Adolescents with psychiatric symptoms such as attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), social phobia, hostility and depression may be more likely to develop an Internet addiction, according to a report in the October issue of Archives of Pediatrics & Adolescent Medicine, one of the JAMA/Archives journals.
Although the Internet has become one of the most significant information resources for adolescents, addiction to the Internet can negatively impact school performance, family relationships and adolescents' emotional state, according to background information in the article. "This phenomenon has been described as Internet addiction or problematic Internet use and classified as a possible behavior addiction," the authors write. Previous studies report that 1.4 percent to 17.9 percent of adolescents are addicted to the Internet in both Western and Eastern societies; therefore, there have been suggestions to add Internet and gaming addictions to the fifth edition of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders. "Identification of the risk factors for Internet addiction is therefore of clinical significance for the prevention of, and early intervention into, Internet addiction in adolescents."
READ MORE @ SCIENCE DAILY
Showing posts with label diagnosis. Show all posts
Showing posts with label diagnosis. Show all posts
Friday, October 9, 2009
Thursday, September 24, 2009
Bipolar Disorder Amongst Children And Adolescents Receive Late Diagnosis
A new study finds that 75% of the cases of paediatric bipolar disorder are diagnosed late – up to 18 months – due to the symptoms manifesting themselves in a different manner depending on whether the patient is a child or adult. Moreover, 25% of sufferers have a delay in their medical diagnoses of up to three years and four months, according to a study by the Department of Psychiatry and Medical Psychology at the University Hospital of Navarra, in collaboration with the Paediatric Psychopharmacology Unit at the Massachusetts General Hospital at Harvard University (Boston, United States).
As Dr. Inmaculada Escamilla Canales, specialist at the Madrid-based Child and Adolescent Psychiatry Unit of the University Hospital of Navarra explained, the research was based on an article previously published by her department in 2005 in which the perspectives of bipolar disorder amongst children outside the USA were reviewed. A very low incidence was observed in Europe compared to the North American samples, especially amongst certain countries. Also, in Great Britain, a study undertaken with a sufficiently representative sample concluded that the rate for this illness was non-existent.
READ MORE @ SCIENCE DAILY
As Dr. Inmaculada Escamilla Canales, specialist at the Madrid-based Child and Adolescent Psychiatry Unit of the University Hospital of Navarra explained, the research was based on an article previously published by her department in 2005 in which the perspectives of bipolar disorder amongst children outside the USA were reviewed. A very low incidence was observed in Europe compared to the North American samples, especially amongst certain countries. Also, in Great Britain, a study undertaken with a sufficiently representative sample concluded that the rate for this illness was non-existent.
READ MORE @ SCIENCE DAILY
Tuesday, September 22, 2009
Brain Scans Link ADHD to Biological Flaw Tied to Motivation
For decades, attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder has sparked debate. Is it a biological illness, the dangerous legacy of genes or environmental toxins, or a mere alibi for bratty kids, incompetent parents and a fraying social fabric?
With 4.5 million U.S. children having received a diagnosis of the disorder -- and more than half of them taking prescription drugs to control it -- the question has divided doctors and patients, parents and teachers, and mothers and fathers.
Scientists maintain that they've been narrowing in on the origins and mechanics of disabling distraction, while gathering increasing evidence that ADHD is as real as such less controversial disorders as Down syndrome and schizophrenia. Their most recent progress is described in a Sept. 9 report in the Journal of the American Medical Association, based on a new study that indicates a striking difference in the brain's motivational machinery in people with ADHD symptoms.
READ MORE @ WASHINGTON POST
With 4.5 million U.S. children having received a diagnosis of the disorder -- and more than half of them taking prescription drugs to control it -- the question has divided doctors and patients, parents and teachers, and mothers and fathers.
Scientists maintain that they've been narrowing in on the origins and mechanics of disabling distraction, while gathering increasing evidence that ADHD is as real as such less controversial disorders as Down syndrome and schizophrenia. Their most recent progress is described in a Sept. 9 report in the Journal of the American Medical Association, based on a new study that indicates a striking difference in the brain's motivational machinery in people with ADHD symptoms.
