How to make the correct diagnosis?

What helps some doctors make the correct diagnosis after so many have failed before that? Jenny McCarthy shares her experience:

"I didn't know what was going on with my son Evan. Countless doctors and hospitals couldn't get to the bottom of it, and no one could figure out the right diagnosis. Finally, I got an appointment to see the best pediatric neurologist in Los Angeles.

When the door opened and a sweet older man walked in, I immediately felt good. He listened closely but had his eyes on Evan the whole time. I could tell he was evaluating Evan and his bizarre behavior.

He asked me a couple of questions and seemed very peaceful about the whole thing. I was starting to feel more relaxed as he played with Evan, and then he stood up and opened his office door and told his secretary to cancel his next appointment.

He closed the door and pulled his chair up close to mine and put his hand on my hand. He looked at me with sorrowful eyes and said, "I'm sorry, your son has autism."

Read the rest of the story:
Jenny McCarthy: The day I heard my son had autism. CNN, 2007.

Related:
FreeMD: Your virtual doctor. Link via David Rothman.

Updated: 01/29/2008

Baby Einstein DVDs May Slow Language Development? Also, Please Cite Your Sources

A new study showed that for every hour per day spent watching educational DVDs like Baby Einstein, infants understood 6-8 fewer words than those who did not watch them. Children with larger vocabularies had parents who read to them or told them stories.

The American Academy of Pediatrics recommends against watching television by children under 24 months.

There are at least 31 news reports on the story found on Google News but none of them links to the original source -- supposedly, an article in the Journal of Pediatrics. I checked the online version of the journal twice but I was still not able to find the study in question. After performing a PubMed search, it became clear the study was actually published in the Archives of Pediatrics & Adolescent Medicine and not in the Journal of Pediatrics.

Linking to the original source of the story should be one of the gold standards of the web journalism and it was obviously not done in this case.

References:
DVDs Don't Produce Brainy Babies. U.S. News & World Report.
Baby Einsteins: Not So Smart After All. Time.
'Baby Einstein' Videos Ineffective, Study Finds. NPR (audio).
Audio: Study hits at the heart of Baby Einstein. MarketWatch.com.
Study: Babies Raised By Videos Approximately As Dumb As Expected. Gawker.com.