Minimizing Parental Health Risks: What Parents Need to Know PART 1 of 2 by Laurette Janak

In 2006, a study found magnesium deficiency in a group of parents who have children with autism. In Spring 2008 autism researcher Dr. Jill James and colleagues published their findings of elevated homocysteine and low glutathione in a similar group of parents. This workshop will explain, in simple terminology, what these findings mean and how they may relate to a host of seemingly unrelated health disorders such as depression, fibromyalgia, cancer, cardiovascular disease and others. Strategies to lessen the risk of health consequences implicit in these abnormalities will be the main focus of the talk.

Laurette Janak is a parent-researcher and mother of a child on the autism spectrum who also has Down syndrome and leukemia. She presented at the Autism One 2007 and 2008 conferences sharing her investigations into mechanisms that might explain the significantly increased occurrence of autism within the Down syndrome population. Her most recent work includes publication of two articles on Down syndrome and autism appearing in the Winter 2009 edition of the international magazine The Autism File.