Psychiatry / Psychology
Anxiety Tied to DCIS Patients’ Overestimation of Cancer Risks
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Elevated levels of anxiety may cause women with ductal carcinoma in situ (DCIS), the most common form of non-invasive breast cancer, to overestimate their risk of recurrence or dying from breast cancer, suggests a study led by researchers at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute in Boston.
“Although DCIS typically is very treatable disease, many women diagnosed with DCIS develop inaccurate risk perceptions,” said Ann Partridge, MD, MPH, the study’s lead author and a breast oncologist at Dana-Farber. “This exaggerated sense of risk needs to be addressed, as it may cause women to make poor treatment choices and adversely affect their emotional well-being and subsequent health behaviors.”
The study’s findings will be published online by the Journal of the National Cancer Institute on Feb. 12 and later in a print edition.
Close ties between parents and babies yield benefits for preschoolers
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Having close ties with parents is obviously good for preschoolers, but what does that really mean? It means that the preschoolers are better able to control their own behavior by showing patience, deliberation, restraint, and even maturity.
That’s the finding of a new study conducted by researchers at the University of Iowa and published in the January/February 2008 issue of the journal Child Development.
The researchers looked at 102 mostly white families—mothers, fathers, and babies—who had volunteered for the study from the time the children were 7 months old until they were almost 4 and a half years old. Repeated observations were carried out in the families’ homes and in a laboratory. In the first two years, the researchers observed how parents and children related to each other, particularly whether they were in sync, picked up on each other’s cues, communicated well, and enjoyed each other’s company. In short, they gauged whether the parents and children had developed a close, positive, reciprocal, cooperative, and mutually responsive relationship.
Findings Suggest Link Between Vitamin E and Subsequent Decline in Physical Function for Older Adults
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Low serum concentration of vitamin E, an indication of poor nutrition, is associated with physical decline for older persons, according to a study in the January 23 issue of JAMA.
“The decline in physical function that occurs with aging often represents the early stage of a continuum leading to disability and other important adverse outcomes such as institutionalization,” the authors write. Understanding the mechanisms associated with this process has been identified as a priority. The potential harmful effect of poor nutrition on physical function in older persons is not well understood.
Benedetta Bartali, R.D., Ph.D., of Yale University School of Medicine, New Haven, Conn., and colleagues conducted a study to determine whether a low concentration of specific micronutrients is associated with subsequent decline in physical function.
Post-concussion depression more than emotional
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Post-concussion symptoms of depression may stem from an underlying neurological abnormality caused by the concussion, results of a Canadian study suggest.
Depression after a blow to the head may not simply be the individual’s emotional or psychological reaction to the injury and their subsequent loss of playing time, as is commonly thought, investigators note in the medical journal, Archives of General Psychiatry.
“It seems there is a cerebral dysfunction caused by the injury,” Dr. Alain Ptito, of the Montreal Neurological Institute and Hospital at McGill University in Quebec, told Reuters Health. The injury manifests itself as symptoms of depression, he added.
Aggression as rewarding as sex, food and drugs
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New research from Vanderbilt University shows for the first time that the brain processes aggression as a reward - much like sex, food and drugs - offering insights into our propensity to fight and our fascination with violent sports like boxing and football.
The research will be published online the week of Jan. 14 by the journal Psychopharmacology.
“Aggression occurs among virtually all vertebrates and is necessary to get and keep important resources such as mates, territory and food,” Craig Kennedy, professor of special education and pediatrics, said. “We have found that the ‘reward pathway’ in the brain becomes engaged in response to an aggressive event and that dopamine is involved.”
Ten minutes of talking has a mental payoff
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Spending just 10 minutes talking to another person can help improve your memory and your performance on tests, according to a University of Michigan study to be published in the February 2008 issue of the Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin.
“In our study, socializing was just as effective as more traditional kinds of mental exercise in boosting memory and intellectual performance,” said Oscar Ybarra, a psychologist at the U-M Institute for Social Research (ISR) and a lead author of the study with ISR psychologist Eugene Burnstein and psychologist Piotr Winkielman from the University of California, San Diego.
Study finds exercise reduces menopausal anxiety, stress and depression
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With more menopausal women seeking natural therapies to ease symptoms, a new study has found that simply adding a brisk walking routine can reduce a variety of psychological symptoms such as anxiety, stress and depression. The research is published in the January issue of Cancer Epidemiology, Biomarkers & Prevention.
“With the aging population, physical activity represents one way for women to stay mentally healthy. Physical activity can help throughout the menopausal transition and afterwards,” said Temple University public health researcher Deborah Nelson, Ph.D, the study’s lead author.