READ MORE @ WASHINGTON POST
Thursday, August 13, 2009
Some Conditions Misdiagnosed as Bipolar Disorder
A study published last year suggested that bipolar disorder may be over diagnosed in people seeking mental health care. Now new findings shed light on which disorders many of these patients actually have.
Bipolar disorder, also known as manic depression, involves dramatic swings in mood -- ranging from debilitating depression to euphoric recklessness.
In the original 2008 study, researchers at Brown University School of Medicine found that of 145 adults who said they had been diagnosed with bipolar disorder, 82 (57 percent) turned out not to have the condition when given a comprehensive diagnostic interview.
In this latest study, published in the Journal of Clinical Psychiatry, the researchers used similar standardized interviews to find out which disorders those 82 patients might have.
Overall, they found, nearly half had major depression, while borderline personality disorder, post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), generalized anxiety and social phobia were each diagnosed in roughly one-quarter to one-third.
READ MORE @ ABC NEWS
Bipolar disorder, also known as manic depression, involves dramatic swings in mood -- ranging from debilitating depression to euphoric recklessness.
In the original 2008 study, researchers at Brown University School of Medicine found that of 145 adults who said they had been diagnosed with bipolar disorder, 82 (57 percent) turned out not to have the condition when given a comprehensive diagnostic interview.
In this latest study, published in the Journal of Clinical Psychiatry, the researchers used similar standardized interviews to find out which disorders those 82 patients might have.
Overall, they found, nearly half had major depression, while borderline personality disorder, post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), generalized anxiety and social phobia were each diagnosed in roughly one-quarter to one-third.
READ MORE @ ABC NEWS
Friday, July 17, 2009
Vets’ Mental Health Diagnoses Rising
A new study has found that more than one-third of Iraq and Afghanistan war veterans who enrolled in the veterans health system after 2001 received a diagnosis of a mental health problem, most often post-traumatic stress disorder or depression.
The study by researchers at the San Francisco Department of Veterans Affairs Medical Center and the University of California, San Francisco, also found that the number of veterans found to have mental health problems rose steadily the longer they were out of the service.
The study, released Thursday, was based on the department health records of 289,328 veterans involved in the two wars who used the veterans health system for the first time from April 1, 2002, to April 1, 2008.
The researchers found that 37 percent of those people received mental health diagnoses. Of those, the diagnosis for 22 percent was post-traumatic stress disorder, or PTSD, for 17 percent it was depression and for 7 percent it was alcohol abuse. One-third of the people with mental health diagnoses had three or more problems, the study found.
READ MORE @ NYTIMES
The study by researchers at the San Francisco Department of Veterans Affairs Medical Center and the University of California, San Francisco, also found that the number of veterans found to have mental health problems rose steadily the longer they were out of the service.
The study, released Thursday, was based on the department health records of 289,328 veterans involved in the two wars who used the veterans health system for the first time from April 1, 2002, to April 1, 2008.
The researchers found that 37 percent of those people received mental health diagnoses. Of those, the diagnosis for 22 percent was post-traumatic stress disorder, or PTSD, for 17 percent it was depression and for 7 percent it was alcohol abuse. One-third of the people with mental health diagnoses had three or more problems, the study found.
READ MORE @ NYTIMES
Monday, July 13, 2009
Map Of Your Brain May Reveal Early Mental Illness
John Csernansky wants to take your measurements. Not the circumference of your chest, waist and hips. No, this doctor wants to stretch a tape measure around your hippocampus, thalamus and prefrontal cortex.
OK, maybe not literally a tape measure, but he does want to chart the dimensions of the many structures in the human brain. From those measurements -- obtained from an MRI scan -- Csernansky will produce a map of the unique dips, swells and crevasses of the brains of individuals that he hopes will provide the first scientific tool for early and more definite diagnosis of mental disorders such as schizophrenia. Diagnosing the beginning stage of mental disorders remains elusive, although this when they are most treatable.
The shapes and measurements of brain structures can reveal how they function. Thus, Csernansky hopes his brain maps will reveal how the brains of humans with and without major mental disorders differ from each other and the time frame over which those differences develop.
