Wakefield Leaves Thoughtful House

For parents like me, dealing with the severe part of the Autism spectrum, Dr. Wakefield's findings gave us hope and a reason for the chaos that no one else could explain. I have never meet him and probably never will, but nevertheless I will be forever in his debt. This witch hunt against a good doctor is disheartening and unfair. I am so very sad to hear he has resign from Thoughtful House Center for Children.

By Mary Ann Roser, statesman.com is.gd/8KsJK

Council, which regulates doctors in the U.K., found that Wakefield was dishonest and irresponsible in conducting research on children in England a dozen years ago. The panel also said Wakefield showed a "callous disregard" for children at his child's birthday party in 1999 when he had blood taken from them and paid them about $10 each. He later joked at a conference about the children being "paid for their discomfort."
Wakefield's 1998 work, published in The Lancet, a prestigious British medical journal, fueled a worldwide scare over vaccines and autism. The Lancet retracted the study earlier this month.
Thoughtful House would not answer questions about Wakefield's departure. By Thursday morning, he was removed from the center's staff list, and the center issued a statement when asked whether Wakefield had resigned.
"The needs of the children we serve must always come first," it said. "All of us at Thoughtful House are grateful to Dr. Wakefield for the valuable work he has done here. We fully support his decision to leave Thoughtful House in order to make sure that the controversy surrounding the recent findings of the General Medical Council does not interfere with the important work that our dedicated team of clinicians and researchers is doing on behalf of children with autism and their families. All of us at Thoughtful House continue to fight every day for the recovery of children with developmental disorders."
Wakefield, who is in his early 50s, helped draw musicians and other celebrities to the Thoughtful House, where he was said to be in charge of research.
Parents who brought their children to the clinic said they saw him as a persecuted hero whose staff helped their children improve. The parents said they believe in the theory he advanced in the Lancet paper — that some children might develop a form of autism and gastrointestinal disease from exposure to the combined measles-mumps-rubella vaccine.
Other researchers have widely disputed the theory. Mainstream practitioners also oppose many of the alternative treatments at Thoughtful House, including chelation — the use of chemicals to remove metals from the body.
Starting April 7 in England, Wakefield will go to the next level of hearings before the General Medical Council, which will decide whether he is guilty of serious professional misconduct and whether he should be sanctioned, which could include losing his medical license.
Wakefield does not have a U.S. medical license.
Last month, he told reporters outside the medical council's office in London, "The allegations against me and against my colleagues are both unfounded and unjust. I repeat, unfounded and unjust, and I invite anyone to examine the contents of these proceedings and come to their own conclusion."

A Petition to help Dr. Andrew Wakefield

"The Nigel Thomas Petition"
http://www.ipetitions.com/petition/gmc/

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• Doctor behind autism-vaccine scare censured (cbc.ca)

Lack of Empathy

Tonight I was reminded of the long road ahead for Mickie.

It was right before his bed time, when I noticed he had an accident on the carpet in his room. It's really no big deal to me, though I usually clean in the morning, I didn't want him to walk around in a dirty carpet. I got the shampooer out and proceeded to clean the area.

As I walked out of his room I stepped over the wet area of the carpet and as soon as I set foot on the tile floor I slipped and fell on my left knee. I screamed once, then just tried to breath slowly till the pain subsided, but I couldn't get up right away. I looked up and saw Mickie walking towards me, and he looked annoyed, but at first glance I thought he was sad because I was hurt, but instead, he just started pushing me to get up. I suppose he knows I don't belong on the hallway floor.

It was then that I was painfully reminded once again, that Mickie feels no empathy yet. I don't remember a time when he cried when someone cried or got hurt. I understand that this is an autistic trade, but I have heard of cases where they develop empathy and in time my hope is that Mickie will too.

Emergency Medicine at It's Best

Last Friday afternoon, as I was walking back in the house from the back porch, where I had just started a load of laundry, I heard Mickie cry. He was in the hallway that leads to my bedroom and making the eeeeee sound that usually follows pain. There was blood running down the right side of his face! I immediately imagined the worse. I thought he had cracked his skull open and I couldn't tell where all the blood was coming from. I embraced him and screamed for my daughter who was towards the front of the house.

I didn't want to look! I've fainted at the site of blood before, so she and her big brother looked for me. It was a cut on his left eyebrow, only I didn't see it, because Mickie's hair is very long.

I called the paramedics, who eased my worries about the wound not being as serious as I first thought. The ambulance drove him to the hospital and I rode in the back with him. Mickie seemed more worried about being in a strange vehicle then about the cut on his face. He was taken to San Antonio Hospital in Upland, Cafifornia, where upon arrival an older looking nurse greeted him with a cute brown plush dog. He took it and made it his own right away, but continued to fuzz and cry. A bracellet with his name was placed in his left arm, which he proceeded to rip off.

We were then taken to a private room, in the new emergency wing. A nurse walked in and asked me if he was allergic to anything-a trick question for me, because Michael is not allergic on paper, but very sencitive to milk protein and his body does not flush out heavy metals very well. She asked me if I wanted him to have a Tetanus shot, to which I replied.........

His autism is directly linked to the vaccines he recieved as a baby and the last time he was vaccinated, was in 2000. He can't get rid of metals. Does it contain Mercury?

She said....Oh this one probably does.

She walked out and a few minutes later a male nurse walken in with her and decided they would go old school and stich him up without putting him under anestheshia, which sounded great to me.

