“Reducing Future Suicide Attempts by Forging Connection”
A new study published Tuesday in PLOS Medicine may offer evidence for an intervention for people who have already been hospitalized for a suicide attempt. The...
“A Compassionate Approach Leads to More Help, Less Punishment”
“Published in the journal PLoS ONE, a new set of studies suggests that compassion—and intentionally cultivating it through training—may lead us to do more to help the wronged than to punish the wrongdoer. Researchers found compassion may also impact the extent to which people punish the transgressor.”
“The Post-Irene Mental Health System of Care”
-Hurricane Irene seems to have left some community-based approaches to psychiatric care in its wake.
Five-year Study Re-affirms that Housing Stabilizes People
A five-year study involving 497 homeless people with mental health or addictions problems in Vancouver found that, when provided free apartments, most people “stabilized...
Nursing Homes Shift Tactics on Dementia
As part of a series on the inappropriate use of antipsychotics in nursing homes, the Boston Globe explores alternative approaches, such as llama therapy,...
On Mentally Ill People Dealing with “Sane” People’s Violence
Jack Bragen writes in the Berkeley Daily Planet about the impacts on people's minds of the war and violence going on around them. "Someone...
Recovery: Personal, Achievable, and Multidimensional
Interviews with 30 individuals three to five years after initial treatment for a first-episode psychosis found that a majority considered themselves to be recovered,...
Recovery-Oriented Services Benefit Providers As Well
In a study of 114 case managers in Ohio, researchers from Bowling Green State University found that those working at a recovery-oriented center reported...
Vermont Moves to Community Care After Hurricane Destroys State Hospital
Vermont Governor Peter Shumlin "is going to use this tragedy of losing our State Hospital during (hurricane) Irene as an opportunity to deliver the...
PLoS Medicine Series: Global Studies of “Practice-Based Evidence”
The Public Library of Science calls for "case studies that can help broaden our understanding of global mental health in 'real-life' contexts." The series...
Challenges and Visions for the “Mental Heatlh” System
I envision a world where there is no need for a mental health field/system because communities are strong and we have a holistic understanding...
Stable Housing Leads to Stable Lives
The Mental Health Commission of Canada will release an interim report this summer of its nationwide "Housing First" study - 1000 people with mental...
Review of Evidence for Non-Pharmacological Treatment of Depressive Disorders
Researchers in Germany review and evaluate the evidence for non-pharmacological treatment of depressive disorders, finding an "adequate level of evidence" for psychotherapeutic intervention, marital/couples/family...
Motherhood in Illness & Recovery
Researchers in Norway, publishing in the International Journal of Mental Health Nursing, explore the experiences of being a mother with mental illness; "their way...
Discrimination Impacts Mental Health: Especially Among the Educated
A cross-sectional study of 1,994 individuals in a deprived area of Japan found that perceived discrimination was significantly associated with depressive symptoms and a...
Bleuler’s Continued Legacy
This month's Neuropsychobiology reviews, in two articles, the continued legacy of Eugen Bleuler - originator of the term "schizophrenia." An article from Switzerland states that...
“Strength-Based Approaches to Community Healing”
Keris Myrick, MIA blogger and President of the NAMI board of directors, writes in Clinical Psychiatry News about community-based solutions that are working, and mentions...
Motherhood: Pride & Recovery
Researchers at the Rockland Psychiatric Center in New York found that of the 39% of female inpatients who were mothers, the majority reported having...
Your Input Welcome For 2012 Alternatives Keynote Speech – SURVEY
I was invited to give a Keynote Address at the 2012 Alternatives Conference in Portland Oregon, and I'm collecting your input on what I should...
Expectations Modulate Social Perception Differently in Schizophrenia, Autism
Writing in Frontiers in Human Neuroscience, researchers from the University of Cambridge and University College in London review the evidence that both attention and...
Training the Brain for Well-Being
Experience shapes the brain, for better or worse. Richard Davidson & Bruce McEwen review the ways that adverse early experience create measurable changes in...
Nevada Legislation Aims to Curb Psychotropics in Foster Children
A touching article in the Las Vegas Sun follows one child from abandonment through foster placements, polypharmacy, suicidality, delinquency and homelessness to stability off...
Transcultural Limitations of Medical Model Treatment in Ghana
An anthropological study of mental health service use in Ghana, published online June 21 in Transcultural Psychiatry, finds that counter to expectations almost all those...
Theory of Mind and Emotion Processing Training for Schizophrenia
Impairments in social cognition are critical predictors of social functioning in patients with schizophrenia. Emotion processing (EP) and theory of mind (ToM) are hypothesized...
Global Mental Health Research Needs Cultural Perspective
This paper in Transcultural Psychiatry states that global mental health (GMH) research "appears to be using a monocultural model that is individualistic, illness-oriented, and...
