Things in the library 25th June...

 Things back in the library... 

(C) Gill Kaye 2021

Me!  After a wonderful break in Cornwall and calling in on friends and relations along the way - with frequent lateral flow tests! It was wonderful to be welcomed to Cornwall by a fly past from the Red Arrows 30 mins after we had arrived...right over head...as this view from our chalet shows! 

Things about young people with cancer...

Teenage Cancer Trust has revealed recently that more than a third of young cancer patients who felt they needed it, have had no, or reduced access to a psychologist in the six months prior to being surveyed, due to inadequate access in parts of the UK. The ‘#NotOK: Filling the gaps in mental health support for young people with cancer’ report, published today to mark the launch of the charity’s #NotOK campaign, also highlights the frustrations of psychologists who feel like they are ‘firefighting’ due to the high demand on ‘limited resource’. 87% of psychologists surveyed think current national provisions for specialist psychological support for teenagers and young adults with cancer is insufficient to meet their specific needs. Teenage Cancer Trust warns that young cancer patients could face depression, anxiety and other mental health conditions well into their adult lives unless UK Governments provide protected funding for high quality support that is available from the point of diagnosis.

Things about fathers... 

The Fatherhood Institute published a report 'Lockdown Fathers: the untold story'.

Their recommendations include:

During lockdowns fathers in the UK almost doubled the time they had been spending on childcare, grew in confidence, learned new skills and built stronger relationships with their babies and children.

All children should benefit, in learning and love, from the support that time with a confident, well-supported dad can bring. As we build back from this pandemic, we owe it to them to make this happen.

Fathers want to keep contributing, but shift patterns dictated to them at the last minute, long commutes, and long and inflexible working hours can get in the way. 

Following on from this is their campaign ‘Time with Dad’ to preserve the ‘lockdown positives’ of fathers spending more time with their children and supporting their learning, development and education. They want the UK to build back from the pandemic in ways that take account of fathers’ importance – and the limits on their time. They are looking for employers, schools, dads, mums, anyone who shares their vision, and might be interested in helping them turn it into a reality.

Things about air quality... 

Ambient air pollution is produced by sources including traffic, coal-fired power plants, hydraulic fracturing, agricultural production, and forest fires. It consists of primary pollutants generated by combustion and secondary pollutants formed in the atmosphere from precursor gases. Air pollution causes and exacerbates climate change, and climate change worsens health effects of air pollution. Infants and children are uniquely sensitive to air pollution, because their organs are developing and they have higher air per body weight intake. Health effects linked to air pollution include not only exacerbations of respiratory diseases but also reduced lung function development and increased asthma incidence. Additional outcomes of concern include preterm birth, low birth weight, neurodevelopmental disorders, IQ loss, pediatric cancers, and increased risks for adult chronic diseases.  This policy (from the American Academy of Pediatrics and available to you with an NHS Athens login) reviews both short- and long-term health consequences of ambient air pollution, especially in relation to developmental exposures. 

Things about fever... 

In the press today is news that Emergency departments across the UK are seeing very high numbers of young children for this time of the year because of a rise in infections usually seen in the winter.  RCPCH, RECM and RCGP are issuing advice for parents and carers concerned about fever in their child. One emergency paediatrician described the situation as “winter in June”. The Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health (RCPCH) has heard from paediatric emergency medicine doctors around the country describing pressures on their emergency department (ED) from an increase in children being brought in with mild fever by anxious parents. Many parents have not seen fever in their child – particularly if they were born during lockdown – and are taking them to A&E rather than seeking help at pharmacies, their GP, NHS 111 or online.

Things about mental health... 

Children and young people will benefit from a cash injection to mental health services which includes addressing the increasing demand for the treatment of eating disorders. An extra £40 million has been allocated to address the COVID impact on children and young people’s mental health and enhance services across the country. One way the additional money will be spent is to support ensuring the right type of beds are in the right places, or that alternatives to admission are in place, supporting parts of the country that have more challenges in their range of bed capacity. Across the country £10 million capital funding is being used to provide extra beds at units which provide care for young people with the most complex needs, including eating disorders, as well as £1.5 million to ensure there are additional facilities for children under 13. This funding is on top of £79 million made available by the government to support children and young people’s mental health in the community, including via increased access to crisis and eating disorder services, and new mental health support teams being rolled out – by April 2023, there will be around 400 teams covering 35% of the country.

Things to visit... 

It is great to be able to visit galleries again so I am looking forward to seeing Sheffield-born John Hoyland, one of Britain’s leading abstract artists, in this new exhibition opening at the Millennium Gallery. John Hoyland is renowned for his bold use of colour and inventive forms. In a career spanning over 50 years, his tireless innovation pushed the boundaries of abstract painting and cemented his reputation as one of the most inventive British artists of the 20th century. To commemorate the 10th anniversary of his passing, John Hoyland: The Last Paintings brings together large-scale canvases, some of which have never been publicly displayed before, made during the last eight years of the artist’s life. Sat 3 Jul - Sun 10 Oct 2021 Millennium Gallery. 

Things fishy...

