Borderline personality disorder and sleep problems in prison

Borderline personality disorder (BPD) is characterized by impulsiveness, unstable moods, relationship difficulties and low self-esteem. People with BPD are more likely to take drugs, behave antisocially and self-harm and are at much greater risk of getting into trouble with the law. Scientists think that only 1-2% of the population as a whole have BPD but this rises to 23-30% of people in prison. People with BPD who are in prison often have sleep problems but it is unclear whether it is the BPD itself of the depression that often goes with it that causes these. Researchers from George Mason University in Virginia studied 513 prisoners and found that symptoms of BPD were significantly associated with sleep problems even after allowing for the effects of depression. Drug use did not affect the link between BPD and depression. Depression was also associated with sleep disorders but again this link was independent of whether people were taking drugs or not.

Harty, Laura ... [et al] - Are inmates' subjective sleep problems associated with borderline personality, psychopathy, and antisocial personality independent of depression and substance dependence? Journal of Forensic Psychiatry and Psychology February 2010, 21(1), 23-38

New website launched for psychosis carers

A new website giving straightforward information, advice and support to relatives and friends of people with psychosis – including people who have schizophrenia and bipolar disorder – was launched on the 8th of February.

http://mentalhealthcare.org.uk/

The Institute of Psychiatry, King’s College London, the South London and Maudsley NHS Foundation Trust and Rethink, the mental health charity that runs support groups for carers, worked together to set up the site and the Wellcome Trust gave a grant to pay for its development.

People looking after friends or relatives with psychosis want accurate, reliable information which they can get easily and quickly. Although there are lots of websites about psychosis on the internet, there are not many British ones, and even less that are reliable. Many of the sites say completely different things so it is hard to know who to believe.

The new site aims to solve these problems by providing:

• short films of interviews with health professionals and researchers talking about different aspects of psychosis, treatment and care
• Ask the Pharmacist, Ask the Psychologist and Ask the Psychiatrist pages where visitors to the site can submit general questions
• summaries of IoP research about psychosis, written in plain English
• information on how to get involved with research
• links to other useful websites.

All the information on the website is based on research carried out to learn more about the causes of psychosis, develop new treatments or improve existing ones. Researchers from the IoP and mental health professionals from SLAM provide information for the site which is easy to find your way around, clearly laid out and written in plain English. It uses simple language and explains mental health terms; gives information about drugs and their side effects; describes other treatments, such as psychotherapy and explains how mental health services work.

Yes, you can be bored to death

Being bored might make life seem longer but it can actually shorten it in the long run. Researchers at University College London have been monitoring over 7,000 civil servants over 25 years as part of a long-term study of lifestyle and health. The civil servants who were aged between 35 and 55 at the start of the study were interviewed about their levels of boredom in the mid 1980s. Those with the highest levels of boredom were most likely to have died by the end of the study, perhaps because they had turned to drink, drugs or smoking to alleviate their boredom. Women, younger employees and those with menial jobs were all more likely to be bored at work.

You can find out more about this study at

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/health/healthnews/7187812/You-really-can-be-bored-to-death-study-shows.html

Twist or stick? Why it might all be down to the amygdala

Most people are reluctant to gamble if the potential losses outweigh the gains; something psychologists call loss aversion. Scientists think a part of the brain called the amygdala might play an important part in loss aversion and researchers at the California Institute of Technology studied two people who had suffered damage to this area. At the start of the experiment the participants, who also included twelve healthy controls, were given $50 to gamble on the toss of a coin. The ratio of what they would win to what they could lose was varied and when the risks outweighed the opportunities the healthy controls stopped gambling. However, the people with the damaged amygdalas carried on gambling whatever the risks confirming the theory that the amygdala does play a role in this process.

You can find out more about this research at

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2010/02/100208144457.htm?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+sciencedaily+%28ScienceDaily%3A+Latest+Science+News%29&utm_content=Google+Reader

Feeling secure on the streets of Sweden

Swedish researchers have been looking into the factors that make people afraid to walk the streets at night. Researchers from the University of Gothenburg carried out a series of studies into this issue. They found that young people who had experienced threats and violence felt more insecure than others, particularly when they were on their own. Being alone was a strong factor in people's insecurity. Being with friends and acquaintances made people feel most secure but even being surrounded by strangers made people feel safer. Younger people actually felt more insecure than older ones. The research also looked at how people's beliefs about the media influenced their perception of danger. They found that people who thought the media under-reported crime thought that the streets were more dangerous than those who thought the media was accurate or that it exaggerated crime.