READ MORE @ SCIENCE DAILY
OK, maybe not literally a tape measure, but he does want to chart the dimensions of the many structures in the human brain. From those measurements -- obtained from an MRI scan -- Csernansky will produce a map of the unique dips, swells and crevasses of the brains of individuals that he hopes will provide the first scientific tool for early and more definite diagnosis of mental disorders such as schizophrenia. Diagnosing the beginning stage of mental disorders remains elusive, although this when they are most treatable.
The shapes and measurements of brain structures can reveal how they function. Thus, Csernansky hopes his brain maps will reveal how the brains of humans with and without major mental disorders differ from each other and the time frame over which those differences develop.
READ MORE @ SCIENCE DAILY
Sunday, July 12, 2009
Childhood-onset schizophrenia remains a mystery
A study at the National Institute of Mental Health that has already spanned 18 years may yield crucial answers to the rare disorder.
So rare is the child form of schizophrenia, it has taken researchers at the National Institute of Mental Health 18 years to diagnosis and collect data on 110 children.
"We are trying to understand schizophrenia in a comprehensive way," says Dr. Nitin Gogtay, a researcher involved with the project in Bethesda, Md. "We see the illness in a very pure form. At that age, there are no confounding factors, like alcohol or drug abuse. We feel a lot of answers will come out of this study."
The study, the largest of its kind worldwide, has already yielded clues about the disease -- the most severe mental illness. Although schizophrenia afflicts about 1% of adults, it occurs in about one of every 30,000 to 50,000 children 13 and under. The causes of the disease are a mystery, although genes are known to play a role. In young children, a brain injury at or near the time of birth may contribute to its onset.
READ MORE @ LOS ANGELES TIMES
So rare is the child form of schizophrenia, it has taken researchers at the National Institute of Mental Health 18 years to diagnosis and collect data on 110 children.
"We are trying to understand schizophrenia in a comprehensive way," says Dr. Nitin Gogtay, a researcher involved with the project in Bethesda, Md. "We see the illness in a very pure form. At that age, there are no confounding factors, like alcohol or drug abuse. We feel a lot of answers will come out of this study."
The study, the largest of its kind worldwide, has already yielded clues about the disease -- the most severe mental illness. Although schizophrenia afflicts about 1% of adults, it occurs in about one of every 30,000 to 50,000 children 13 and under. The causes of the disease are a mystery, although genes are known to play a role. In young children, a brain injury at or near the time of birth may contribute to its onset.
READ MORE @ LOS ANGELES TIMES
Saturday, May 2, 2009
Researchers find common genetic variations in autistic people
Findings show that many autistic people have a deviation in a portion of their DNA that affects the way brain cells connect with one another. The discovery may lead to treatments.
Researchers have found that many people with autism share common genetic variations, a discovery that may improve diagnosis and offers the promise of developing treatments for the frustratingly mysterious disorder.
Their findings, published in the journal Nature, compared the genomes of thousands of autistic people with those of thousands of people without the disorder -- a massive task that new technology has only recently made possible. The genome is the complex system of DNA coding that builds and runs the human body.
The review showed that most autistic people examined have a genetic variation in a portion of their DNA that affects the way brain cells connect with one another. Scientists also reported a link between autism and small "mistakes" in another DNA segment involved with cell communication. Both reports add weight to the idea that autism is related to problems with the way brain cells connect.
READ MORE @ LOS ANGELES TIMES
Researchers have found that many people with autism share common genetic variations, a discovery that may improve diagnosis and offers the promise of developing treatments for the frustratingly mysterious disorder.
Their findings, published in the journal Nature, compared the genomes of thousands of autistic people with those of thousands of people without the disorder -- a massive task that new technology has only recently made possible. The genome is the complex system of DNA coding that builds and runs the human body.
The review showed that most autistic people examined have a genetic variation in a portion of their DNA that affects the way brain cells connect with one another. Scientists also reported a link between autism and small "mistakes" in another DNA segment involved with cell communication. Both reports add weight to the idea that autism is related to problems with the way brain cells connect.
READ MORE @ LOS ANGELES TIMES
Friday, April 17, 2009
What Should Count as a Mental Disorder in DSM-V?
