimland, head of the Autism Research Institute in San Diego, and

Beck, who first called attention to the enzyme after her son's improvement.

Rimland, who has a 43-year-old autistic son, said a dozen more secretin

studies are nearly complete. He said there is convincing data showing a

clear response by children to secretin.

" Kids who never slept the night through sleep the night through, " he

said. " Kids who never said " Daddy' are beginning to react to their parents. "

Copyright 1999 The Associated Press. All rights reserved.

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Does Morning Sickness Mean a Girl?

[by Emma Ross, Associated Press.]

LONDON--For centuries, expectant mothers have been seeking simple ways

to predict the sex of their baby. Now, researchers have found a real clue:

Women who suffer severe morning sickness early in pregnancy are more likely

to have a girl.

The finding by epidemiologists at Stockholm's Karolinska Institute may

give credence to an observation once made by Hippocrates, physician to the

Ancient Greeks and the father of Western medicine.

He said that a woman carrying a female baby has a pale face, whereas if

she is carrying a male baby, she has a healthy tone to her skin.

The scientific study, published in this week's issue of The Lancet

medical journal, found that mothers-to-be who get severe morning sickness in

their first trimester are more likely to have a girl than a boy.

" Throughout history, people have tried to predict the sex of their

offspring, " the study said. " Despite efforts to find reliable physical signs

or symptoms to indicate the sex of the offspring, none have been found. "

The Swedish scientists examined all births in Sweden between 1987 and

1995. More than one million children were born during that time, 51 percent

of them girls, 49 percent boys.

But when the scientists looked only at the 5,900 women who were

admitted to hospitals in the first three months of their pregnancy with

vomiting and extreme nausea, the ratio changed.

Fifty-six percent of those struck with nasty morning sickness in their

first trimester gave birth to girls and 44 percent bore boys.

However, among women who were hospitalized with severe morning sickness

later in their pregnancies, the gender ratio of the babies matched the

national figures.

The scientists couldn't tell why the women were sick, but they

suspected it was because their bodies produced increased amounts of a

pregnancy-related hormone called human chorionic gonadotropin.

In normal pregnancies, a female fetus is associated with higher

concentrations of the hormone in the mother when she gives birth, though

levels in early pregnancy are unknown, the study said.

The latest study echoed the findings of a smaller survey in 1987 based

on 3,000 women who were severely sick during pregnancy, also conducted by

Swedish researchers.

But the researchers warn expectant mothers not to start decorating the

nursery based on the findings.

" Using sickness to predict the sex of an individual offspring is not

much better than tossing a coin, " said the study's lead investigator, Dr.

Johan Askling.

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