Children who are breastfed for longer than six months could be at lower risk of mental health problems later in life, according to Australian research.
A study by the Telethon Institute for Child Health Research in Perth looked at 2,366 children born to women enrolled in a pregnancy study in the state of Western Australia.
Each of the children underwent a mental health assessment when they were aged two, five, eight, 10, and 14.
The researchers found that breastfeeding could help babies cope better with stress and may signal a stronger mother-child attachment which could provide lasting benefits.
"Breastfeeding for a longer duration appears to have significant benefits for the onward mental health of the child into adolescence," researcher Dr. Wendy Oddy, who led the study, wrote in The Journal of Pediatrics.
READ MORE @ REUTERS
Showing posts with label mental health. Show all posts
Showing posts with label mental health. Show all posts
Thursday, January 14, 2010
Friday, November 13, 2009
Web-based counseling service Vets Prevail offered to veterans
Veterans in need of counseling, support or information to deal with mental and emotional issues can now turn to an online, interactive program called Vets Prevail. The services are provided confidentially and free of charge.
The website allows veterans to connect with other vets through forums, blogs and multimedia content. Vets can also sign up for a six-week online mental health program tool designed to help them build resilience and readjust to life after deployment. The aim of the training is to help vets tackle negative emotions and keep the trauma of the battlefield from affecting daily life and relationships.
About 500 veterans will be able to access the training program based on funds provided by Major League Baseball and the McCormick Foundation. However, organizers aim to continue the service with additional funding.
READ MORE @ LS ANGELES TIMES
The website allows veterans to connect with other vets through forums, blogs and multimedia content. Vets can also sign up for a six-week online mental health program tool designed to help them build resilience and readjust to life after deployment. The aim of the training is to help vets tackle negative emotions and keep the trauma of the battlefield from affecting daily life and relationships.
About 500 veterans will be able to access the training program based on funds provided by Major League Baseball and the McCormick Foundation. However, organizers aim to continue the service with additional funding.
READ MORE @ LS ANGELES TIMES
Sunday, May 17, 2009
Preventing Another Camp Liberty
Midway through her 2004 deployment to Iraq's Anbar province, Navy psychologist Heidi Kraft was e-mailing her husband about her experiences, and the message somehow turned into verse. The poem became the basis for her memoir "Rule Number Two: Lessons I Learned in a Combat Hospital" -- lessons that she revisited last week following the shooting at a combat stress facility in Baghdad. Kraft, who left active duty after nine years in the Navy and now treats combat stress patients, spoke with Outlook's Rachel Dry about how the military handles mental health and why PTSD can be like a sprained ankle. Excerpts:
Last Monday, Sgt. John M. Russell allegedly walked into a combat stress facility at Camp Liberty in Baghdad and opened fire, killing five service members. What did you think when you heard about the shooting?
My heart sank. I was so terribly saddened to hear it. As a provider, I can understand how something like this might have happened. Certainly if someone expresses either suicidal or homicidal thoughts, that person is categorized as a psychiatric emergency and steps are taken to stabilize that person. Sometimes those thoughts are not expressed in a way that makes it very clear what you're dealing with, and sometimes there's nothing to be done.
READ MORE @ WASHINGTON POST
Last Monday, Sgt. John M. Russell allegedly walked into a combat stress facility at Camp Liberty in Baghdad and opened fire, killing five service members. What did you think when you heard about the shooting?
My heart sank. I was so terribly saddened to hear it. As a provider, I can understand how something like this might have happened. Certainly if someone expresses either suicidal or homicidal thoughts, that person is categorized as a psychiatric emergency and steps are taken to stabilize that person. Sometimes those thoughts are not expressed in a way that makes it very clear what you're dealing with, and sometimes there's nothing to be done.
READ MORE @ WASHINGTON POST
Saturday, January 31, 2009
Women's mental health deteriorates as one in five experience common disorders
An NHS report has found a significant increase in the number of women suffering from depression, anxiety and suicidal thoughts
Women's mental health is deteriorating according to an NHS report that has found that more than one in five of the adult female population experiences depression, anxiety or suicidal thoughts.
The report found the proportion of women aged 16-64 with common mental disorders (CMDs) increased from 19.1% in 1993 to 21.5% in 2007, whereas the rate in men did not alter significantly.
The largest increase in CMD rates, up 20% between 1993 and 2007, was among women aged 45-64. The proportion of women aged 16-74 reporting suicidal thoughts also increased from 4.2% in 2000 to 5.5% in 2007.
