-DK
News & Reviews
NEW BOOKS
Measuring Treatment Progress: An Outcome Study Guide
by Patricia L. Owen
Guide for treatment providers interested in designing and conducting outcome studies for their programs.
-www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1568389825/top100
Cognitive Neuroscience: A Functionalist Perspective
by Roy H. Smith
An overview of to this field for the layperson. Reviews studies in perception, memory, motor function, language, executive function, emotion, and consciousness.
-www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0761823530/top100
The Emotional Revolution: Transform Your Life Using the New Science of Feeling
by Norman E. Rosenthal
Affective neuroscience and its impact on psychology, psychiatry, and everyday life.
-www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0806524472/top100
Adult AD/HD: A Reader-Friendly Guide to Identifying...
by Michele Novotni, Thomas A. Whiteman
Guide for self-identification of ADHD in adults
-www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1576833577/top100
Traumatic Brain Injury: Methods for ..Forensic Neuropsychiatric Assessment
by Robert P. Granacher
Guides practitioners in methods for evaluating traumatic brain injury in adults and children and in important elements of forensic brain injury assessment (detecting deception, legal concepts of causation, damage)
-www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0849314291/top100
Exploratory Analysis and Data Modeling in Functional Neuroimaging
by Friedrich T. Sommer (Editor)
A survey of theoretical and computational approaches to neuroimaging, including inferential, exploratory, and causal methods of data analysis.
-www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0262194813/top100
JOURNAL PAPERS
Paradoxical autonomic response to mental tasks in autism.
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Some autistic subjects are more stressed during 'rest' than during mechanical or repetitive mental tasks, as indicated by their autonomic response.
Caffeinated beverages and decreased seizure control.
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Excessive caffeine ingestion from tea can lead to increase seizure frequency. Decaffeinated beverages is the solution.
Neural correlates of traumatic recall in PTSD
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PTSD patients and controls had differential blood flow patterns during emotional recall in amygdala, insula and medial prefrontal cortex.
EEG-based communication and control: speed-accuracy relationships.
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Continual online gain adaptation could increase the speed and accuracy of EEG-based cursor control.
Hypothalamic regulation of sleep and arousal.
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Mutually-inhibitory interactions between sleep-promoting and arousal-promoting systems, focused in and near the hypothalamus, are hypothesized to form a sleep-wake switch.
Neuroanatomical circuits modulating fear and anxiety behaviors.
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Anxiety disorders are heterogeneous, both symptomatically and neuroanatomically.
EEG signatures of attentional and cognitive default modes
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Alpha oscillations signal a neural baseline with "inattention" whereas beta rhythms index spontaneous cognitive operations during conscious rest.
Short-term alcohol and drug treatment outcomes predict long-term outcome.
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There is a clear association between short-term and long- term treatment success.
Anatomic brain abnormalities in monozygotic twins discordant for ADHD
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MZ twins with ADHD have smaller caudate volumes than their unaffected co-twins, which provides further support for striatal models of ADHD pathophysiology.
Time course of EEG background activity level before spontaneous awakening in the second semester of human life.
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Infant sleep EEGs refect changes in activation levels prior to waking. If we could just condition them to suppress these changes, parents of newborns could get a good night's sleep.
Are the electroencephalograms mainly rhythmic?
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Another new QEEG method to quantify periodicity- period specific average -indicates that EEGs are mostly aperiodic, generally and locally (peaks).
Upcoming CoursesA Pathway to Brain Regulation - Neurofeedback helps improve neuroregulation. It's used by health care professionals for ADHD, depression, anxiety disorders, LD, mood disorders, and behavioral problems. This 4-day course, Neurofeedback in a Clinical Practice, provides the basis for using Neurofeedback clinically. - *28 CEs
Our course is a hands-on experience right from the start. Attendees consistently say this format is a very good way to learn Neurofeedback. "Neurofeedback should be viewed as one of the three essential or primary forms of intervention - psychotherapy, psychopharmacology, and Neurofeedback. In my experience, Neurofeedback is every bit as important and powerful as the other two forms of treatment." - Dr. Laurence Hirshberg of Brown University Medical School, a psychologist specializing in Developmental Disorders and Autism. Contact Karie Kramer, our training coordinator, for more information 818-789-3456 ext 847 or see www.eegspectrum.com/Training *EEG Spectrum International, Inc. is approved by the APA to offer continuing education to psychologists. ESII maintains responsibility for the program. |
Conferences for Neurofeedback Clinicians & Researchers | ||
|---|---|---|
| CONFERENCE | LOCATION | DATES |
| Winter Brain - http://www.brainmeeting.com/ | Palm Springs CA | Feb 6-10 |
Excitation vs Inhibition: Continuing saga of my neuroendocrine model of autism
What may happen in autism is that the testosterone production, which spikes during 2nd trimester before birth, and in the 2nd and 3rd months after birth, does not shut down, or whatever modulates it never gains efficiency.
Lacking MD's encouragement, I considered what would be the effect of over-the-counter estrogen replacement therapy. Was there any condition where boys are treated with estrogen, and at what doses and what possible side effects must be monitored. An endocrinologist could probably rattle these off in seconds, but without physician assistance I had to become a novice endocrinologist. I discovered two conditions where young male children are treated with estrogen: phimosis, a penile morphology problem, and precocious puberty, when a prepubescent boy (as young as an infant) starts sprouting pubic hair and other signs of impending puberty. That autism is not directly linked with precocious puberty shows that it isn't the amount of testosterone that causes autism, that sexually dimorphisizes the brain to the extreme; it's what the brain (or mind) does with this excess, its inability to counter or control it, with comparable estrogen, presumably (so I believe).
As I studied the effect of elevated testosterone levels in infant brain development, my wife commented how my autistic son is the only one of my three sons to have ever peed on us while diaper changing. As he is the oldest, I thought it was normal, and wanted to invent a "penis sheath" to protect other unsuspecting parents. We presumed it was a common occurrence until the next boy appeared, without this problem. Stress urinary incontinence, I uncovered in the literature, appears to be due to a lack of estrogen -- though treating it with estrogen has been greeted with mixed results. I believe the fundamental failure to feel one's body is due to the lack of estrogen -- estrogen promotes a sense of bodily representation, among other things (like verbal memory and other verbal functions, as witnessed in estrogen replacement therapy).
Another condition of extreme testosterone in infancy for boys is macrophallus -- an enlarged penis. Macropenis, despite whatever benefits it might provide outside of the L.A. porn industry, is associated with psychomotor retardation with autistic features. More evidence, however slight, linking high testosterone levels with autism.
I made a joke in the last newsletter that if my son starting throwing like a girl, I've given him too much estrogen. Well, I wanted to find out the true side effects of estrogen "replacement" therapy in boys. There are two: growing breasts (gynecomastia) and increase in growth trajectory. The former is not too troubling and reversible, the later is not the best but reasonably benign, better than a lifetime of autism.
As it turns out, as I finally convinced myself the proper course of action, that course was interrupted (or delayed) by professional help, by someone who is not an amateur endocrinologist. Our MD referred us to a pediatric endocrinologist, who will take the case under the rubric of precocious puberty -- which I hope soon falls into the category of autism cure. My other two sons also had their testosterone levels tested by our MD and both fall below 10 nmol/dl -- the normal range for 2 to 9 year olds-- nonetheless the lab, continuing a theme of obstacles, will not provide the exact numbers, so I cannot be too confident. As for reversing the effect insufficient estrogen and elevated testosterone has played on my autistic son's mind, we will know more next month, and the month after that, etc. -DK