If sick men fared just as well eating and drinking and living exactly as healthy men do . . . there would be little need for the science [of medicine].
attributed to Hippocrates
Well, while I’m here, I’ll do the work—and what’s the work? To ease the pain of living. . . .
Allen Ginsberg
What exactly is a “mental disorder”? For that matter, what criteria should determine whether any condition is a “disease” or a “disorder”? Is “disease” something like an oak tree—a physical object you can bump into or put your arms around? Or are terms like “disease” and “disorder” merely abstract, value-laden constructs, akin to “injustice” and “immorality”? Are categories of disease and disorder fundamentally different in psychiatry than in other medical specialties? And—by the way—how do the terms “disease,” “disorder,” “syndrome,” “malady,” “sickness,” and “illness” differ?
Anyone who believes there are easy or certain answers to these questions is either in touch with the Divine Mind, or out of touch with reality. To appreciate the complexity and ambiguity in this conceptual arena, consider this quote from the venerable Oxford Textbook of Philosophy and Psychiatry:
The term “mental illness” is probably best used for those disorders that are intuitively most like bodily illness (or disease) and, yet, mental rather than bodily. This of course implies everything that is built into the mind-brain problem!1(p11)
In a single sentence, we are already grappling with the terms “illness,” “disorder,” and “disease,” not to mention Cartesian psychology! And yet—daunting though these issues are—they are central to the practical task now before the DSM-V committees: figuring out what conditions ought to be included as psychiatric disorders.
READ MORE @ PSYCHIATRIC TIMES
attributed to Hippocrates
Well, while I’m here, I’ll do the work—and what’s the work? To ease the pain of living. . . .
Allen Ginsberg
What exactly is a “mental disorder”? For that matter, what criteria should determine whether any condition is a “disease” or a “disorder”? Is “disease” something like an oak tree—a physical object you can bump into or put your arms around? Or are terms like “disease” and “disorder” merely abstract, value-laden constructs, akin to “injustice” and “immorality”? Are categories of disease and disorder fundamentally different in psychiatry than in other medical specialties? And—by the way—how do the terms “disease,” “disorder,” “syndrome,” “malady,” “sickness,” and “illness” differ?
Anyone who believes there are easy or certain answers to these questions is either in touch with the Divine Mind, or out of touch with reality. To appreciate the complexity and ambiguity in this conceptual arena, consider this quote from the venerable Oxford Textbook of Philosophy and Psychiatry:
The term “mental illness” is probably best used for those disorders that are intuitively most like bodily illness (or disease) and, yet, mental rather than bodily. This of course implies everything that is built into the mind-brain problem!1(p11)
In a single sentence, we are already grappling with the terms “illness,” “disorder,” and “disease,” not to mention Cartesian psychology! And yet—daunting though these issues are—they are central to the practical task now before the DSM-V committees: figuring out what conditions ought to be included as psychiatric disorders.
READ MORE @ PSYCHIATRIC TIMES
Wednesday, April 1, 2009
Comorbidity in Bipolar Disorder The Complexity of Diagnosis and Treatment
The central tenet of clinical comorbidity, the occurrence of 2 syndromes in the same patient, presupposes that they are distinct categorical entities. By this definition, 2 or more coexisting syndromes do not negate one another, nor paradoxically does this coexistence negate the potential for one to influence the course, outcome, and treatment response of the other. Isolating a syndrome by characterizing it through a unique pathogenic process allows for diagnostic fidelity even while acknowledging overlapping phenotypes.
Bipolar disorder (BPD) is highly prevalent and heterogeneous. Its increasing complexity is often caused by the presence of comorbid conditions, which have become the rule rather than the exception. Lifetime prevalence of psychiatric comorbidity has been reported in community and clinical studies. Most (95%) of the respondents with BPD in the National Comorbidity Survey met criteria for 3 or more lifetime psychiatric disorders.1 In a Stanley Foundation Bipolar Treatment Outcome Network study of almost 300 patients, 65% met DSM-IV criteria for at least 1 comorbid Axis I disorder.2
Analogous to models in medicine (eg, cardiovascular disease), BPD incorporates psychiatric and medical comorbidities (Table) whose simultaneous treatment is equally pressing to the core mood disturbance.3 Checks and balances must be used to address the distressing comorbid condition (eg, anxiety) whose treatment with an SSRI or serotonin norepinephrine reuptake inhibitor (SNRI) may catalyze a round of mood cycling in an otherwise stable patient; a greater degree of protection via mood stabilizers may be warranted in such an individual to reduce this possibility.
