Community engagement was just one tool supporting the project's primary goal: to empower family physicians and their staff to act to increase immunization rates, specifically among adolescents.Supported by a three-year educational grant from the CDC, the project awarded individual grants to 20 practices.During the AAFP Adolescent Immunization Office Champions Project Conference, participants discussed successes and challenges they've encountered while trying to improve adolescent immunization rates during the three-year initiative .Projects have been running at each practice since April 2013 and are scheduled to conclude Aug. 31. And overall, each practice showed marked improvement in adolescent immunization rates, especially with the HPV vaccine.

AAFP News, June 23, 2015

They were full of promise, ability and drive.But because pain led them to OxyContin prescriptions, and those prescriptions led them to addiction, young athletes across the U.S. have increasingly turned to heroin with disastrous results, according to a special investigative report by Sports Illustrated. A researcher at the University of Michigan published a national study in 2013 that showed that by the time high school athletes were in their senior year, 11 percent will have used a narcotic pain reliever such as OxyContin or Vicodin-for non-medical purposes.

Lancaster Online, June 22, 2015

A new study offers more evidence that the advent of vaccines to fight human papillomavirus (HPV) could reduce cervical cancer in American women.While it's still too early to say that vaccines such as Gardasil and Cervarix are lowering cases of cervical cancer, the new study finds a recent decline in the number of young American women with cervical tissue changes that can lead to cancer.

Web MD, June 22, 2015

Adolescent boys who reported spending more sedentary time in front of a TV or computer screen had a lower bone mineral density than boys who were more physically active, according to research in BMJ Open.In a cross-sectional, population-based study of Norwegian boys and girls, researchers also found that the screen-time behavior of adolescent girls had no effect on their BMD.

Helio, June 17, 2015

Fewer than three doses of the bivalent human papillomavirus (HPV) vaccine may be sufficient to offer adequate protection against cervical HPV-16 and -18 infection, research published in The Lancet Oncology indicates."Our findings question the number of HPV vaccine doses truly needed to protect the majority of women against cervical cancer, and suggest that a one-dose schedule should be further evaluated", said the study's joint lead author Aim?e Kreimer (National Cancer Institute, Bethesda, Maryland, USA) in a press release.

Medical Net, June 17, 2015 

Pharmacy Practice: Immunizations Update in the Pediatric Population 

Along with questions about HPV, pharmacists must prepare to respond to parents' concerns regarding egg allergies and if vaccines cause autism. Correctly and empathetically answering may help parents embrace vaccinations as the most important method of protecting their children from preventable illnesses. Because of the recent outbreak of meningococcal disease serogroup B, pharmacists must be aware of recent FDA-approved vaccines. This article covers the updates and trends affecting pediatric immunizations and vaccinations, provides a cursory overview of Merck's December 2014 approval of Gardasil 9, addresses egg allergy and autism concerns regarding vaccines, and discusses various meningococcal vaccines.

Pharmacy Times, June 16, 2015 

"In male foetuses there is a big pulse of testosterone made by the testes between 10 and 14 weeks of gestation. And a lot of organs have a particular receptor for testosterone and will respond to that testosterone in a way that will make them more male."We found that the changes in the male foetuses are linked with liver cirrhosis while those in the female are linked with disorders of glucose metabolism," he said."The implications are that the foetal livers are already being programmed towards metabolic syndrome, i.e. obesity, cardiovascular disease and liver disease. It is likely that these changes might make these individuals more susceptible to these diseases in adulthood."

Herald Scotland, June 13, 2015 

The National Institutes of Health has awarded$146,684 to the University of California San Francisco to study whether the human papillomavirus (HPV) vaccine prevents HIV infection in "Indian men who have sex with men.""Several recent publications indicate that human papillomavirus (HPV) and/or HPV-related disease may play a role in acquisition of HIV infection, similar to other sexually transmitted infections (STIs)," the grant stated.

CNS News, June 12, 2015 

Online comments show support for HPV vaccine but misperceptions too 

There may be more support for HPV vaccination than you might expect, given the controversies that dogged the vaccine programs in their early days, a new study suggests.But it also found misinformation about the vaccines abounds. And it gives public health officials clues as to how to reframe the debate about vaccines that protect against cancer-causing human papillomaviruses.The research was done by scientists at Public Health Ontario who analyzed comments posted online in response to Canadian newspaper articles on HPV vaccine. It was published in the online journal PLoS One.

Alaska Highway News, June 10, 2015 

Autism spectrum disorder (ASD) is characterised by social impairments, communication difficulties and restricted, repetitive and stereotyped patterns of behaviour."The results imply that there may be an over representation of boys with autism, based on sex differences that affect all children," said principal investigator of the study Daniel Messinger, professor of psychology at University of Miami in the US.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) estimates that some 1.1 million people in the U.S. are living with human immunodeficiency virus, the virus that causes AIDS. About one case in six is undiagnozed.

While only about 4 percent of U.S. males have sex with other men, they represent about two-thirds of the country's new infections, according to the CDC.

Reuters, June 5, 2015 

Pesticides Linked to ADHD, Study Says

Research found greater exposure tied to more hyperactivity and impulsivity in boys

There's evidence -- but not proof -- of a link between a commonly used household pesticide and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) in children and young teens, according to a new study.Specifically, researchers found an association between exposure to pyrethroid pesticides and ADHD, as well as ADHD symptoms such as hyperactivity and impulsivity.The link between the pesticides and ADHD was stronger in boys than in girls, according to the findings published online in the journal Environmental Health.

Medline Plus, June 3, 2015

Since there are no national databases or registries, and no single study compiling and analyzing suicide deaths, attempts, and/or thoughts among college and university students, the data presented here are from sources that have been selected as the most comprehensive and up to date. In all  three studies, US college and university students had about half the rate of suicide per 100,000 people compared to a matched sample in the general population. Male students accounted for the majority of the 2 suicides and had about half the rate of suicide compared to males in the general population. The rates for female students did not differ much from those of same-age females in the general population.

Suicide Prevention Resource Center, 2014