A generation ago, fewer than 5 percent of girls started puberty before the age of 8; today, that percentage has more than doubled. Early puberty is not just a matter of physical transformation—it’s also deeply psychological, with a myriad of effects that can put a girl at higher risk for behavioral problems and long-term health challenges. In this reassuring and empowering guide, Louise Greenspan, MD, and Julianna Deardorff, PhD—two leading experts on the root causes and potential consequences of early puberty in girls—deliver vital advice on how to prevent and manage early puberty. They explain surprising triggers—from excess body fat to hormone-mimicking chemicals to emotional stressors in a girl’s home and family life—and offer highly practical strategies, including how to limit exposure to certain ingredients in personal care and household products, which foods to eat and which to avoid, ways to improve a child’s sleep routine to promote healthy biology, and more. The New Puberty is an engaging, urgently needed road map to helping young girls move forward with confidence, ensuring their future well-being.
Adolescenceâ€"beginning with the onset of puberty and ending in the mid-20sâ€"is a critical period of development during which key areas of the brain mature and develop. These changes in brain structure, function, and connectivity mark adolescence as a period of opportunity to discover new vistas, to form relationships with peers and adults, and to explore one's developing identity. It is also a period of resilience that can ameliorate childhood setbacks and set the stage for a thriving trajectory over the life course. Because adolescents comprise nearly one-fourth of the entire U.S. population, the nation needs policies and practices that will better leverage these developmental opportunities to harness the promise of adolescenceâ€"rather than focusing myopically on containing its risks. This report examines the neurobiological and socio-behavioral science of adolescent development and outlines how this knowledge can be applied, both to promote adolescent well-being, resilience, and development, and to rectify structural barriers and inequalities in opportunity, enabling all adolescents to flourish.
More children born today will survive to adulthood than at any time in history. It is now time to emphasize health and development in middle childhood and adolescence--developmental phases that are critical to health in adulthood and the next generation. Child and Adolescent Health and Development explores the benefits that accrue from sustained and targeted interventions across the first two decades of life. The volume outlines the investment case for effective, costed, and scalable interventions for low-resource settings, emphasizing the cross-sectoral role of education. This evidence base can guide policy makers in prioritizing actions to promote survival, health, cognition, and physical growth throughout childhood and adolescence.
The publication of this volume at this time appears particularly auspi cious. Biological, psychological, and social change is greater during the pubertal years than at any other period since infancy. While the past two decades have witnessed a virtual explosion of productive research on the first years of life, until recently research on adolescence, and particularly on puberty and early adolescence, has lagged substantially behind. This book provides encouraging evidence that things are changing for the better. Considered separately, the individual chapters in this book include important contributions to our growing knowledge of the biological mechanisms involved in pubertal onset and subsequent changes, as well as of the psychological and social aspects of these changes, both as con sequences and determinants. In this regard, the book clearly benefits from the breadth of disciplines represented by the contributors, includ ing developmental endocrinology, adolescent medicine, pediatrics, psy chology, and sociology, among others.
Written with the busy practice in mind, this book delivers clinically focused, evidence-based gynecology guidance in a quick-reference format. It explores etiology, screening, tests, diagnosis, and treatment for a full range of gynecologic health issues. The coverage includes the full range of gynecologic malignancies, reproductive endocrinology and infertility, infectious diseases, urogynecologic problems, gynecologic concerns in children and adolescents, and surgical interventions including minimally invasive surgical procedures. Information is easy to find and absorb owing to the extensive use of full-color diagrams, algorithms, and illustrations. The new edition has been expanded to include aspects of gynecology important in international and resource-poor settings.
The pituitary, albeit a small gland, is known as the "master gland" of the endocrine system and contributes to a wide spectrum of disorders, diseases, and syndromes. Since the publication of the second edition of The Pituitary, in 2002, there have been major advances in the molecular biology research of pituitary hormone production and action and there is now a better understanding of the pathogenesis of pituitary tumors and clinical syndromes resulting in perturbation of pituitary function. There have also been major advances in the clinical management of pituitary disorders. Medical researchers and practitioners now better understand the morbidity and mortality associated with pituitary hormone hyposecretion and hypersecretion. Newly developed drugs, and improved methods of delivering established drugs, are allowing better medical management of acromegaly and prolactinoma. These developments have improved the worldwide consensus around the definition of a "cure" for pituitary disease, especially hormone hypersecretion, and hence will improve the success or lack of success of various forms of therapy. It is therefore time for a new edition of The Pituitary. The third edition will continue to be divided into sections that summarize normal hypothalamic-pituitary development and function, hypothalamic-pituitary failure, and pituitary tumors; additional sections will describe pituitary disease in systemic disorders and diagnostic procedures, including imaging, assessment of the eyes, and biochemical testing. The first chapter will be completely new – placing a much greater emphasis on physiology and pathogenesis. Two new chapters will be added on the Radiation and Non-surgical Management of the Pituitary and Other Pituitary Lesions. Other chapters will be completely updated and many new author teams will be invited. The second edition published in 2002 and there have been incredible changes in both the research and clinical aspects of the pituitary over the past 8 years – from new advances in growth hormones to pituitary tumor therapy. - Presents a comprehensive, translational source of information about the pituitary in one reference work - Pituitary experts (from all areas of research and practice) take readers from the bench research (cellular and molecular mechanism), through genomic and proteomic analysis, all the way to clinical analysis (histopathology and imaging) and new therapeutic approaches - Clear presentation by endocrine researchers of the cellular and molecular mechanisms underlying pituitary hormones and growth factors as well as new techniques used in detecting lesions (within the organ) and other systemic disorders - Clear presentation by endocrinologists and neuroendocrine surgeons of how imaging, assessment of the eyes, and biochemical testing can lead to new therapeutic approaches