All the latest research on mental health taken from a range of different high-quality sources, written in clear English and with a reference back to the original journal article or website. Based on the Mental Health Update blog http...
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All the latest research on mental health taken from a range of different high-quality sources, written in clear English and with a reference back to the original journal article or website. Based on the Mental Health Update blog http://mentalhealthupdate.blogspot.com
There has been a lot of debate about the links between cannabis and psychosis and in particular the effects of high-strength 'skunk' cannabis which contains much more of the active ingredient delta-9-tetrahydrocannabinol. Researchers from the Institute of Psychiatry, King's College London compared 280 people turning up for treatment with their first episode of psychosis with 174 healthy people recruited from the local population. There was no difference between the two groups in terms of... Read Full Story
Adolescence is a crucial stage for physical and mental human development. An adolescent brain has increased desire of knowledge and exploration. At the same time it is highly vulnerable to high-risk behaviors, mental illness, and addiction. Adolescent drug and alcohol abuse, results in side affects that can impact them for entire life.
Adolescence and Alcohol Abuse Easy access to alcohol is one of the most potential reasons that drive an adolescent towards alcohol abuse. As adolescents are... Read Full Story
I have previously blogged about the unfortunate effect of atypical antipsychotics on body weight and on the possible strategies that may be effective in dealing with this important complication of psychiatric treatment.
As the number of children and adolescents diagnosed with and treated for psychiatric disorders continues to increase, the use of these medications in this population is of growing concern.
The extent to which atypical antipsychotic medications promote weight gain and... Read Full Story
Mens sana in corpore sano - a healthy mind in a healthy body - was one of the most popular sayings in traditional education. Researchers from the University of Gothenburg and the University of Southern California looked at the data for all 1.2 m Swedish men born between 1950 and 1976 who enlisted for mandatory military service at the age of 18. In every measure of cognitive functioning they analyzed - verbal ability, logical performance, geometric perception and mechanical skills - average... Read Full Story
Researchers from the Department of Psychology at the University of Quebec have been looking into the links between gender and facial expression. They showed people a series of androgynous faces and asked them to say whether they were men's or women's. The faces with grumpy expressions - lowered eyebrows and tight lips - were more likely to be identified as male while those with more cheerful expressions were more likely to be identified as female. Another study showed people's faces with a... Read Full Story
A report by the European Monitoring Centre for Drugs and Drug Addiction has found that the U.K. has the biggest problem of illegal drug use among teenagers. 5% of 15-16 year-olds had taken cocaine with 3% trying crack. 4% of youngsters had taken ecstasy and three out of ten had tried cannabis. There were estimated to be 860,000 cocaine users in England and Wales and 74,000 problem drug users in London. You can find out more about this study at http://www.telegraph.co.uk/health/healthnews... Read Full Story
Researchers from the VA Ann Arbor Health System in Michigan have been looking into the links between mental-health problems and heart disease. They studied 150,000 veterans who completed a survey in 1999 and were followed for eight years. By the end of the study 8% of the participants had died of heart disease with people with psychosis being more than twice as likely to die. People with depression and bipolar disorder were also more likely to die of heart disease but this increased risk... Read Full Story
Researchers at the Institute of Psychiatry, King's College London have been looking into abnormalities in the white matter of people's brains and how this can lead to the development of schizophrenia. Professor Philip McGuire and Dr Sophia Frangou used a technique called diffusion tensor imaging to examine the white matter of adolescents and adults with schizophrenia. They found that the adolescents had severe deficits of white matter in the posterior (back) region of the brain; specifically... Read Full Story
Problems with cognition are one of the hallmarks of schizophrenia and there is no established treatment for them. People with schizophrenia have problems with perception, attention, memory, language and intellect. Impaired decision-making is one of the main problems and this has been linked to impaired functioning in the prefrontal cortex. Researchers from the University of California, Davis School of Medicine reviewed 41 brain-imaging studies measuring the activity in the brains of people... Read Full Story
Last year the UK government reclassified cannabis from a class C to a class B drug, partly out of concerns that cannabis, especially the more potent varieties, may increase the risk of schizophrenia in young people. But the evidence for… Read Full Story
