Past research forums

November, 2006

Current research directions of CHERI

April, 2006

The changing pattern of childhood disability

July, 2005

Thinking in a brainstorm: The language and cognitive impacts of childhood epilepsy

February, 2005

Language Disorders / The Neuroscience of ADHD

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November 2006

Current research directions of CHERI

This program focused on the current research activities of CHERI.

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April, 2006

The changing pattern of childhood disability

Convenors: CHERI and the NSW Department of Education and Training, South Western
Sydney Region.

Presentations focused on the effectiveness of new perspectives in early intervention for a range of conditions with an emphasis on autism spectrum disorder.  The day's program was of value to all involved in early intervention services, particularly educators, allied health and medical professionals.

Keynote speaker: Professor Barry Carpenter, OBE. Professor, Early Childhood Intervention, University of Worcester; and Chief Executive, Sunfield School, United Kingdom.

Keynote presentation: The changing pattern of childhood disability (please click here to download presentation)

Topic: This presentation identified the rapidly changing pattern of diagnosable disability in early childhood. It focused on the survival of pre-term infants, foetal alcohol syndrome, genetic abnormalities, as well as children who are vulnerable due to poverty and social disadvantage.

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Title: Early childhood intervention: International perspectives and parent thoughts (please click here to download presentation)

Topic: Early childhood intervention remains the key to meeting the needs of very young children with disabilities and their families. This presentation invited participants to share and develop their own thinking in this field, having reflected on some of the international definitions and practice models available and what families are themselves telling us.

Title: Autism spectrum disorder: How can we contribute to the research agenda? (please click here to download presentation)

Topic: This presentation highlighted the range of research projects that the Sunfield School, UK, is undertaking to meet various current challenges and to enhance the research agenda. In so doing, the types of professions included at Sunfield were covered, covering health, education, social care, psychology, therapies and allied professions.

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Title: Comparative analysis of early intervention programs for young children with autism (please click here to download presentation)

Presenter: Dr Natalie Silove, Staff Specialist, Child Development Unit, The Children's Hospital at Westmead.

Topic: Report on a study to compare differing methods of early childhood intervention in autism.  This presentation briefly covered the range of early intervention programs/approaches available. It introduced the recently commenced study, "Comparative analysis of early intervention programs for young children with autism". This was a collaborative project with Aspect Australia, Sydney University, Macquarie University, Centre for Developmental Disability Studies and The Children's Hospital at Westmead.

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July, 2005

Thinking in a brainstorm: The language and cognitive impacts of childhood epilepsy

The medical management of childhood epilepsy has traditionally focused on the control of epileptic seizures. However, there is increasing evidence that children with epilepsy have poorer educational outcomes than would be expected. This forum focused on the effects of epilepsy on language and cognitive function in childhood.

The forum’s aim was to bring together researchers and clinicians with a particular interest in childhood epilepsy - of relevance to paediatricians, psychologists, speech pathologists, and other professionals who are involved in the care of children with epilepsy.

Title: Intelligence and language in childhood epilepsy (please click here to download presentation)

Presenter:  Associate Professor Annie Bye MD, FRACP. Paediatric Neurologist, Sydney Children’s Hospital. Conjoint Associate Professor, School of Women’s and Children’s Health, University of NSW.

Annie Bye is a paediatric neurologist with a long-term research interest in the cognitive, language and social consequences of childhood epilepsy. For the past 14 years she has maintained a highly productive multi-disciplinary research programme at Sydney Children’s Hospital which has investigated outcomes in paediatric epilepsy syndromes.

Topic:

Intellectual deficits and language impairments are a common and significant cause of morbidity in children with epilepsy. This talk reviewed the results of two recently concluded studies.

In the first study, the incidence and factors associated with cognitive impairment were systematically reviewed in a large cohort of children with childhood epilepsy. The second study addressed the controversial issue of whether the most common form of childhood epilepsy (Benign Rolandic Epilepsy) is associated with either language or cognitive impairments. The clinical and educational implications of these findings were discussed.

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Title: Language disorders in children with epilepsy  (please click here to download presentation)

Presenter: Jenny McIntyre, L.A.C.S.T., Speech Pathologist, Sydney Children’s Hospital.

Jenny McIntyre is an experienced Speech Pathologist at Sydney Children’s Hospital. Jenny works in the Brain Injury Rehabilitation Program. During the past three years she has participated in a prospective collaborative research project, “The neuropsychological and language profile of children with Benign Rolandic Epilepsy.”

Topic:

Jenny briefly reviewed the current literature about language and epilepsy and discussed the language findings in children with different forms of epilepsy. Finally, the implications of these findings with regard to learning and literacy were discussed.

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Title: Language and epilepsy: The more we know the less we comprehend  (please click here to download presentation)

Presenter: Dr Richard Webster MBBS, MSc, FRACP. Paediatric Neurologist, The Children’s Hospital at Westmead; and Research Neurologist, CHERI.

Richard Webster is a Paediatric Neurologist with an interest in the biological causes of paediatric language disorders. He became interested in language disorders after conducting research on Acquired Epileptic Aphasia (the Landau-Kleffner Syndrome). He has recently returned from Montreal where he spent two years studying the outcomes and neuroimaging findings in developmental language disorders.

