1. Provide the title of your story or series and the names of the journalists involved.
"Is Your Kid Truly Allergic? Tests Add to Food Confusion"
"Mind Games – Attention-Deficit Disorder Isn't Just for Kids"
"Fictional Stars, Real Problems — In Medical Schools, Therapists Train on Characters From His Movies, Television and Books"
"The Prostate Cancer Quandary"
All by Melinda Beck.
See a slideshow of a 4-year-old undergoing food challenge testing.
See an interactive sreening test of ADHD.
Match the movie clip with the psychiatric diagnosis.
2. List date(s) this work was published or aired.
Jan. 26, 2010; April 6, 2010; June 8, 2010; June 29, 2010
3. Provide a brief synopsis of the story or stories, including any significant findings.
Writing a weekly consumer health column for The Wall Street Journal allows me the luxury to follow my curiosity, pounce on hot topics and explore quandaries readers are struggling with too. In these four representative columns, I presented the mounting evidence that many children diagnosed with multiple food allergies can actually eat some of those foods safely and explained how families can find out for sure. I explored the difficulty discerning ADHA in adults from the ubiquitous distractions of modern life. I raised the curtain on how budding psychotherapists often hone their diagnostic skills by studying fictional characters, and I reported on how researchers are coming ever closer to being able to tell in advance which prostate cancers are likely to spread and which can be safely watched instead, which could spare millions of U.S. men from having unnecessary prostatectomies every year.
4. Explain types of documents, data or Internet resources used. Were FOI or public records act requests required? How did this affect the work?
1) Ccurrent and past journal articles
2) Journal articles, books, Web sites
3) Journal articles, psychology textbooks, fiction, movies
4) Journal articles, prostate-cancer research Web sites
5. Explain types of human sources used.
1) Interviews with allergy experts at Mt. Sinai, Duke, Johns Hopkins, National Jewish Hospital, Phadia Corp, parents and children with food allergies
2) Psychiatrists, behavioral therapists, professional organizers, ADHD patients
3) Psychiatrists, psychologists, medical residents
4) Prostate cancer researachers at Memorial Sloan-Kettering, Harvard, University of Michigan, Prostate Cancer Research Foundation
6. Results (if any).
1) Nine months after this story ran, the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Disease issued new guidelines for diagnosing food allergies, suggesting the same steps that I had advised families to take.
2) Dozens of readers wrote in to say that the story had helped their loved ones understand what their ADHD is like or saying they had recognized symptoms in themselves and had decided to seek help.
3) No important results; just a fun read that gave readers insight into how psychology works and used characters they know well.
4) Philanthropist Mark Chapin Johnson was so intrigued with the University of Michigan genetic research described in the story that he visited Dr. Arul Chinnaiyan's lab and is discussing funding further research
7. Follow-up (if any). Have you run a correction or clarification on the report or has anyone come forward to challenge its accuracy? If so, please explain.
None on these stories.
8. Advice to other journalists planning a similar story or project.
Writing 1800 words on a different medical issue each week is an ongoing challenge. I am constantly learning how much I don't know. It pays to save everything and slowly build areas of broader expertise. Meanwhile, keep your antenna up constantly. You never know where an idea will come from. These four columns were inspired by 1) a stray comment from a pr guy pitching a different story, 2) a speaker at a depression conference, 3) a research abstract found in a conference program, and 4) studies in three separate medical journals in one month, each hoping to unlock the secret of determining which prostate cancers are likely to spread and which aren't. However, I never would have appreciated their significance if I hadn't done a series on prostate cancer earlier. Remember that a weekly column is a marathon, not a sprint.