Autism

Medical Topic of the Day:  Autism

Off The Top of My Head: I Do not know much about it but I know one thing for certain.  Standard vaccinations do not cause Autism.  I have seen so many children with permanent deficits for life because their parents read something online about vaccines causing autism and now think they are experts in 60 plus years of vaccination therapy.

I don't want to go on a rant so I will just ask you if you know why the supposed study linking vaccines to autism is bullshit?  Look it up.  The physician responsible was performing an illegal uncontrolled study of the friends of his own child.  He was taking bribes from a law firm in  Europe who was going to use the study to levy a law suit against the pharmaceutical industries.  The mother of all lawsuits.  Like trying to represent everyone in the world whom had ever received a vaccine.

It's always about money.

But lets get into what autism is and how it effects people.

Off the Top Of My Head:  Technically referred to a pervasive developmental disorder, Autism presents within the first 3 years of a human's life.  The disorder directly effects the development of social and communication skills.  It is more common in the male sex and there is no known cause for autism but most experts believe it is probably a combination of unknown factors.  Genetic factors seem to have a lot to do with autism as identical twins are much more likely to both have autism than fraternal twins or bothers and sisters.

Symptoms can include any number of behavior that difficulties with social interaction or communication could create.  Everything from unusual attachment to objects to awkward social interaction.  Communication attempts may be bizarre or seemingly nonsensical like trying to communicate with gestures without speaking or the inability to recognize common objects.

Socially awkward?  Vanilla Ice must
be autism's poster boy. Word to
your mother.

Other symptoms effecting sensory information can be heightened or diminished.  For example, it is common for children to startle at loud noises.  Children with autism may not startle and therefore not make adrenaline which would conflict with a normal fight or flight response.  They can also have heightened or diminished aspects of any of their sensory inputs.  Perhaps they feel little pain or are extremely sensitive to smells.

Autism is relatively rare but really not rare enough.  It is estimated by some experts that 1% of the population has autism or autistic traits.  That is 1 in one hundred, 10 in a thousand or 10,000 in a million.  There are 300 million people in the United States.  That is 3 million people with autism.

Autism is part of a broader spectrum of disorders mentioned above as pervasive developmental disorders.  Due to the nature of these disorders and the fact that although they have common traits but are unique to the individual they are difficult to treat.  Autism as a whole is poorly understood and hotly debated.

One thing that all experts agree on is that Jenny McCarthy is an idiot and her child probably has autism caused by the amount of bleach in his mother's hair during pregnancy.  Hah, hah, not really but Jenny McCarthy is still a moron.  Seriously, why would you take medical advice from the hostess of Singled Out?  She doesn't even have a college education.

Really?  You took medical advice from this person?
Also pooping on a toilet is not hot, Jenny, it's gross.
Are you sure YOU don't cause autism?

Anyways, I am done for the night. Special shout-out to Beck for the topic suggestion.

Quest To 180:
11 miles on my bike cause I am awesome like that.

The MAN:
Feeling better but I have not gone out in a long time.  Anybody wanna hang?