Overall, the presence of comorbidities in BPD has negative prognostic implications for psychological health and for medical well-being and longevity.4-6 The most common comorbid conditions are reviewed below to help guide the clinician through this diagnostic maze and associated treatment considerations.
READ MORE @ PSYCHIATRIC TIMES
Bipolar disorder (BPD) is highly prevalent and heterogeneous. Its increasing complexity is often caused by the presence of comorbid conditions, which have become the rule rather than the exception. Lifetime prevalence of psychiatric comorbidity has been reported in community and clinical studies. Most (95%) of the respondents with BPD in the National Comorbidity Survey met criteria for 3 or more lifetime psychiatric disorders.1 In a Stanley Foundation Bipolar Treatment Outcome Network study of almost 300 patients, 65% met DSM-IV criteria for at least 1 comorbid Axis I disorder.2
Analogous to models in medicine (eg, cardiovascular disease), BPD incorporates psychiatric and medical comorbidities (Table) whose simultaneous treatment is equally pressing to the core mood disturbance.3 Checks and balances must be used to address the distressing comorbid condition (eg, anxiety) whose treatment with an SSRI or serotonin norepinephrine reuptake inhibitor (SNRI) may catalyze a round of mood cycling in an otherwise stable patient; a greater degree of protection via mood stabilizers may be warranted in such an individual to reduce this possibility.
Overall, the presence of comorbidities in BPD has negative prognostic implications for psychological health and for medical well-being and longevity.4-6 The most common comorbid conditions are reviewed below to help guide the clinician through this diagnostic maze and associated treatment considerations.
READ MORE @ PSYCHIATRIC TIMES
Sunday, December 14, 2008
Is There Really an Epidemic of Depression? A new book argues that the mental illness is being overdiagnosed
LEHRER: In your book, you take a critical look at major depressive disorder (MDD), a mental illness that will afflict approximately 10 percent of individuals at some point during their life. In recent decades, the number of cases of MDD has sharply increased. Are we currently experiencing an epidemic of depression? Or is this surge due to changes in diagnosis?
HORWITZ AND WAKEFIELD: Our book argues that, despite widespread beliefs to the contrary, the rate of depressive disorders in the population has not undergone a general upsurge. In fact, careful studies that use the same criterion for diagnosis over time reveal no change in the prevalence of depression. What has changed is the growing number of people who seek treatment for this condition, the increase in prescriptions for antidepressant medications, the number of articles about depression in the media and scientific literature, and the growing presence of depression as a phenomenon in popular culture. It is also true that epidemiological studies of the general population appear to reveal immense amounts of untreated depression. All of these changes lead to the perception that the disorder itself has become more common.
READ MORE @ SCIENTIFIC AMERICAN
HORWITZ AND WAKEFIELD: Our book argues that, despite widespread beliefs to the contrary, the rate of depressive disorders in the population has not undergone a general upsurge. In fact, careful studies that use the same criterion for diagnosis over time reveal no change in the prevalence of depression. What has changed is the growing number of people who seek treatment for this condition, the increase in prescriptions for antidepressant medications, the number of articles about depression in the media and scientific literature, and the growing presence of depression as a phenomenon in popular culture. It is also true that epidemiological studies of the general population appear to reveal immense amounts of untreated depression. All of these changes lead to the perception that the disorder itself has become more common.
READ MORE @ SCIENTIFIC AMERICAN
Sunday, September 21, 2008
The Tyranny of Diagnosis
Not long ago, while surfing online for one disease, I got sidetracked by another: cryptogenic cirrhosis.
