Andre Tomlin

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André Tomlin is an Information Scientist with 20 years experience working in evidence-based healthcare. He's worked in the NHS, for Oxford University and since 2002 as Managing Director of Minervation Ltd, a consultancy company who do clever digital stuff for charities, universities and the public sector. Most recently André has been the driving force behind the Mental Elf and the National Elf Service; an innovative digital platform that helps professionals keep up to date with simple, clear and engaging summaries of evidence-based research. André is a Trustee at the Centre for Mental Health and an Honorary Research Fellow at University College London Division of Psychiatry. He lives in Bristol, surrounded by dogs, elflings and lots of woodland!

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Valuing mental health as much as physical health: new report from the Royal College of Psychiatrists

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Parity

The Royal College of Psychiatrists has today published what they are calling a landmark report on achieving parity between mental and physical health. The report, Whole-Person Care: From Rhetoric to Reality, defines parity as valuing mental health equally with physical health. It highlights the significant inequalities that exist between physical and mental health care, including [read the full story…]

A practical guide to social media in mental health practice

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This review highlights a huge range of predictors of treatment response that varying widely in their clinical utility.

This new 30-page guide (PDF) is a must read for any health and social care professionals who are thinking about getting more involved with social media. Twitter remains a terrifying prospect for many professionals working in health and social care, but in my experience it’s very rare for someone to actually give it a go, [read the full story…]

People with disability are more likely to be victims of violence and to suffer mental illness as a result

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Fight-2

In the UK over 10 million people live with a disability, many of whom suffer from violence (Department for Working Pensions, 2011). A recent World Report on Disability by WHO (2011) highlighted that people living with disabilities are at  risk from sexual and physical violence. Despite this, little is known about who is at risk [read the full story…]

New evidence update from NICE on common mental disorders

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nhs evidence eye

The NICE guideline on common mental disorders (PDF) was published back in May 2011, which means that it only included evidence published up until the end of 2010. This is a fast moving field, so NICE have now put out an evidence update, which focuses on new evidence published from Sept 2010 to Oct 2012. This [read the full story…]

Healthcare commissioning for people with long-term conditions: new report from the Nuffield Trust

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Man looking at piles of coins

What do healthcare commissioners actually do? Ask a hundred people who work in the NHS and you’ll probably get a hundred different answers. The landscape is moving quickly as we approach the April changeover, and with management budgets getting cut, it’s an increasingly challenging area to work in. This new report from the Nuffield Trust [read the full story…]

Cochrane review finds bupropion is the best treatment to help people with schizophrenia give up smoking

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Woman breaking cigarette

People with schizophrenia are 2-3 times more likely to smoke tobacco than the rest of the population, so helping them quit is a significant public health issue. The evidence for smoking cessation interventions in the general population is fairly well defined. We know quite a bit about what works and we have a range of [read the full story…]

New meta-review highlights the best approaches for preventing violence in young people

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Young man with shot gun

The WISQARS Leading Causes of Death website is a mine of information for researchers and bloggers alike. I searched it to find out what the leading causes of death are for people (all races, both sexes) in the US aged 10-24 years. The top three in 2010 were: Unintentional injury (e.g. road traffic accidents, poisoning, [read the full story…]

Non-drug treatments delivered by family carers can improve neuropsychiatric symptoms in people with dementia

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This quali

About three-quarters of people with dementia are affected by neuropsychiatric symptoms (NPS). This is a broad group of symptoms including depression, sleep problems, apathy, psychosis and aggression. Of course, many people with dementia still live at home and are cared for by their spouse or other primary carer. These neuropsychiatric symptoms can have a major impact [read the full story…]

Joined-up and evidence-based services to promote student mental health and well-being

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Studying

Yesterday was University Mental Health and Wellbeing Day and there were various activities going on to help promote mental health and wellbeing. Students in higher education present some interesting challenges to mental health professionals, other NHS and higher education staff who provide services for this population. Student health services remain a bit of a mixed bag [read the full story…]

Low birth weight boys who experience stress may be at increased risk of adolescent depression and anxiety

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Premature baby

Depression and anxiety are common conditions in adolescence that can lead to persistent and life-long mood and anxiety disorders for some people. One theory is that prenatal maternal stress can contribute to depression in young people (the so called fetal programming hypothesis). The notion here is that pregnant women who experience stress may send messages to their foetus [read the full story…]