Cal State San Bernardino and Loma Linda University to lead local study center in landmark government study of child health

EMAIL

PRINT

SAN BERNARDINO, Calif. - California State University, San Bernardino and Loma Linda University are part of one of the 22 centers named Thursday, Oct. 4, in the next phase of the largest study of child health and development ever attempted in the United States.

The National Children's Study will eventually follow a representative sample of 100,000 children from conception to age 21 - including 1,000 in San Bernardino County - seeking information to prevent and treat some of the nation's most pressing health problems, including autism, birth defects, diabetes, heart disease and obesity.

The San Bernardino County location is part of one of 22 new study centers of the National Children's Study, which is led by UC Irvine and also includes UC San Diego. The study is a collaborative effort between the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (including the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development and the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences at the National Institutes of Health, and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention) and the Environmental Protection Agency.

CSUSB and LLU will partner to lead the San Bernardino County study location, which will manage local participant recruitment and data collection.

"This will be a profoundly valuable study, and it's an important achievement of the two faculties that Cal State San Bernardino and Loma Linda University were chosen to be lead institutions in San Bernardino County," said Albert Karnig, president of Cal State San Bernardino. "I'm proud of each of the participants involved in crafting the proposal. Simply put, this landmark study will have enormous long-term impact in improving the health of children and families in the Inland Empire and throughout the nation, as well as give direction to other research aimed at saving lives and fostering better health."

"As the largest long-term study of children's health and development ever to be conducted in the United States, the National Children's Study is unprecedented in scope and magnitude," said Lyn Behrens, president of Loma Linda University, the Medical Center and the Children's Hospital. "We are delighted to collaborate with California State University, San Bernardino in this historic effort, which is going to have a significant impact both locally and nationally. We are also proud to partner with the County Department of Public Health, First 5 of San Bernardino, the Children's Network, the various hospitals and health care providers, and numerous other local organizations who are actively involved in improving the health and welfare of our children."

"The study includes a fairly comprehensive range of biological, physical, genetic, social, cultural and other environmental factors starting from before birth that can be harmful or helpful to child health and development," said Jayakaran Job, co-principal investigator and faculty at the Loma Linda University Schools of Public Health and Medicine. "By examining relationships between environments and children's growth, development and progress, this study seeks to unravel the basic causes of many of today's childhood diseases and disorders, some of which are even reaching epidemic proportions."

"What we learn will help not only children and families in San Bernardino County, but it will help children across the U.S.," said Kimberley Lakes, co-principle investigator, assistant professor in Pediatrics at the University of California, Irvine, and former associate director of the Institute for Child Development and Family Relations at Cal State San Bernardino. "The study's findings will help improve child health and set policies for generations to come."

The National Children's Study will eventually follow a representative sample of 100,000 children from before birth to age 21, seeking information to prevent and treat some of the nation's most pressing health problems, including autism

Kimberly Lakes, assistant professor, UC Irvine, and Jayakaran Job, associate professor, Loma Linda University, announce that CSUSB and LLU have been selected to be part of one of the study centers for the National Children's Study.