I have cared for patients with cryptogenic cirrhosis. It is a common cause of liver-related illness and death in the United States, and symptoms can range from jaundice, bleeding and confusion to life-threatening hemorrhage, coma and death.
The cause of the disease, as the name implies (from the Greek “krypt,” or hidden, and “genesis,” or origin), has long been unknown. Every one of my patients with cryptogenic cirrhosis has heard the same thing from their doctors, including myself: “We have no idea why you are so sick.”
For these patients, cryptogenic cirrhosis is not a diagnosis but a non-diagnosis.
READ MORE @ NY TIMES
I have cared for patients with cryptogenic cirrhosis. It is a common cause of liver-related illness and death in the United States, and symptoms can range from jaundice, bleeding and confusion to life-threatening hemorrhage, coma and death.
The cause of the disease, as the name implies (from the Greek “krypt,” or hidden, and “genesis,” or origin), has long been unknown. Every one of my patients with cryptogenic cirrhosis has heard the same thing from their doctors, including myself: “We have no idea why you are so sick.”
For these patients, cryptogenic cirrhosis is not a diagnosis but a non-diagnosis.
READ MORE @ NY TIMES
Monday, September 15, 2008
The Bipolar Puzzle
When Claire, a pixie-faced 6-year-old in a school uniform, heard her older brother, James, enter the family’s Manhattan apartment, she shut her bedroom door and began barricading it so swiftly and methodically that at first I didn’t understand what she was doing. She slid a basket of toys in front of the closed door, then added a wagon and a stroller laden with dolls. She hugged a small stuffed Pegasus to her chest. “Pega always protects me,” she said softly. “Pega, guard the door.”
James, then 10, had been given a diagnosis of bipolar disorder two years earlier. He was attending a therapeutic day school in another borough and riding more than an hour each way on a school bus, so he came home after Claire. Until James’s arrival that April afternoon, Claire was showing me sketches she had drawn of her Uglydolls and chatting about the Web site JibJab, where she likes to watch goofy videos. At the sound of James’s footsteps outside her bedroom door, she flattened herself behind the barricade. There was a sharp knock. After a few seconds, James’s angry, wounded voice barked, “Forget it,” and the steps retreated.
READ MORE @ NY TIMES
James, then 10, had been given a diagnosis of bipolar disorder two years earlier. He was attending a therapeutic day school in another borough and riding more than an hour each way on a school bus, so he came home after Claire. Until James’s arrival that April afternoon, Claire was showing me sketches she had drawn of her Uglydolls and chatting about the Web site JibJab, where she likes to watch goofy videos. At the sound of James’s footsteps outside her bedroom door, she flattened herself behind the barricade. There was a sharp knock. After a few seconds, James’s angry, wounded voice barked, “Forget it,” and the steps retreated.
READ MORE @ NY TIMES
Friday, August 15, 2008
Dissociative disorder often persists to adulthood
Dissociative disorder that begins in childhood or adolescence frequently persists into adulthood and is often followed by other psychiatric disorders, according to a report published online in the journal Child and Adolescent Psychiatry and Mental Health.
Dr. Thomas Jan from the University of Wuerzburg, Germany and colleagues analyzed the long-term clinical outcomes of 27 former patients with juvenile dissociative disorder (two of whom had committed suicide). The average age at onset of dissociative disorder was 12 years old.
According to the researchers, 89 percent of these patients had "recovered or had markedly reduced symptoms" after treatment during childhood. However, at follow-up an average of 12.4 years after the initial diagnosis, 83 percent of the patients "met the criteria for some form of psychiatric disorder."
READ MORE @ REUTERS
Dr. Thomas Jan from the University of Wuerzburg, Germany and colleagues analyzed the long-term clinical outcomes of 27 former patients with juvenile dissociative disorder (two of whom had committed suicide). The average age at onset of dissociative disorder was 12 years old.
According to the researchers, 89 percent of these patients had "recovered or had markedly reduced symptoms" after treatment during childhood. However, at follow-up an average of 12.4 years after the initial diagnosis, 83 percent of the patients "met the criteria for some form of psychiatric disorder."
