Heritage Behavioral Services Blog

An electron microscope was used to image synapses in the mouse brain. Sleep makes our brain more efficient. NIMH study suggest that sleep streamlines neural connections, or synapses, making them more efficient. It likely restores homeostatic balance to energy resources spent by learning during wakefulness, say the researchers. Read more......

Reposte:.... A woman who spent 30 years of her life believing that she suffered from cerebral palsy, only to learn that she had in fact been misdiagnosed and almost all of her symptoms could be cured with just one pill, insists she feels no resentment or anger about her doctor’s life-changing error. Jean  Sharon Abbott Jean Sharon Abbott 38, from Plymouth, Minnesota, was told she had spastic diplegia, a form of cerebral palsy, when she was just four-years-old. But after three decades of suffering from muscle spasms, weakness, near immobility, as well as undergoing painful surgical procedures, she learned at the age of 33 that she actually had dopa-responsive dystonia (DRD), a rare, yet treatable, muscle disorder............ .........And while Jean realized that there are so many things she wants to try now that she can, she still insists that she doesn't have any regrets about receiving her diagnosis so late in life. As someone who believes that everythi...

Parents of children with autism are more likely to remain in the workforce if they have access to Medicaid waiver services for their kids, new research suggests. In a study looking at over 17,000 children on the spectrum, researchers found a link between the availability of waivers and parent employment. Read more........                   

More than 10,000 children will participate in study of brain, social, emotional, and cognitive development. Adolescence is a time of extraordinary physical, emotional, and intellectual growth as well as a changing social environment full of new challenges and opportunities that help shape a young person’s adult identity, health and well-being. Read more......

Human Brain Cortex Researchers have mapped 180 distinct areas in our brain’s outer mantle, or cortex – more than twice the number previously known. They have also developed software that automatically detects the “fingerprint” of each of these areas in an individual’s brain scans.  Funded by the National Institutes of Health through its  Human Connectome Project   (HCP), this software correctly mapped the areas by incorporating data from multiple non-invasive brain imaging measures that corroborated each other. Read more.....  

by Jane Hammond, Daily Press/TNS HAMPTON, Va. — The U.S. Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights said this month that it determined Hampton City Schools retaliated against a parent who was advocating for her daughter, who was receiving special education services at a school in the division.   Read more....

by Michelle Diament Spending on institutional care across the country is being outpaced by funding for community-based services, according to a new analysis of Medicaid allocations for long-term care services during fiscal year 2014. (Thinkstock) Of the $152 billion spent on long-term care services across the country during the 2014 fiscal year, 53 percent was directed to community-based services, according to a new report produced for the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services. Read more......