Time to Quit: It’s the Great American Smokeout!

Ambitious Autism Study: Enrollment is beginning on the largest study undertaken to look at environmental and genetic risk factors for autism. The five-year study will involve 2,700 children and their families from around the US. “We hope this study will help us learn more about the factors that may lead to autism and other developmental disabilities, and how genes and the environment may affect child development,” said Lisa A. Croen, PhD, the study’s local principal investigator and an epidemiologist with Kaiser Permanente’s Division of Research in Oakland, Calif. “The results may also contribute to better services and treatments for affected children and to prevention strategies.”

Conjoined Twins Doing Well: Yurelia and Fiorella Rocha-Arias, 27-month-old twin girls from Costa Rica, survived a nine-hour surgery and are now separated. The riskiest part of the surgery on the formerly conjoined twins was clamping their hearts after separation, as they had been connected there. Their surgeon announced that, baring any complications, he expects the girls to live normal lives. The two are the ninth and tenth children in their family.

Health Scare for Nancy Grace: CNN anchor Nancy Grace, who gave birth prematurely earlier this month, is back in the hospital because developed pulmonary edema. Her husband reports that the new mother is now on medication and under observation, and is doing well. The new babies, John David and Lucy Elizabeth, are also continuing to do well and are, according to their dad, “out of the critical area”.