You can find out more about this research

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2010/02/100208144457.htm?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+sciencedaily+%28ScienceDaily%3A+Latest+Science+News%29&utm_content=Google+Reader

Older parents and autism

Putting off having a child until later in life could increase the child's risk of developing autism. Increasing numbers of men and women are starting families later in life. Researchers from the University of California Davis looked at the records of all births in California between 1990 and the end of 1999 - a total of about 4.9 million births including 12,159 cases of autism. They found that a 40-year-old mother's risk of having an autistic child was 50% greater than that of a woman giving birth between the ages of 25 and 29. The father's age was only a factor when the mother was young. Fathers over 40 were twice as likey to have an autistic child if the mother was under 25 than fathers who were between 25 and 29. Some of the reasons put forward by the researchers to explain this were that sperm and egg quality declined with age and that environmental toxins accumulate in parent's bodies over time. But the risk of having a child with autism is still very low whatever age parents are.

You can find out more about this research at

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/health/healthnews/7188456/Putting-off-motherhood-increases-risk-of-autistic-child-researchers.html

Mediterranean diet could stave off Alzheimer's

The Mediterranean diet is good for you in all sorts of ways and a new study by researchers at Columbia University Medical Centre in New York has found that it can help stave off memory problems as well. The researchers studied 712 people and divided them into three groups depending on how closely they stuck to a Mediterranean diet high in vegetables, fruit, cereals and fish. Six years later they carried out MRI brain scans on the volunteers looking out for damage to areas of the brain that deal with memory. Those participants who followed the Mediterranean diet most closely were 36% less likely to have damage in these areas than those who stuck to a 'North European' diet high in dairy products, meat and chicken and with a moderate intake of alcohol. The researchers next project might be to work out a way to make broccoli, kiwi fruit and herbal tea taste as nice as chocolate, chips and whisky!

You can find out more about this study at

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/health/healthnews/7189891/Mediterranean-diet-can-lower-risk-of-Alzheimers.html

Depressed mothers and violent teenagers

Mothers who are depressed during their pregnancy may have children who are more aggressive than others and may also have been more aggressive as teenagers themselves. Researchers from Cardiff University, King's College London and the University of Bristol studied 120 children and interviewed their mothers while they were pregnant, after they gave birth and again when their children were 4, 11 and 16. The mothers who were depressed when they were pregnant were four times as likely to have children who were violent at 16. The mothers' depression was predicted by their own aggressive and disruptive behaviour as teenagers.

You can find out more about this research at

http://psychcentral.com/news/2010/02/08/depression-in-pregnancy-may-affect-childs-behavior-as-teen/11262.html

Family therapy and teenage depression

Family therapy can help to reduce suicidal thoughts and depression in adolescents. Suicide is the third leading cause of death in American teenagers, accounting for more than 1,300 deaths in children between the ages of 12 and 18 in 2005. Researchers from the Children's Hospital of Philadelphia studied 66 children aged between 12 and 17 who were suffering from suicidal thinking and depression. Some received Attachment-based Family Therapy while others received 'treatment as usual' in the community. By the end of the treatment those children who had had family therapy - which aims to resolve family conflicts and promote family strength - were four times more likely to have no suicidal thinking. They also showed a more rapid decrease in depression symptoms and were more likely to stay in treatment longer.

You can read more about this research at

http://psychcentral.com/news/2010/02/08/family-therapy-helps-suicidal-teens/11256.html

Excess mortality and schizophrenia

As a group, people with schizophrenia have a higher death rate than other people; something that has been proved in a number of different populations, continents and time periods. In Scandinavia the number of excessive deaths among schizophrenic people has actually increased since the 1970s but it is not known if this trend holds true in the U.K. A team of researchers from the University of Southampton studied 370 people with schizophrenia who had had contact with local NHS services between 1981 and 1982 and looked to see how many of them had died, and of what, by 2006. The researchers found that people with schizophrenia had a 2.89x greater risk of dying over this period than people in the rest of the population. Deaths from suicide were concentrated in the first five years after people had come into contact with psychiatric services but most of the excess mortality was due to natural causes. There was an 'indication' that deaths from cardiovascular disease may have increased in frequency relative to the rest of the population over the course of the study.

Brown, Steve ... [et al] - Twenty-five year mortality of a community cohort with schizophrenia British Journal of Psychiatry February 2010, 196(2), 116-121

Befriending for depression

Over 500 charities in the U.K. offer befriending to people where volunteers meet up with people to go for walks, see films, play snooker and a host of other activities. Lack of social support is known to be a risk factor for depression and a team of researchers led by Nicola Mead from the University of Manchester reviewed 24 studies into the effects of befriending schemes on people's depression symptoms. They found that compared with usual care or no treatment befriending had a modest but significant effect on depression symptoms.

