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LAS VEGAS -- "It is a place that worships momentum and mocks inertia, craves acceleration and condemns lethargy. All angle and pitch, slope and slant, it is a place of dry pools and concrete runways, of mad ramps and half-pipes. No one ever told Aaron Fotheringham it was a place he shouldn't enter, or didn't belong in. After all, he did the same things -- spinning and rising, falling and crashing - every other skateboarder and BMX rider did. Aaron Fotheringham had wheels. His were just a little different than the others. "People call it wheelchair skateboarding," he says with...

NETHERLANDS, January 16, 2008 (LifeSiteNews.com) - Dutch paediatric neurosurgeon Rob de Jong, in collaboration with peers from several other countries, has expressed his concern at the practice in the Netherlands of carrying out euthanasia on some babies born with spina bifida in an article in the medical journal Child's Nervous System.According to a report by Radio Netherlands Worldwide, the lives of a small number of babies are terminated each year by doctors who, together with the parents, believe the infant is experiencing unbearable suffering and will continue to suffer in this way in the future.In his article "Deliberate Termination of...

LONDON, England, 13 June, 2007 (LifeSiteNews.com) - The Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists (RCOG) London, today refused to let wheelchair-user Alison Davis present a petition on the infanticide of disabled babies. Officials told Ms. Davis, leader of the No Less Human disability rights group, that she could not come in because she would need someone to push her wheelchair, and the RCOG would only let one person into its London headquarters. Alison Davis, who has spina bifida, said: “It would be comical if it weren't also tragic that the RCOG, which has asked for a debate on the killing...

A couple of weeks ago Wake Forest University physicians described the first human recipients of a laboratory-grown organ. In the prestigious medical journal "The Lancet," Dr. Anthony Atala, director of the Institute for Regenerative Medicine, detailed a series of patients (children and teenagers) who received urinary bladders grown from their own cells. WHAAAAT? Did somebody say "laboratory organs?!" Yes. Perhaps like you, the first reaction of some who heard the news was, “why would anyone need a new bladder?” Well, many infants are born with congenital birth defects a very serous one is spina bifida (incomplete closure of the spine)....

<p>This is just unbeleivable! Please read before viewing picture - it's worth it!</p> <p>A picture began circulating in November. It should be "The Picture of the Year," or perhaps, "Picture of the Decade." It won't be. In fact, unless you obtained a copy of the US paper which published it, you probably would never have seen it.</p>

ATLANTA, Georgia (CNN) -- Doctors on Friday released Baby Noor, the 3-month-old Iraqi girl brought to the United States for life-saving medical treatment after being discovered by U.S. soldiers in Baghdad. "Her prognosis is excellent as far as her ability to develop normally and cognitively," Dr. Roger Hudgins, the pediatric neurosurgeon at Children's Healthcare of Atlanta, told CNN's "Live From."

ATLANTA - The first of a series of operations for Baby Noor, an Iraqi infant who has severe birth defects of the spine, was successful Monday, a hospital spokesman said. Three-month-old Noor al-Zahra was "doing well" and was in recovery Monday morning at Children's Healthcare of Atlanta, said hospital spokesman Kevin McClelland. McClelland said in a statement that she "will reunite with her family within the hour." Hospital officials declined to release additional information, saying more details will be released at a 4:30 p.m. news conference. Baby Noor has spina bifida, in which the backbone and spinal cord do not...

ATLANTA — An Iraqi infant brought to the United States for treatment of severe birth defects is "interactive and playful," with good mental function, but will likely wind up using a wheelchair, her doctor said Monday.

<p>An Iraqi infant with a severe birth defect began her journey Friday to the United States, where she will receive medical care at the urging of U.S. soldiers who discovered her during a raid.</p> <p>Noor al-Zahra, who is 3 months old, and family took off in a military transport plane from Baghdad airport, the Atlanta Journal-Constitution reported. They will fly to Kuwait and then board a commercial flight, said social and medical workers who have arranged for her care.</p>

Half-baked Barbara By John McCaslin October 7, 2005 It's not easy being the master of ceremonies for a roast when half of the roasters don't show up. Ask political commentator Mark Shields, who found himself in that uncomfortable position Wednesday evening as the Spina Bifida Association attempted to put TV personality Barbara Walters in the "hot seat" at the Hyatt Regency Washington. "This is more like a bake-off," a visibly embarrassed Mrs. Walters said after the roasting, expressing disappointment that Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton of New York and fellow roaster Sen. Mary L. Landrieu of Louisiana were no-shows. As it...

Mayor Richard Daley on Tuesday viewed the controversy over the fate of Terri Schiavo through the eyes of a father who lost a young son to a disabling condition. And though Daley tried not to take sides in the Schiavo case, it became obvious where he stands as he spoke about Kevin Daley, who died in 1981 when he was 33 months old. "I think it gets down to people with disabilities," the mayor said. "I had a son who was very sick with spina bifida. Some people would have said, `Why should he live?'" Kevin "had a struggle," said...

My daughter's sister-in-law is in her fifth month of pregnacy with twin girls. Tests have confirmed that both girls have spinal bifida and will need surgery within twenty four hours after delivery. The parents are young Christian folks who were delighted when they learned the news of an addition to their family. They have three children, the youngest being only fifteen months old. As a medical professional, I know what they must face.

Pregnant women who eat sugary or highly processed food such as white bread and cornflakes face double the risk of having malformed babies, according to new research. Scientists made the discovery after comparing the diets of mothers whose babies had so-called neural tube defects such as spina bifida with those of mothers with normal babies. The study, involving almost 1,000 women, found that the risk of such birth defects was substantially greater among those who consumed higher levels of sugar and the highly refined carbohydrates found in potatoes, white bread and rice and many popular breakfast cereals. University researchers at...

Scientists at the Royal Melbourne Hospital have made a major breakthrough in spina bifida research, identifying the gene which causes the congenital birth defect in mice. Spina bifida can lead to lower limb paralysis, bladder and bowel dysfunction and psycho-social difficulties. Stephen Jane, who heads the hospital's Bone Marrow Research Laboratory, says a joint study with researchers in the United States could isolate the gene in humans. "We should have the answer in a few months' time that hopefully this will allow us to detect specific changes in the gene that will predict families that are going to have children...

MATTERS OF LIFE AND DEATH 'Baby Samuel' testifies before Senate Remarkable photo showed hand reaching from womb during surgery Posted: October 1, 2003 5:00 p.m. Eastern © 2003 WorldNetDaily.com A stunning photograph of an unborn child reaching from his mother's uterus and grasping a doctor's finger during surgery took center stage at a Senate subcommittee hearing. Samuel Armas, now 3 years old, answered questions posed by Sen. Sam Brownback, R-Kan., last Thursday as he chaired the Senate Commerce Subcommittee's examination of recent advances in surgery conducted inside the womb. (Photo copyright Michael Clancy. Used with permission) As WorldNetDaily reported, the...

Story of "The Baby Hand" June 14, 2003 RenewAmerica staff report Photo by Michael Clancy Some of us may be familiar with a picture called "The Baby Hand," taken on Aug. 19, 1999, by photojournalist Michael Clancy for USA Today, which first published the picture. Clancy was assigned to document a spina bifida operation performed in utero on a 21-week unborn baby named Samuel Armas by Dr. Joseph Bruner, a surgeon at Nashville's Vanderbuilt University Medical Center. The picture and its story have been circulated on the internet so often that some question whether they are authentic. They are. Clancy...