Based on the results of a study of over 7,000 households carried out by the National Centre for Social Research together with researchers at the University of Leicester, the Adult Psychiatric Morbidity Survey is the latest in a series of surveys conducted at roughly seven-year intervals, with previous surveys carried out by the Office for National Statistics in 1993 and 2000.
READ MORE @ GUARDIAN
Women's mental health is deteriorating according to an NHS report that has found that more than one in five of the adult female population experiences depression, anxiety or suicidal thoughts.
The report found the proportion of women aged 16-64 with common mental disorders (CMDs) increased from 19.1% in 1993 to 21.5% in 2007, whereas the rate in men did not alter significantly.
The largest increase in CMD rates, up 20% between 1993 and 2007, was among women aged 45-64. The proportion of women aged 16-74 reporting suicidal thoughts also increased from 4.2% in 2000 to 5.5% in 2007.
Based on the results of a study of over 7,000 households carried out by the National Centre for Social Research together with researchers at the University of Leicester, the Adult Psychiatric Morbidity Survey is the latest in a series of surveys conducted at roughly seven-year intervals, with previous surveys carried out by the Office for National Statistics in 1993 and 2000.
READ MORE @ GUARDIAN
Wednesday, January 16, 2008
On Parenting: Getting a Doctor to Face Behavioral Concerns
Pediatricians may not look after kids' mental health—unless parents lend a hand
When parents are worried about a child being depressed or having an eating disorder or a problem with drugs or drinking, the family pediatrician is the natural place to turn for help. But families might not get the help they need. Doctors, it turns out, are often reluctant to tackle children's mental and behavioral problems.
That's the sobering news from a study that offers clues as to why so many families struggle to get treatment for their troubled children. Fortunately, it also offers insight into how parents can work the system to get their children the help they need.
Mental-health care may sound like a frill compared with, say, treating asthma or strep throat. Yet mental-health problems are nearly twice as common as asthma, with at least 11 percent of children having a mental or behavioral disorder that significantly impairs their life. Given that, you'd think that pediatricians would be all over the mental-health issue.
READ MORE @ US NEWS & WORLD REPORT
When parents are worried about a child being depressed or having an eating disorder or a problem with drugs or drinking, the family pediatrician is the natural place to turn for help. But families might not get the help they need. Doctors, it turns out, are often reluctant to tackle children's mental and behavioral problems.
That's the sobering news from a study that offers clues as to why so many families struggle to get treatment for their troubled children. Fortunately, it also offers insight into how parents can work the system to get their children the help they need.
Mental-health care may sound like a frill compared with, say, treating asthma or strep throat. Yet mental-health problems are nearly twice as common as asthma, with at least 11 percent of children having a mental or behavioral disorder that significantly impairs their life. Given that, you'd think that pediatricians would be all over the mental-health issue.
READ MORE @ US NEWS & WORLD REPORT
Wednesday, October 24, 2007
Veterans are denied mental health help
After two combat tours in Iraq on a "quick reaction team" that picked up body parts after suicide bombings, Donald Schmidt began suffering from nightmares and paranoia. Then he had a nervous breakdown.
The military discharged Schmidt last Oct. 31 for problems they said resulted not from post-traumatic stress disorder but rather from a personality disorder that pre-dated his military service.
Schmidt's mother, Patrice Semtner-Myers, says her son was told that if he agreed to leave the Army he'd get full benefits. Earlier this month, however, they got a bill in the mail from a collection agency working for the government, demanding that he repay his re-enlistment bonus, plus interest — $14,597.72.
Schmidt, 23, who lives near Peoria, Ill., is one of more than 22,000 service members the military has discharged in recent years for "pre-existing personality disorders" it says were missed when they signed up.
"They used these guys up, and now they're done with them and they're throwing them away," Semtner-Myers said.
Her frustration extends to Capitol Hill, where the stage is being set for a confrontation between Congress and the Pentagon.
Rep. Bob Filner, D-Calif., chairman of the House Veterans Affairs Committee, calls the treatment of these troops "disgraceful."
READ MORE @ ST. LOUIS POST DISPATCH
The military discharged Schmidt last Oct. 31 for problems they said resulted not from post-traumatic stress disorder but rather from a personality disorder that pre-dated his military service.
Schmidt's mother, Patrice Semtner-Myers, says her son was told that if he agreed to leave the Army he'd get full benefits. Earlier this month, however, they got a bill in the mail from a collection agency working for the government, demanding that he repay his re-enlistment bonus, plus interest — $14,597.72.
Schmidt, 23, who lives near Peoria, Ill., is one of more than 22,000 service members the military has discharged in recent years for "pre-existing personality disorders" it says were missed when they signed up.
