Andre Tomlin

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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What kind of exercise is best for depression? New Cochrane review says we need more trials before we can be sure

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Sep 12 2013

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Andre Tomlin

Some mental health interventions feel intuitively right. Exercise for depression is a great example. Of course, people suffering from low mood, poor motivation, lethargy and all of the other symptoms of depression will benefit from a jog around the park and some fresh air, right? The logical explanation for how this might help is fairly [read the full story…]

New mental health commissioning guides from JCPMH

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Jun 26 2013

Posted by
Andre Tomlin

Some doctors are reluctant to talk to patients about reducing their use of prescription drugs, even if they know there is no longer a medical reason for continued use.

Those lovely people at the Joint Commissioning Panel for Mental Health (JCP-MH) have published four new guides to help those of you involved in commissioning community specialist services, older people’s services, inpatient and crisis home treatment and services for people with learning disabilities. These guides are short (around 20 pages), readable and nicely summarised with ten [read the full story…]

The latest evidence from NICE on depression in children and young people

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Jun 21 2013

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Andre Tomlin

The NICE guideline for depression in children and young people was published way back in September 2005. Any elf worth his salt will tell you that a whole heap of evidence has been published since then, so it’s good to see an evidence update appear this week from NICE, which brings together research published from 17th [read the full story…]

Healthy Active Lives (HeAL): tackling premature death in young people with psychosis

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Jun 19 2013

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Andre Tomlin

The Healthy Active Lives (HeAL) international consensus statement aims to reverse the trend of people with severe mental illness dying early by tackling risks for future physical illnesses pro-actively and much earlier. The statement is being launched today by the Royal College of Psychiatrists, at a special event focusing on achieving parity between mental and [read the full story…]

NICE publish first clinical guideline on social anxiety disorder

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May 23 2013

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Andre Tomlin

I wonder if the timing of this publication was planned to be so close to the release of DSM-5, but this debut guidance on social phobia (now known as social anxiety disorder) is certainly going to ruffle some feathers. It fuels the discussion about the medicalisation of human personality traits and some will see it [read the full story…]

NICE publish dementia commissioning guide: practical advice for commissioners

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Apr 19 2013

Posted by
Andre Tomlin

NICE have published a new guide to help commissioners provide evidence-based care for people with dementia. Providing care for our ageing population seems not to have been out of the news in recent years and rightly so, especially as the headline stories are frequently not positive. A recent Care Quality Commission report found that people [read the full story…]

The latest evidence from NICE on the longer-term management of self-harm

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Apr 17 2013

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Andre Tomlin

The NICE guideline on the longer-term care and treatment of self-harm was published in November 2011 and contains research published up until January 2011. A group of experts including psychiatrists, psychologists and social workers has compiled an evidence update looking at the high quality research that has been published in the last two years (from [read the full story…]

Support the AllTrials campaign now!

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Apr 8 2013

Posted by
Andre Tomlin

The National Elf Service and Minervation (the organisation behind the elves) have been supporters of the AllTrials campaign since it began. We believe that all clinical trials should be published so that we can avoid repeating trials unnecessarily and make treatment decisions as good as they can be. It’s estimated that around half of the [read the full story…]

NICE publish first guideline for conduct disorders and antisocial behaviour in children and young people

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Apr 5 2013

Posted by
Andre Tomlin

Conduct disorders are the most common reason why children are referred to mental health services and it’s estimated that around 5% of all UK children aged 5-16 have a diagnosis of the condition. Around half of the young people affected by conduct disorders go on to have a serious mental health problem as an adult. [read the full story…]

New Cochrane review on employing consumer-providers in mental health services

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Apr 3 2013

Posted by
Andre Tomlin

It is commonplace in the UK and elsewhere for mental health service users to start working alongside mental health professionals in what is known as a ‘consumer-provider’ role. This can include a number of different skills and responsibilities such as peer support, advocacy, outreach and crisis support. A new systematic review from the Cochrane Consumers [read the full story…]

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