New Findings

Young children who stutter may be more emotionally sensitive and have greater difficulty regulating their feelings than children who don’t have the common speech problem, according to a new study by Vanderbilt University researchers. Some experts say the finding may offer new clues to treating the frustrating and sometimes disabling disorder.

Stuttering, characterized by the repetition or prolongation of words or the inability to start saying a word, affects about 3 million Americans and usually surfaces between the ages of 2 and 5. For reasons that are not well understood, the problem usually disappears by late childhood, especially in those who begin stuttering before their third birthdays. But in other cases, stuttering can persist into adulthood, causing serious social problems.

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Sleeping Without a Prescription

Whether meditating before bed or sipping a kava kava nightcap, more than 1.6 million Americans use some form of alternative medicine when they have trouble sleeping. In analyzing data from 31,000 Americans interviewed for the 2002 National Health Interview Survey, researchers found that nearly one-fifth of adults reported difficulty sleeping in the last 12 months, and of those, about 5 percent used complementary and alternative medicine to treat their sleeplessness. The majority of those who tried the therapies said they helped, with nearly half saying they helped “a great deal.”

Nearly 65 percent of people using alternative methods to help them sleep used “biological therapies,” such as herbs or supplements, and 39 percent used “mind-body therapies,” such as self-hypnosis, guided imagery or other relaxation techniques.

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