"They used these guys up, and now they're done with them and they're throwing them away," Semtner-Myers said.
Her frustration extends to Capitol Hill, where the stage is being set for a confrontation between Congress and the Pentagon.
Rep. Bob Filner, D-Calif., chairman of the House Veterans Affairs Committee, calls the treatment of these troops "disgraceful."
READ MORE @ ST. LOUIS POST DISPATCH
Tuesday, September 25, 2007
A Plan for Better Troop Mental Care
The Department of Defense has released a plan to improve mental-health care for American troops who are facing multiple tours in war zones.
The report lays out a "road map for change" in an effort to "put psychological health and fitness on an equal footing with physical health and fitness." The recommendations address findings from a report released earlier this year that found that troops going to war face increasing levels of anxiety and depression with each successive deployment, with shorter "dwell times," or times at home with their families.
READ MORE @ US NEWS & WORLD REPORT
The report lays out a "road map for change" in an effort to "put psychological health and fitness on an equal footing with physical health and fitness." The recommendations address findings from a report released earlier this year that found that troops going to war face increasing levels of anxiety and depression with each successive deployment, with shorter "dwell times," or times at home with their families.
READ MORE @ US NEWS & WORLD REPORT
Monday, August 27, 2007
Survey: Post-Storm Mental Health Worsens
More Gulf Coast residents are thinking seriously about suicide or showing symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder as the recovery from Hurricane Katrina inches along, a new survey finds.
The survey is a follow-up to one done six months after the hurricane, which found that few people in Louisiana, Mississippi and Alabama _ about 3 percent _ had contemplated suicide in the storm's aftermath.
That figure has now doubled in the three-state area and is up to 8 percent in the New Orleans area, according to Ronald Kessler of Harvard Medical School, lead researcher for the Hurricane Katrina Community Advisory Group.
More people also showed signs of post-traumatic stress disorder, 21 percent of those interviewed this year compared to 16 percent in the earlier survey.
READ MORE @ ASSOCIATED PRESS
The survey is a follow-up to one done six months after the hurricane, which found that few people in Louisiana, Mississippi and Alabama _ about 3 percent _ had contemplated suicide in the storm's aftermath.
That figure has now doubled in the three-state area and is up to 8 percent in the New Orleans area, according to Ronald Kessler of Harvard Medical School, lead researcher for the Hurricane Katrina Community Advisory Group.
More people also showed signs of post-traumatic stress disorder, 21 percent of those interviewed this year compared to 16 percent in the earlier survey.
READ MORE @ ASSOCIATED PRESS
Monday, July 16, 2007
Gov. seeks to cut mental services for homeless
Schwarzenegger says ending the acclaimed program would save $55 million annually toward $3-billion budget gap.
A nationally lauded program that has helped thousands of mentally ill homeless men and women break the cycle of psychiatric hospitalization, jail time and street life is now on Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger's list of budget cuts.
The governor has proposed eliminating Integrated Services for Homeless Adults With Serious Mental Illness, which receives $55 million annually, as part of his attempt to close a budget gap estimated at more than $3 billion.
Mental health advocates, clients and concerned legislators are lobbying fiercely to save the program, which served as the blueprint for California's ongoing efforts to radically retool the state's mental health system.
READ MORE @ LOS ANGELES TIMES
A nationally lauded program that has helped thousands of mentally ill homeless men and women break the cycle of psychiatric hospitalization, jail time and street life is now on Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger's list of budget cuts.
The governor has proposed eliminating Integrated Services for Homeless Adults With Serious Mental Illness, which receives $55 million annually, as part of his attempt to close a budget gap estimated at more than $3 billion.
Mental health advocates, clients and concerned legislators are lobbying fiercely to save the program, which served as the blueprint for California's ongoing efforts to radically retool the state's mental health system.
READ MORE @ LOS ANGELES TIMES
Thursday, June 21, 2007
Gates Vows to Fix Mental Health System
Defense Secretary Robert Gates promised Thursday to speed up changes to the military's much-criticized mental health system, declaring ''this is something that we can, must and will get fixed.''
A study released last week said more money and people are needed to care for troops suffering depression, anxiety, post-traumatic stress symptoms and other mental health problems because of their war experiences. It also said the Pentagon needs to build a culture of support throughout the military to help remove the stigma of asking for and getting psychological help.
READ MORE @ NY TIMES
A study released last week said more money and people are needed to care for troops suffering depression, anxiety, post-traumatic stress symptoms and other mental health problems because of their war experiences. It also said the Pentagon needs to build a culture of support throughout the military to help remove the stigma of asking for and getting psychological help.
READ MORE @ NY TIMES
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