On our one venture into St Ives (predictably they had a COVID outbreak following the G7 summit) we ate in a wonderful little restaurant recommended on one of Rick Stein's programmes. All the fish we ate in Cornwall was wonderful, of course, so today my recipe is  Hake in a Chorizo, Tomato & Olive Sauce.

Things in the library 22 June...

Things to help you sleep...
The University of Manchester yesterday unveiled new technology which could revolutionize displays in televisions, smartphones, projectors, computer screens and tablets. The researchers – who published their European Research Council funded study in the journal Sleep– say the technology could also mean that night workers are less likely to fall asleep at a computer. The device - which the researchers call a ‘melanopic display’ allows users to control the alerting effects of screen use and can also enhance the visual appearance of screens, say the team. The technology allows the amount of cyan light in images to be altered while keeping colours true. Conventional display is made up of red green and blue primary colours, which match up with three types of photoreceptors in our eyes. The team added a fourth ‘primary colour’ (cyan) which controls melanopsin cells in the eye which detect light, normally in the daytime. When the cyan light was turned up, the eleven participants in the trial felt more alert; when turned down, they felt more sleepy.

Things about sepsis...
Children’s immune systems could hold the key to preventing life-threatening infections and sepsis, a new study has revealed. The ground-breaking research conducted by an international team of scientists at the University of Sheffield and Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, has identified the key response that children use to control infections - making them resilient to many severe infections and sepsis. The new study, which is the first of its kind, has helped scientists identify key differences in cell-pathway activity in the blood of septic adults and children. Establishing the pathways that help prevent sepsis is a powerful new way to discover drugs for intervention against sepsis and provides direct insight into potential cures for the disease. The findings of the study are now being used to design drugs for research into prevention of other pathological diseases including Alzheimer’s.

Things about fathers...
Father involvement with children has increased in recent decades.‍ Research has demonstrated the positive contributions fathers make to their children’s health and well-being.‍ For instance, father involvement has been linked to decreased risk of prematurity and infant mortality.‍ It has also been associated with the father’s parenting confidence, positive father-child interactions, future father involvement,10 and healthier coparenting relationships.‍ Father involvement benefits fathers themselves; men who are involved with their children report greater physical and mental health.‍
Despite the accumulating evidence for the benefits of father involvement,
few early parent education programs have focused on including fathers. In this systematic review, they examined father-inclusive perinatal parent education
programs in the United States as they relate to a range of father outcomes.

Things about eating patterns...

Childhood nutrition is important in optimising growth, development and future health. This study compared dietary intakes of Australian children aged 4–8 years with

(i) Australian Guide to Healthy Eating (AGHE) food group recommendations and 

(ii) age‐specific Nutrient Reference Values (NRVs), in addition to 

(iii) describing food group intakes of children meeting key NRVs. 

Significant discrepancies existed between contemporary dietary patterns of Australian children and national recommendations. 

Things about sugar...

Children in England are on track to consume around 4,800 cubes of sugar by the end of the year, more than double the maximum recommendation. Children aged 4 to 10 years should have no more than the equivalent of 5 to 6 cubes of sugar each day, but are consuming on average 13 cubes. This means they are on track to consume around 4,800 cubes of sugar by the end of the year, more than double the maximum recommendation. Sugary soft drinks remain one of the main contributors of free sugars to children’s diets, more than ice cream and puddings combined. Apart from fruit juice, which counts as one of our 5 A Day, the other main sources of sugar in children’s diets are:

• Sugary soft drinks (including squashes, juice drinks, energy drinks, cola and other fizzy drinks) 10%
• Buns, cakes, pastries and fruit pies 10%
• Sugars, including table sugar, preserves and sweet spreads 9%
• Biscuits 9%
• Breakfast cereals 8%
• Chocolate confectionery 7%
• Sugar confectionery 7%
• Yoghurt, fromage frais and other dairy desserts 6%
• Ice cream 5%
• Puddings 4%

Things about child mortality...

England and Sweden are both prosperous Western European countries with universal social security and healthcare, so one might expect mortality rates to be similar: not so. A major study in The Lancet highlights how badly England is doing compared with Sweden  The authors looked at national data for mortality between 2003 and 2012 for children aged 2 days to 4 years (deaths on days 0 and 1 were excluded because of possible discrepancies in live birth vs stillbirth classification). They identified a range of diagnostic and clinical data that were collected universally, and could be meaningfully compared between the two countries. Their interpretation is that excess child mortality in England compared with Sweden was largely explained by the unfavourable distribution of birth characteristics in England. Socioeconomic factors contributed to these differences through associations with adverse birth characteristics and increased mortality after 1 month of age. Policies to reduce child mortality in England could have most impact by reducing adverse birth characteristics through improving the health of women before and during pregnancy and reducing socioeconomic disadvantage.

Things to eat...

Well the exciting news is that after several months I now have a means of cooking food without having to use the microwave...just in time for a heatwave when we will want to eat salads! So as I have spinach leaves growing in the garden I think I will try this seedy spinach salad out....and I will need the cooker to fry the seeds.