Dr. Deb

Once a year my husband takes an annual “male bonding trip” with our twins and their octogenarian grandfather to a small cottage by the lake. Grilling out over hot coals is part of this summer tradition as it is for many families, especially this holiday weekend.  Unfortunately, accidental fires are also too common as they discovered the next day. My son went to play ball outside and noticed some smoke beside the cottage. Suddenly, the coals from the cookout the night before burst into flames. Luckily Louie’s sports obsession put him in the exact location so that he could alert grandpa and put out the fire. Many are not so lucky when it comes to accidental fires, especially around a holiday.

More fires are reported on 4^th of July than any other single day with half of these caused from fireworks. In fact 7,000 people each year get treated for 4th of July related accidents.

Dr. Deb 4^th of July Safety Tips

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My first and only car accident as a teen happened within weeks of getting my license. I was seriously backing out of a church parking lot going so slowly for fear of a passing car that I drove right into the car next to me (now they were over the line..but still)  While I doubt many teens hit a car at 1 mph, most teen accidents will happen within 6 months of receiving their license. Many teen accidents are very serious, even deadly.

According to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, motor vehicle crashes are the leading cause of death for 15 to 20 year olds with over 2 million accidents-both fatal and non-fatal-a year.

Teens are involved in 3-4 times the number of accidents ,with more teens dying during summer months than any other time of year.

Here is Dr. Deb’s  5 step Safe Teen Driving Plan

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Summer Safety

Today is the last day of school for my 4 children. Summer brings such great joy and freedom yet more children are sent to the emergency room from injury in the summer than any other time of year. Here are my summer safety tips to help keep you and yours safe!

Dr. Deb’s Summer Safety Tips (more…)

I am shocked by number of Facebook babies.  I call them babies because while many 8-12 year olds are more tech savvy than their parents, they still lack the judgment and maturity to protect their privacy.  A recent study that found 25% of children age 8-12 that use the internet have a profile on Facebook, MySpace or Bebo even though the legal minimum age for most social networks is 13.

The majority of parents in the survey knew that their kids had a FB account but 17% did not. What was astounding to me was the amount of personal information that I could find out about my own 8 & 11 year old children’s peers that were facebook babies while not being “friends” with them.  90% of the kids that I searched had many photo albums, videos and interactions public, viewable to the entire internet. One 12 year old did a strip tease (fully clothed) kissing the camera while the other lamented being alone in her house while her family was bowling.

Why are so many children using social media?

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Well I got a girl named Boney Maroni
& She’s as Skinny as a Stick of Macaroni!

Hard to believe but that was the song that my Dad sang to me when I was a child. That quickly changed with puberty and estrogen transformed my body from straight to curvy then quite round. Common wisdom at the time was starvation diets from the Scarsdale to fasting liquid protein. Those helped me to lose weight quickly, only to pack it back on plus more until I ballooned to over 200 lbs.

We’ve learned a lot about healthy ways to lose weight but our society has abandoned many healthy habits that kept us thin to begin with. More than 30% of children in the United States are now overweight or obese.

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