Mead, Nicola ... [et al] - Effects of befriending on depressive symptoms and distress: systematic review and meta-analysis British Journal of Psychiatry February 2010, 196(2), 96-101

Genes, bullying and depression

Scientists are discovering more and more information about the way in which people's genes and environment interact to affect their health. A study of 78 girls by researchers at Stanford University in Palo Alto, California looked into the links between bullying, depression and a variation in a gene called 5-HTTLPR. Between 20-40% of children report bullying of some kind and 3-8% of children report frequent victimization. Bullying has been linked to depression, anxiety, loneliness and low self-esteem and girls are both more likely to suffer from it and to be more severely affected by it while variations in the gene 5-HTTLPR have been linked to an increased vulnerability to depression. So, the study asked the children about their mental health and whether they had been bullied and also tested them to see which variation in the gene they had. The researchers found that the genetic variation did not influence the children's levels of depression on its own. However, of the girls who had been bullied only those with the genetic variation were significantly more likely to develop depression.

Benjet, Corina, Thompson, Renee J. and Gotlib, Ian H. - 5-HTTLPR moderates the effect of relational peer victimization on depressive symptoms in adolescent girls Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry February 2010, 51(2), 173-179

Obesity and ADHD

Recent research has suggested that there is a link between mothers who are obese before they become pregnant and their children's risk of developing ADHD (Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder). This could be down to a number of factors. Mothers may gain weight because they are stressed and it is their stress rather than their weight problems that lead their children to develop ADHD; there may be a common genetic factor linking a tendency to obesity in mothers with a tendency towards ADHD in their children or obese mothers may be more likely to have obese children and it is the children's obesity that makes them more likely to have ADHD. Alina Rodriguez from Uppsala University in Sweden looked into this further in a study of 1,714 children and their mothers who were monitored from before the mother's pregnancy until their children were five. The study took into account the mother's circumstances (smoking, depression, 'life events', education, age and family structure), the child's birth weight and gestational age, whether the child was a boy or a girl, whether the parents had ADHD and if the child was overweight. Even after allowing for all these factors mothers who were overweight or obese before becoming pregnant were more likely to have children with attention problems. Being obese before becoming pregnant was associated with a doubling in the risk of one's children developing problems with 'emotional intensity' and managing emotions.

Rodriguez, Alina - Maternal pre-pregnancy obesity and risk for inattention and negative emotionality in children Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry February 2010, 51(2), 134-143

Suicide and genetics

It is estimated that between 10 and 20 million people a year try and kill themselves with around one million succeeding. Previous studies have shown that there is a genetic influence on suicide and that suicides tend to cluster in families. Researchers from the Max Planck Institute of Psychiatry in Munich studied three different groups of people in an attempt to find genes that might be associated with an increased risk of suicide. They studied 760 people in Germany. 394 of them were depressed of whom 113 had tried to kill themselves. They also studied another 744 German people being treated for depression, 152 of whom had attempted suicide. Finally they studied 921 African Americans who were attending a clinic for physical health problems - 119 of them had attempted suicide. The researchers found five genetic variations that were associated with an increased risk of suicide. For people with the three most significant variations there was a 4.5x greater risk of attempting suicide.

You can find out more about this research at

http://psychcentral.com/news/2010/02/03/suicide-risk-among-depressed-influenced-by-genetics/11152.html

Acupuncture for depression in pregnancy

About 10% of pregnant women meet the criteria for major depression and almost 20% have increased symptoms of depression during their pregnancy. These rates are about the same as other women but researchers can sometimes be reluctant to study treatments for pregnant women with depression in case they affect mother's babies. Dr Rosa Schnyer from the University of Arizona researched the effectiveness of acupuncture in treating depressed pregnant women. She divided the women into three separate groups. One group received acupuncture to treat their depression, another group received a different acupuncture treatment and a third group had some massage. After eight weeks the women who had received acupuncture for depression showed a significantly greater decrease in the severity of their depression and had a higher response rate to treatment than the other two groups.