READ MORE @ REUTERS
Thursday, August 14, 2008
FDA Psychiatry Chief Refuses To Address Questions About Pediatric Bipolar Disorder
Two weeks ago, the FDA announced that pediatric bipolar disorder--aka, child bipolar disorder, juvenile bipolar disorder, etc.--was a valid diagnosis, despite the fact that it doesn't exist in the DSM and child psychiatrists cannot even agree amongst themselves whether the disorder exists, whether it's a proxy term for something else, and what its exact symptomology might be much less its supposed pathology. The announcement occurred in an odd way--one of the inventors of child bipolar disorder, Harvard's Janet Wozniak, asserted in a letter to the editor of the Boston Globe that the FDA considered "pediatric bipolar disorder"--her term--a valid diagnosis. That was news to me, so I queried the FDA and was told that, why yes indeedy, the agency considered the diagnosis real. Despite approving two drugs (Risperdal and Abilify, both atypical antipsychotics) for the treatment of pediatric bipolar disorder in kids aged 10 to 17 in the last year, the agency had not taken any sort of public stance on the existence of the disorder in kids and teens. Now it has.
READ MORE @ FURIOUS SEASONS
READ MORE @ FURIOUS SEASONS
Sunday, August 10, 2008
Houston scientists develop test for personality disorder - Malfunction is identified by brain imaging devices during game play
Using brain imaging devices and a computer game, Houston researchers have developed an objective test for borderline personality disorder, a serious mental illness whose sufferers are unable to form and maintain stable relationships.
The brain malfunction found by Baylor College of Medicine neuroscientists is thought to be the first identified for any personality disorder.
"I'm hopeful this will mark a new approach for mental illness," said Read Montague, director of Baylor's Human Neuroimaging Lab and the project's leader. "It should provide a tool to diagnose the condition and test therapy's effectiveness."
The research, published in Friday's edition of the journal Science, is part of an ongoing effort to understand the neurobiology behind mental illnesses and to develop objective diagnostic tests for them, similar to the bloodwork, biopsies and x-rays used to diagnose other ailments. Baylor has been a leader in the effort.
As many as one in five psychiatric inpatients have borderline personality disorder, a formidable toll on not just those afflicted but on their social network and the health-care system.
READ MORE @ HOUSTON CHRONICLE
The brain malfunction found by Baylor College of Medicine neuroscientists is thought to be the first identified for any personality disorder.
"I'm hopeful this will mark a new approach for mental illness," said Read Montague, director of Baylor's Human Neuroimaging Lab and the project's leader. "It should provide a tool to diagnose the condition and test therapy's effectiveness."
The research, published in Friday's edition of the journal Science, is part of an ongoing effort to understand the neurobiology behind mental illnesses and to develop objective diagnostic tests for them, similar to the bloodwork, biopsies and x-rays used to diagnose other ailments. Baylor has been a leader in the effort.
As many as one in five psychiatric inpatients have borderline personality disorder, a formidable toll on not just those afflicted but on their social network and the health-care system.
READ MORE @ HOUSTON CHRONICLE
Thursday, December 27, 2007
Searching for Similar Diagnosis Through DNA
The girls had never met, but they looked like sisters.
There was no missing the similarities: the flat bridge of their noses, the thin lips, the fold near the corner of their eyes. And to the families of 14-year-old Samantha Napier and 4-year-old Taygen Lane there was something else, too. In the likeness was lurking an explanation for the learning difficulties, the digestion problems, the head-banging that had troubled each of them, for so long.
Several of the adults wiped tears from their eyes. “It’s like meeting family,” said Jessica Houk, Samantha’s older sister, who accompanied her and their mother to a Kentucky amusement park last July to greet Taygen.
But the two families are not related, and would never have met save for an unusual bond: a few months earlier, a newly available DNA test revealed that Samantha and Taygen share an identical nick in the short arm of their 16th chromosomes.
READ MORE @ NY TIMES
There was no missing the similarities: the flat bridge of their noses, the thin lips, the fold near the corner of their eyes. And to the families of 14-year-old Samantha Napier and 4-year-old Taygen Lane there was something else, too. In the likeness was lurking an explanation for the learning difficulties, the digestion problems, the head-banging that had troubled each of them, for so long.