Mental health linked to amputation risk in diabetic veterans
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For U.S. veterans with diabetes, lower scores on a test of mental health functioning are associated with an increased risk of major amputations, reports a study in the November/December issue of the journal General Hospital Psychiatry.
“Our findings suggest that foot care programs need to assess individuals for mental health functioning as a risk factor and to develop appropriate interventions to counteract this higher risk of major amputation,” write the study authors, led by Chin-Lin Tseng, Dr.P.H., of the VA New Jersey Health Care System, East Orange, N.J.
Mental Health Care Needed Before, After Bariatric Surgery
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Bariatric surgery is the most effective weight-loss option for people who are severely obese. However, the surgery involves substantial risks and requires a lifelong commitment to behavioral change. People eligible for the surgery often have a history of mental health problems or eating disorders. Therefore, patients must be prepared mentally as well as physically before surgery, reports the January 2008 issue of the Harvard Mental Health Letter.
The psychological aspects of bariatric surgery are less well understood than the physical risks and benefits. Although the surgery is generally associated with improved mental health and quality of life, postsurgical psychological and behavioral changes are less predictable than physical changes.
Duloxetine improves depression-related pain
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Treatment with duloxetine relieves pain in patients with major depressive disorder, according to a report in the Journal of Clinical Psychiatry.
Duloxetine is used to treat depression and generalized anxiety disorder. It is also used to treat pain and tingling caused by diabetic neuropathy.
Health needs higher for kids of abused moms
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Children whose mothers have a history of abuse by intimate partners have higher health care needs than children whose mothers have no history of abuse, according to a study conducted at Group Health, a Seattle-based health plan.
These needs—expressed in terms of the cost of providing care and use of health services—were higher even if the abuse occurred before the children were born, the research team found. Scientists from Group Health Center for Health Studies, Harborview Injury Prevention and Research Center (HIPRC), and Seattle Children’s Hospital Research Institute conducted the study, which appeared in the December 2007 issue of the journal Pediatrics.
Natural human hormone as the next antidepressant?
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Novel treatment strategies for major depression with broader treatment success or a more rapid onset of action would have immense impact on public health, a new study published in the December 1st issue of Biological Psychiatry explains. This new study reports findings that support the evaluation of a potential new antidepressant agent.
According to the lead author on this study, Kamilla Miskowiak, MSc: “Although depression is often related to problems in the chemistry of the brain, recent evidence also suggests that there may be structural problems as well with nerve cells not being regenerated as fast as normal or suffering from toxic effects of stress and stress hormones.”
Is there a developmental component to the risk for depression?
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Psychiatrists remain divided as to how to define and classify the mood and anxiety disorders, the most common mental disorders. Committees across the globe are currently pondering how best to carve nature at its anxious joints for the fifth version of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual (DSM-V), the “gold standard” reference book for psychiatrists. Only recently has the process of refining the diagnostic system been informed by high quality longitudinal data. An important new study of this type was published in the December 1st issue of Biological Psychiatry.
Ian Colman, Ph.D., the lead author, notes, ““Rarely have classification systems in psychiatry considered the nature of symptoms of depression and anxiety over time; however research into trajectories of alcohol abuse and antisocial behaviour shows that accounting for symptoms over time may help in better understanding causes and outcomes of these disorders.”
Essential adolescent psychiatry
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General practitioners and paediatricians increasingly undertake the assessment and management of children and adolescents with emotional and behavioural problems. Non-psychiatrists want to know what they are dealing with (the diagnostic criteria), what conditions to exclude (with laboratory and other tests), what to expect over time (natural history and prognosis) and the latest and best non-medical and medical treatment approaches.
This authoritative American textbook by well respected authors and editors (Professor Dulcan is the former editor of the Journal of the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry) appears to fill the gap between shorter textbooks such as Barker’s Basic child psychiatry — designed more for allied health professionals or medical students — and the complex longer texts, such as those by Rutter and Hersov.
Relatives of patients with Parkinson’s disease face increased risk of depression/anxiety disorders
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Immediate relatives (brother, sister, mother, father, son or daughter) of people who have Parkinson’s disease are at increased risk for developing depression and anxiety disorders, according to a new study by Mayo Clinic. The risk is particularly increased in families of patients who develop Parkinson’s disease before age 75. The Mayo Clinic report appears in the December 2007 issue of the journal Archives of General Psychiatry (archpsyc.ama-assn.org/).
“Studies by our group and others have shown that relatives of patients with Parkinson’s disease have an increased risk of Parkinson’s disease,” explains Walter Rocca, M.D., senior author of the study and a Mayo Clinic neurologist and epidemiologist. “Recently, we showed they also have increased risk of essential tremor and of cognitive impairment or dementia. However, their risk of psychiatric disorders was unknown.