Topic:

Epilepsy and language impairment commonly co-exist in childhood. This presentation focused on what is known about the relationship between these two disorders. Clinical and EEG findings in a series of children with Acquired Epileptic Aphasia (the Landau-Kleffner syndrome) were presented and theories about the cause of this disorder were reviewed. The implications of these studies with regard to more common childhood language disorders were then discussed.

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Title: Epilepsy in the primary school aged child (please click here to download presentation)

Presenter: Dr Deepak Gill, MBBS, BSc, FRACP

Deepak Gill is a Paediatric Neurologist at The Children’s Hospital at Westmead. He is the Lead Clinician at the Tertiary Epilepsy Clinic and is the Supervisor of the Epilepsy Monitoring Unit. Dr Gill trained in Paediatric Neurology at Guy’s Hospital, London, and completed a fellowship at The Children’s Hospital at Westmead, in 2000. He has interests in infant-onset epilepsy, paediatric neuro-imaging and acquired cerebellar disease in children.

Topic: For a child presenting with recurrent seizures, the first consultation with the clinician is crucial in helping diagnose the type of epilepsy, allowing rational treatment, and providing an accurate prognosis. Accurate diagnosis and then counseling of parents provides the cornerstone of the parent’s and subsequently the school’s ability to manage the child’s epilepsy.

Early identification of children with epilepsy ‘syndromes’ associated with a high risk of cognitive or behavioural problems is essential to provide appropriate educational support. Some of these children may be candidates for resective epilepsy surgery and should be referred to specialist epilepsy units early. This talk discussed the neurophysiological basis of epileptic disorders, the identification of epilepsy ‘syndromes’ and provided a brief overview of rational drug choices in treating epilepsy and potential associated cognitive side-effects.

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February, 2005

Language Disorders / The Neuroscience of ADHD

This first research forum focused on two main topics - language disorders and ADHD.

Title: Psycholinguistics of specific language impairment (please click here to download presentation)

Presenter: Professor Max Coltheart, Academic Director and James Packer Chair of Educational Research, CHERI; and ARC Federation Fellow and Scientific Director, Macquarie Centre for Cognitive Science, Macquarie University.

Professor Max Coltheart is a cognitive scientist who has held positions at the University of Sydney, Monash University, the University of Waterloo, the University of London, Emory University and the University of Padua. He has been at Macquarie University since 1987 and took up his position at CHERI in 2004. Much of his research is on cognitive science and its clinical applications, including work on dyslexia, specific language impairment, delusions and hallucinations.

Topic:
Most children acquire language effortlessly without needing to be taught anything about it: if they hear enough language, they will become adept at it. But this is not so for a significant proportion of children: those with Specific Language Impairment (SLI). Such children learn to talk much later than do normal children, and even once they have got to the level of being able to produce sentences, language errors abound. The incidence of SLI amongst 5-year-olds is about 8%. 70% of people diagnosed at age 5 with SLI will still show abnormal language in adulthood. Current research is showing that there are distinct subtypes of SLI: some SLI children lack adequate knowledge of syntax (“Who did Marge see someone?”), others are specifically poor at correctly producing prefixes and suffixes (“Yesterday I fall over”), and others have problems with pragmatic or phonological aspects of language.

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Title: Neurobiology of specific language impairment (please click here to download presentation)

Presenter: Dr Richard Webster, Research Neurologist, CHERI and Child Neurologist, T. Y. Nelson Department of Neurology and Neurosurgery, The Children’s Hospital at Westmead.

Richard Webster has an interest in the biological causes of paediatric language disorders. He has recently returned from Montreal where he studied the outcomes and neuroimaging findings in developmental language disorders.

Topic:
This presentation focused on what is known about the biological causes of Specific Language Impairment (SLI). Both genetic and environmental factors have been shown to be important aetiological factors in SLI. Structural neuroimaging studies suggest that atypical patterns of asymmetry of language cortex, white matter abnormalities and cortical dysplasia are also associated. Abnormalities in the later stages of auditory processing have been demonstrated using Auditory Event-Related Potentials. A better understanding of the neurobiology of SLI is important for the development of therapeutic strategies to treat this common disorder.

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Title: Update on the neuroscience of ADHD: Diagnostic and treatment implications (presentation not available for downloading)

Presenter: Professor Joseph Sergeant, Chair of Clinical Neuropsychology, University of Vrije, Amsterdam.

Professor Sergeant has researched the attentional problems of hyperactive children for the last 30 years. The main achievement of Professor Sergeant's research has been to draw attention to the cognitive-energetic dysfunction associated with children who have Attention Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD).

Professor Sergeant is the co-ordinator of Eunethydis (European Network on Hyperkinetic Disorders). Eunethydis has produced several joint scientific publications and an extensive set of guidelines for treatment of hyperkinetic children which has been completely revised and published as a new up-date in European Journal of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry in 2004. Professor Sergeant’s visit to Australia is proudly supported by Eli Lilly.

Topic:
This talk gave a review of the most recent neuroscientific findings in ADHD. The importance of these findings for the validity and developmental nature of the diagnosis of ADHD were stressed. The significance and implications of pharmacological interventions, as well as behavioural management of child and family was discussed. Examples of the kind of neuroscientific studies which are required were given in order to encourage effective management.

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