Several of the adults wiped tears from their eyes. “It’s like meeting family,” said Jessica Houk, Samantha’s older sister, who accompanied her and their mother to a Kentucky amusement park last July to greet Taygen.
But the two families are not related, and would never have met save for an unusual bond: a few months earlier, a newly available DNA test revealed that Samantha and Taygen share an identical nick in the short arm of their 16th chromosomes.
READ MORE @ NY TIMES
Tuesday, November 27, 2007
Brain scans 'may detect OCD risk'
Brain scans may be able to reveal which people are at genetic risk of developing obsessive compulsive disorder (OCD), researchers say.
Individuals with OCD and their close relatives have distinctive patterns in their brain structure, a team at Cambridge University found.
The genes responsible remain unknown, but it appears they change the brain's anatomy, which may aid diagnosis.
The study is published in the latest edition of the journal Brain.
OCD is an anxiety disorder in which the person is compelled by irrational fears and thoughts to repeat seemingly needless actions over and over again.
It can manifest itself in repetitive behaviours, such as excessive hand washing, cleaning or repeated checking, affects 2%-3% of the population and is known to run in families.
READ MORE @ BBC
Individuals with OCD and their close relatives have distinctive patterns in their brain structure, a team at Cambridge University found.
The genes responsible remain unknown, but it appears they change the brain's anatomy, which may aid diagnosis.
The study is published in the latest edition of the journal Brain.
OCD is an anxiety disorder in which the person is compelled by irrational fears and thoughts to repeat seemingly needless actions over and over again.
It can manifest itself in repetitive behaviours, such as excessive hand washing, cleaning or repeated checking, affects 2%-3% of the population and is known to run in families.
READ MORE @ BBC
Tuesday, September 4, 2007
More Children Being Treated for Bipolar Disorder
The number of American children and adolescents treated for bipolar disorder increased 40-fold from 1994 to 2003, researchers are to report on Tuesday, in the most comprehensive study to look at the controversial diagnosis. And experts say the numbers have almost certainly risen further in the years since.
Most experts believe the jump reflects the fact that doctors are more aggressively applying the diagnosis to children, not that the number of new cases has gone up. But the magnitude of the increase is surprising to many experts, who say it is likely to intensify a debate over the validity of the diagnosis that has shaken the field of child psychiatry in recent years.
READ MORE @ NY TIMES
Most experts believe the jump reflects the fact that doctors are more aggressively applying the diagnosis to children, not that the number of new cases has gone up. But the magnitude of the increase is surprising to many experts, who say it is likely to intensify a debate over the validity of the diagnosis that has shaken the field of child psychiatry in recent years.
READ MORE @ NY TIMES
Friday, August 24, 2007
Depression is over-diagnosed, psychiatrist claims
Too many people are being diagnosed with depression when they are merely unhappy, a senior psychiatrist said today.
Normal emotions are sometimes being treated as mental illness because the threshold for clinical depression is too low, according to Professor Gordon Parker.
Prof Parker said depression had become a "catch-all" diagnosis, driven by clever marketing from pharmaceutical companies and leading to the burgeoning prescription of antidepressant drugs.
Writing in the British Medical Journal (BMJ), he said the drugs were being marketed beyond their "true utility" in cases in which people were unhappy rather than clinically depressed.
The psychiatrist, of the University of New South Wales, Australia, said the "over-diagnosis" of depression began in the early 80s, when the diagnostic threshold for minor mood disorders was lowered.
READ MORE @ GUARDIAN UNLIMITED
Normal emotions are sometimes being treated as mental illness because the threshold for clinical depression is too low, according to Professor Gordon Parker.
Prof Parker said depression had become a "catch-all" diagnosis, driven by clever marketing from pharmaceutical companies and leading to the burgeoning prescription of antidepressant drugs.
Writing in the British Medical Journal (BMJ), he said the drugs were being marketed beyond their "true utility" in cases in which people were unhappy rather than clinically depressed.
The psychiatrist, of the University of New South Wales, Australia, said the "over-diagnosis" of depression began in the early 80s, when the diagnostic threshold for minor mood disorders was lowered.
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