This recent study concludes that childhood abuse creates an enduring vulnerability to psychosis that is realised in the event of exposure to further stressors and risk factors, such as separation, bereavement, or being involved in an accident or physical attack.
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John Baker reports on the first population based report of the positive effects of antipsychotic medication and mood stabilisers on reducing the risk of a conviction for violent crime, published in the Lancet in May.
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The MATISSE trial in 2012 concluded that group art therapy did no better than standard care at improving symptoms for people with schizophrenia. A new critique of that RCT from the British Association of Art Therapists says the therapy can be more useful.
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Raphael Underwood reports on routinely collected data from the Scottish Morbidity Record, which suggests that 1 in 8 people with first-ever diagnosed acute and transient psychotic disorders will develop schizophrenia within 3–5 years. Researchers conclude that those at high risk of transition may benefit from monitoring for possible diagnostic change.
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For me, one of the most infuriating aspects of health care is the relegation of mental health problems, and mental health services, as secondary to physical health. There are a myriad of examples of this, from the classic stigma that people with mental health problems receive compared to those with physical health problems (fantastically illustrated [read the full story…]
Schizophrenia is a complex disorder (or, more likely, group of disorders) that has reality distortion at its core. Efforts to establish the cause of schizophrenia have been ongoing for more than a century, and many models have come and gone in that time (not for nothing has schizophrenia been called ‘the graveyard of neuropathologists’ (Plum, [read the full story…]
In England and Wales, the Mental Health Act (1983, revised 2007) allows for the detention of individuals to hospital for a period of assessment (Section 2) or treatment (Section 3) if it is deemed that they suffer with a mental disorder of a nature or degree sufficient to warrant admission to hospital and it is necessary [read the full story…]
The relationship between cannabis and psychosis has been one of the hottest topics in psychiatry over the last decade, and with good reason. Policy-makers still disagree on whether cannabis should be legalised or how it should be classified, with Uruguay being the most recent country to legalise it. Drawing broadly from work initiated by Robin [read the full story…]
This report provides everything that is needed for people working in mental health services to make a business case for investing in early and community-based interventions. This includes, commissioners, practitioners, local authorities, policy-makers, providers, and social care. As part of this document, the authors have provided the evidence for the cost-effectiveness of a range of [read the full story…]
For many years, psychiatry has highlighted that people with epilepsy appear to have an elevated risk for psychosis. However, studies exploring this relationship (of which there are many) seem to disagree on just what the prevalence of psychosis is in this group. For example, Gudmundsson (1966) interviewed every patient with epilepsy in Iceland and concluded [read the full story…]