A few minutes later the doctor walked in and she said to him something like......Just for the record she is refusing a tenanus shot, so there's no need to ask her again.

While they got ready I heard them talking about how they didn't understand why they can't just stitch kids up without putting them to sleep or waiting for ex-rays and keeping them there for hours.

The male nurse rapped Mickie in a sheet folded in 4 and held him down, while the female nurse held his head. I held his legs, so he didn't push up-he has strong legs. The doctor proceded to apply a local anesthetic, then he put in the three stitches, which he tripple knotted to make sure Mickie didn't pull them out.

I couldn't help but noticed how much they enjoyed praticing medicine.
They patched my special boy old school and sent him home within an hour-It doesn't get any better then that.

Later that day when I told my mom how he was treated-she releid to me, that San Antonio Hospital was ranked within the best 100 hospitals in the US. It was easy to understand how they had earned that status. A thankyou note is on it's way to the nurses and doctors at the emergercy room.

CIVILIAN HAZ-MAT TEAM TO PROTEST FLU SHOTS

	For Immediate Release Contact: Amy Carson (828) 776- 0082 Karey Williams (312) 479-5305

ATLANTA – As millions of Americans remain concerned about government-recommended flu shots, dozens of citizens dressed in full haz-mat suits will gather Wednesday, October 21, at the entrance to the Centers For Disease Control (CDC) to greet arriving members of the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices. Those advisors are meeting, Wednesday, starting at 8:00am. The event is designed to dramatize the toxicity of the H1N1 vaccine and Flu shot as they meet to discuss the H1N1 vaccine.

“We want the public to see just how toxic these vaccines are. If a vaccine vile is spilled, a haz-mat team is required for clean-up and the vaccine must be disposed of as biohazardous waste. Since when has the human body been deemed a toxic waste dump?” asks Karey Williams of Moms Against Mercury.

These protesters believe government health officials have not told all they know about the potential hazards of the H1N1 vaccine and the seasonal flu shot which they are also recommending. Officials do not deny that many flu vaccines will contain Thimerosal, a mercury based preservative, and a number of other toxins including ethylene glycol (antifreeze), formaldehyde, phenol, and antibiotics.

Thimerosal has been linked to neurodevelopmental disorders. Government-mandated warnings known as Material Safety Data Sheets warn of mild to severe mental retardation in unborn infants exposed in utero, yet flu shots are recommended by the CDC to all pregnant women.

According to Dr. Joseph Mercola, board-certified family physician, H1N1 vaccines made by Novartis and GlaxoSmithKline both contain immune system boosters known as squalene. One of them, known as MF-59, has yet to be approved by the FDA and has been linked to the Gulf War Syndrome.

“ Two studies out this month point to evidence that mercury in vaccines causes neurological damage. One found 1 in 71 vaccinated children born in the 1990’s, have received an autism diagnosis. Another study discovered brain damage in newborn monkeys who were given a mercury-containing Hepatitis B vaccine,” says Scott Laster of SafeMinds.

The protest starts at 7:30am on Wednesday, October 21, 2009, at the gates of the CDC at 1600 Clifton Road, as the participants for the ACIP meeting arrive.

A press conference will follow at 10:00.

Amy M. Carson, Co-Founder
Moms Against Mercury
http://momsagainstmercury.org/
828-776-0082

The Object of His Obsession

One of the things that an Autism diagnosis takes from a home, is the sense of normalcy. I remember, that it took me about a year to come to the realization, that life as I knew it, was over and that there was no turning back.

For the past two years or so, cooking has become a struggle. Mickie would cry for as long as I was preparing his sisters food. He wanted everything that I was cooking, but the couldn't eat any of it, an account that his diet is very restricted-SCD,GFCF, etc.

By the end of every evening my head would be hurting and his sister and I were unable to enjoy our meal. For the last eight months I gave up cooking all together.

For months, Mickie had been placing random items behind the refrigerator, Anything from his blankets, to his shoes, backpack, lunch pail, plates, spoons and then it escalated to the burners and grids from the stove. He had started with little things like trash and spoons, but as with all obsessions, a little was not enough for him and he soon started moving the refrigerator forward in order to fit bigger items.

He would put things behind the refrigerator throughout the day-one thing here, one thing there. He then continued in the middle of the night. I remember waking up to the noise of items trickling down the back of the refrigerator and not even my Shakespeare and Hemingway books were spared.

Every morning after I sent him off to school, I would start the tedious task of sorting through the vast amounts of stuff, stuck behind the fridge, which would take me anywhere from thirty minutes to 3 hours.

One morning in particular, I walked into the kitchen area, to find my frail looking boy carrying the Microwave oven across the room towards the table, so I took it out to the garage area.

Fresh flowers and plants behind the sink were now a memory, as they would end up torn up, all over the floor.

Having a trashcan, became impossible, as he would turn it upside down and many times eat food items that he found in it.

My mom had suggested a wall around the kitchen with a door I could lock. I toiled with the idea for the passed year and finally decided to try it.

With nothing more then a wall, the object of Mickie's obsession, was eliminated. The kitchen is now a separate room. After years of struggling with this issue, it has been solved and it didn't take psychotic medication nor biomedical interventions, nor hours of research on the Internet.

I remember wondering that now that he had no access to the kitchen, what would he go after next? I guess I will worry about crossing that bridge, when I get to it. In the mean time, I'm enjoying a much calmer Mickie and the fresh flowers in my kitchen again.