Two powerful new tests developed by psychologists show great promise in predicting patients' risk of attempting suicide. The work may help clinicians overcome their reliance on self-reporting by at-risk individuals, information that often proves misleading when suicidal patients wish to hide their intentions. (Source: ScienceDaily Headlines)MedWorm Message: Register for MedMatcha, MedWorm's medical advertising network, and receive $5 free advertising.

Conclusions: Our findings showed predictive significance of the TCI-R dimensions HA and RD for long-term antidepressant treatment outcome. (Source: Medical Science Monitor)

The objective of this study was to determine predictors of weight loss among participants with knee OA in a clinical trial. A secondary analysis of data from a randomized clinical trial was used. Multiple regression analysis was used to predict weight loss after identification of predictor variables from the data. Hypothesized predictors of weight loss included demographic, clinical, and behavioral characteristics. The only baseline variable that was significantly related to weight loss was the Center for Epidemiologic Studies Depression Scale (CES-D) score. The CES-D score was an independent predictor of weight loss at 16 (p

Deep brain stimulation — Overview covers definition, risks, results of this experimental depression treatment. (Source: MayoClinic.com Full Feed)

Despite what many social observers have described as a generally dark and brooding take on life, a new report suggests that Russians are actually ... (Source: USATODAY.com Health)

CONCLUSION: Although the issue of 'lack of time' is usually considered a major barrier to successful implementation of preventive care, lack of family physician knowledge and skills, and organisational barriers should also be addressed. PMID: 20659401 [PubMed - in process] (Source: Quality in Primary Care)MedWorm Message: Register for MedMatcha, MedWorm's medical advertising network, and receive $5 free advertising.

In conclusion, myocardial in vivo HEP metabolism is impaired following ADR administration, occurring before systolic or diastolic abnormalities and in proportion to the extent of eventual contractile abnormalities. These observations are consistent with the hypothesis that impaired HEP metabolism contributes to ADR-induced myocardial dysfunction. (Source: AJP: Heart and Circulatory Physiology)

The essential psychological effect of trauma is a shattering of innocence. Trauma creates a loss of faith that there is any safety, predictability, or meaning in the world, or any safe place in which to retreat. It involves utter disillusionment. Because traumatic events are often unable to be processed by the mind and body as other experiences are, due to their overwhelming and shocking nature, they are not integrated or digested. The trauma then takes on a life of its own and, through its continued effects, haunts the survivor and prevents normal life from continuing until the person gets help. Post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) is a condition created by exposure to a psychologically distressing event outside the range of usual human experience, one which would be markedly distressing...

Research suggests that childbearing does not necessarily cause psychological distress among teenagers. Dr. Stefanie Mollborn of the University of Colorado and her team investigated stress and depression using a large group of teenage girls and adult women. In the Journal of Health and Social Behavior, they explain that teenage mothers’ high depression rates have received “considerable research attention” in small studies, but a larger study of adolescent childbearing and depression was needed. So they used figures from two large long-term surveys, the U.S. National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health and the Early Childhood Longitudinal Study-Birth Cohort. The participants completed questionnaires to measure depression, although the term “depression” was a...

Joshua's wife, just returning from the US, insisted on a joint HIV/AIDS test before sex. (Source: AllAfrica News: HIV-Aids and STDs)

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Emergency department visits by patients presenting with mental health concerns may represent a missed opportunity to detect those at high risk for suicide. Medscape Medical News (Source: Medscape Today Headlines)

Emergency department visits by patients presenting with mental health concerns may represent a missed opportunity to detect those at high risk for suicide. Medscape Medical News (Source: Medscape Today Headlines)

Two powerful new tests developed by psychologists at Harvard University show great promise in predicting patients' risk of attempting suicide. The work may help clinicians overcome their reliance on self-reporting by at-risk individuals, information that often proves misleading when suicidal patients wish to hide their intentions. Both new tests are easily administered within minutes on a computer, giving quick insight into how patients are thinking about suicide, as well as their propensity to attempt suicide in the near future... (Source: Health News from Medical News Today)

Conclusion The study showed an association between the strength of social relationships and lower mortality rates. However, as the researchers highlighted, many different measures of the strength of social interactions are used, and this study does not classify what constitutes a healthy social life. Owing to the high variability of the studies included in this meta-analysis, the researchers looked at social relationships in very broad terms. There are some limitations to this research, some of which the authors highlight: Behavioural risk factors for disease, such as smoking and drinking alcohol, were adjusted for in some but not all of the studies included in this meta-analysis. Some of the effect on mortality may, therefore, be due to these and other factors that were not adjusted fo...

A textbook of mental health disorders makes it far too easy for doctors to label patients – and disregard the roots of sufferingThe Diagnostic and Statistical Manual, whose updated fifth edition will include a range of new diagnoses, is a mythology, not a scientific text. It is created by American psychiatrists who meet in groups to consider whether or not a certain diagnosis should be included in the DSM. These groups meet a number of times so that they can say that their agreement about a certain diagnosis is reliable. Thus they could reliably agree that there is a mental disorder called Guardian Readers' Personality Disorder with the symptoms of a need to read this paper regularly, an overvaluation of the Guardian, and so on. Who knows, it might already be in the most recent version o...MedWorm Message: Register for MedMatcha, MedWorm's medical advertising network, and receive $5 free advertising.

(Source: Journal of Epidemiology and Community Health)

(Source: Journal of Epidemiology and Community Health)

Conclusion These results highlight the importance of both vertical and horizontal components of workplace social capital as predictors of employee mental health. (Source: Journal of Epidemiology and Community Health)

Conclusions The programme was feasible and acceptable and participants showed improvements in metabolic and psychological variables. A larger controlled trial is now needed to confirm these promising preliminary results. (Source: British Journal of Sports Medicine)