You can find out more about this research at

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2010/02/100204075105.htm?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+sciencedaily+%28ScienceDaily%3A+Latest+Science+News%29&utm_content=Google+Reader

Brighter children at higher bipolar risk

Children who do better at school are more likely to develop bipolar disorder later in life. Researchers from King's College London and the Karolinska Institute in Gothenburg looked at the exam results of more than 700,000 Swedish teenagers and compared them to their later medical history. They found that those children with the highest performance were nearly four times as likely to develop bipolar disorder as those with average grades. Children with the poorest grades were twice as likely to develop bipolar disorder in adulthood as those with average grades. The link between high grades and bipolar disorder was particularly strong for creative subjects such as Swedish or music. People who suffer from bipolar disorder often experience extra energy, creativity and ability to connect ideas during the manic phase of their illness although mania can lead to inappropriate, dangerous or excessive behaviour. It is also worth remembering that on the whole people who do well at school tend to have better mental health than other people.

You can find out more about this research at

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/health/healthnews/7137591/Straight-A-schoolchildren-at-higher-risk-of-bipolar-disorder-research-claims.html

Clarkson is right say psychologists

In research guaranteed to gratify ageing petrol heads psychologists from the University of Wales Institute in Cardiff have found that a prestigious car really can make men seem more attractive. People in Cardiff city centre were asked to rate the attractiveness of men and women. The pictures were all of the same man or woman but half the time they were pictured in a Bentley and half the time they were pictured in a Ford Fiesta. The women who saw the man in a Bentley rated him as more attractive than the women who saw him in a Ford Fiesta. However, the men rated the women as equally attractive regardless of whether they saw her in a Bentley or a Fiesta.

You can find out more about this research at

http://bps-research-digest.blogspot.com/2010/02/shiny-swanky-car-boosts-mens-appeal-to.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+BpsResearchDigest+%28BPS+Research+Digest%29&utm_content=Google+Reader

Lack of treatment for depressed people in the U.S.

Most Americans with depression are not receiving adequate treatment and this situation is particularly bad among Mexican Americans and African Americans. A team of researchers led by Hector M. Gonzalez from Wayne State University in Detroit studied 15,762 people from all over the 48 states of mainland America. They assessed the severity of their depression using questionnaires and asked people whether they had received treatment in the last year. Despite having symptoms that were just as bad depressed Mexican Americans and Africa Americans received less treatment than other group. All groups used more psychotherapy than drugs and this bias was particularly strong in Caribbean black and African American people.

Gonzalez, Hector M. ... [et al] - Depression care in the United States: too little for too few Archives of General Psychiatry January 2010, 67(1), 37-46

Polypharmacy and psychiatry

Polypharmacy is prescribing more than one drug to the same patient for the same condition. It is recommended in some situations but in others drugs can work together to cause side effects and polypharmacy also adds to the costs of medical treatment. Researchers from Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore and Columbia University in New York analyzed 13,079 visits to psychiatrists in the U.S. between 1996 and 2006. They found that visits to the psychiatrist in which two or more drugs were prescribed rose from 42.6% in 1996/7 to 59.8% in 2005/6. Prescriptions for two or more antidepressants, antipsychotics, sedatives/hypnotics and antidepressant-antipsychotic combinations significantly increased across the period of the survey. The odds of prescribing two or more antidepressants were significantly associated with major depression, two or more antipsychotics were associated with schizophrenia, two or more mood stabilizers with bipolar disorder and two or more sedative/hypnotics with anxiety disorders.

Mojtabai, Ramin and Olfson, Mark - National trends in psychotropic medication polypharmacy in office-based psychiatry Archives of General Psychiatry January 2010, 67(1), 26-36

EMDR for traumatised children

Trauma-focused cognitive therapy has been shown to be effective in treating post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) in children and adolescents after physical and sexual abuse but there are fewer treatments for children who have suffered a single, severe trauma such as a car accident. Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing (EMDR) has been found to be effective in some cases of PTSD and a team of Australian researchers led by Michael Kemp from Murdoch University looked into EMDR in a study of 27 children aged between 6 and 12. The children were all suffering from persistent PTSD symptoms after a car accident. Half the participants were allotted to an EMDR group and the others were put on a waiting list. At the start of the study all of the children had two or more symptoms of PTSD but after treatment only 25% of the children in the EMDR group did compared to all those on the waiting list. However, the parents' rating of their children's PTSD symptoms showed no difference between the two groups and nor did other symptoms such as depression and anxiety. So, the jury is still out on EMDR as a therapy for this group of children.

Kemp, Michael, Drummond, Peter and McDermott, Brett - A wait-list controlled pilot study of eye-movement desensitization and reprocessing (EMDR) for children with post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) symptoms from motor vehicle accidents Clinical Child Psychology and Psychiatry January 2010, 15(1), 5-25