For many children, snoring can be more than a noisy nuisance.

"Snoring can run the gamut from being relatively minor to being a symptom of sleep apnea," said Dr. Max Hirshkowitz, associate director of the Sleep Disorders Center at Baylor College of Medicine.

Multiple sleep disturbances can keep a child from achieving a truly restful state.

"At school, these children will often wiggle around in their seats or doodle, all very subtle signs of sleepiness," Dr. Hirshkowitz said. "They become wound up, are unable to control their fidgeting and eventually stop paying attention."

Although parents might try to tune out their child's earsplitting habit, Dr. Hirshkowitz recommends getting a professional evaluation as soon as possible. A checkup can help diagnose any serious conditions and pinpoint any potential sleep-related problems.

"Many adults we treat for sleep apnea have symptoms that can be traced back to childhood," Dr. Hirshkowitz said. "Sleep problems can have a huge effect on schoolwork and parents should not wait until the ill effects surface in the classroom."

Courtesy of Baylor College of Medicine

You've had pierced ears for years and have amassed quite a collection of earrings and jewelry. Then suddenly, every time you wear earrings, your earlobes swell, redden and develop tiny blisters. Maybe your bracelets or rings give you a rash. You've given up wearing your favorite jewelry and wonder if you'll ever be able to wear it again. What's going on?

You've probably developed an allergy to nickel, one of the most common forms of contact allergies. Jewelry isn't the only culprit - metal snaps in infants' or children's clothing, zippers or tools made with nickel alloy can spark an allergic reaction, too. Brief contact with the metal can produce an instant allergic reaction or an allergic reaction may occur only after years of contact. But once you develop a nickel allergy, it can last a lifetime.

Stop wearing the offending baubles, apply a topical steroid cream prescribed by your doctor, and symptoms should improve almost overnight.

Courtesy of The University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston

Other activities might build bigger muscles or burn more calories, but yoga gives the body and mind the ultimate workout.

"There may be more physically demanding activities," said Dr. Ken Goodrick, associate professor of medicine at Baylor College of Medicine. "But yoga has other benefits such as reducing stress and allowing individuals to breathe more easily."

Yoga strengthens bones and muscles and improves posture and overall health and vitality.

"The best part of yoga is that you don't have to be in peak physical shape to do it,"

Dr. Goodrick said. "That makes it ideal for seniors who might not otherwise exercise."

Courtesy of Baylor College of Medicine

Until recently, the best you could do once you got the flu was to crawl into bed, treat your symptoms, keep your fever under control and try to ride out your bout with the flu. Most cases of flu last from one to five days, but the flu can linger for two weeks or more.

"Now we have several medications that actually kill the flu virus once you get the flu," said Dr. Philip C. Johnson, professor of medicine at The University of Texas Medical School at Houston. "But they need to be given within 48 hours of the beginning of flu symptoms, so contact your physician immediately as soon as symptoms arise."

The antiviral influenza medications currently available in the U.S. are:

* amantadine (trade names: Cerebramed, Infectoflu, Endantadine, Symmetrel, Tantron), approved for treatment of type A influenza in 1966;

* rimantadine (Flumadine), approved for treatment of type A influenza in 1993; and

* zanamivir (Relenza) and oseltamivir (Tamiflu), two newer medications approved in 1999 that treat type A and type B flu strains.

Courtesy of The University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston

A metabolic "glitch" could help explain why Mexican Americans are two to three times more likely to suffer from diabetes than their European American counterparts.

Researchers at Baylor College of Medicine have found that one of the body's basic metabolic responses to the hormone insulin, which is to turn off the production of glucose by the liver when a meal is consumed, is significantly reduced in Mexican Americans.

"We believe this could be one of the earliest markers of insulin resistance in Mexican Americans," said Dr. Ashok Balasubramanyam, Baylor assistant professor of medicine.

Insulin resistance, a condition in which body tissues become insensitive to the action of insulin, is responsible for 90 to 95 percent of all cases of diabetes in Mexican Americans.

Because this defect was found in completely healthy Mexican Americans who had no close relatives with diabetes, the researchers believe it is one of the factors that could be contributing to the high rates of Type 2 diabetes in this group as a whole.

"Knowing that this pathway is affected could help us identify the cause, such as a unique gene responsible for this disregulation, and lead to therapies and early lifestyle interventions that help at-risk Mexican Americans before the clinical symptoms of insulin resistance and diabetes appear," Dr. Balasubramanyam said.

Courtesy of Baylor College of Medicine

If you're the parent of a newborn, one all-important question you're asking is: "How soon will my baby sleep through the night?"

Dr. Richard J. Castriotta, associate professor of medicine at The University of Texas Medical School at Houston and director of the Memorial Hermann Hospital Sleep Disorders Center, recognizes that establishing a successful sleep routine for your infant is one of the major milestones in parenting.

The majority of infants sleep through the night around the age of six months. How long an infant lasts between feedings often determines his or her ability to sleep through the night. Most newborns need about 14 hours of sleep a day. This decreases to 12 hours a day from six months to 12 months.

"Young children need a lot of sleep and disrupted sleep is not very restful," said Dr. Castriotta. Infants and young children need the same quiet and cool environment as adults to achieve optimum rest. Sleep patterns for each child are different, with some children taking more frequent or longer naps than others.

"Prolonged crying may mean your infant has a problem," added Dr. Castriotta. "It's a good idea to briefly check your infant to ensure everything is okay. Sleeping habits may improve when your infant is ready for solid food and learns how to return to sleep with minor soothing attention from you. "

Courtesy of The University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston

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©2006 Texas Medical Center

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