Mental Health News and Research

Latest Mental Health News and Research

Largest study of child health ever conducted in the United States

The UCLA Center for Healthier Children, Families and Communities has been selected as one of 22 new study centers for the National Children's Study, a nationwide project designed to assess the effects of environmental and genetic factors on children's health in the United States.

4 Oct 2007

Nurses play valuable role in assessing people held in police custody

Nurses are now playing a valuable role in assessing people held in police custody, complementing the traditional role of the police doctor and improving response times, according to research published in the latest Journal of Advanced Nursing.

4 Oct 2007

Sex after chronic heart failure

Although medication can help extend the lives of men with chronic heart failure, several factors associated with this disease can interfere with a person's ability to engage in and enjoy sexual activities.

4 Oct 2007

A systematic review of mortality in schizophrenia

As medical advances boost lifespans across the world, one group of people has been left out.

4 Oct 2007

$1.2 million grant for Geropsychiatric Nursing Collaborative

The Hartford Center for Geriatric Nursing Excellence in the University of Iowa College of Nursing, and two other Hartford centers in the nation, have been funded for a four-year $1.2 million grant to ensure that nurses have the most recent evidence-based guidelines for caring for elders with mental health issues.

4 Oct 2007

Tips to manage stress

When stress never seems to go away, health can suffer. The October issue of Mayo Clinic Health Letter offers an overview of stress, the good, the bad and ways to reduce its ill effects.

4 Oct 2007

Large gap between physician and patient understanding of necessity of monthly periods

More than the two thirds of the women in a national survey say that they are interested in suppressing their menstrual periods but many of them aren't sure if it's safe.

4 Oct 2007

AACAP reaction to S-CHIP Veto

The American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry strongly urges Congress to override President Bush's veto of the State Children's Health Insurance Program (H.R. 976) act.

4 Oct 2007

Humans appear to have an on-board carbon dioxide sensor

PLoS ONE publishes a study showing that inhalation of carbon dioxide (CO2) triggers emotional distress and a panic response in healthy individuals. The findings of the study posit panic as an inborn survival-oriented response.

3 Oct 2007

Black gay men, lesbians, have fewer mental disorders than whites

According to a study conducted at Columbia University's Mailman School of Public Health among lesbian, gay, and bisexual populations, blacks and Latinos do not have more mental disorders than whites.

3 Oct 2007

First significant genetic finding in severe premenstrual dysphoric disorder

The first significant genetic finding in premenstrual dysphoric disorder (PMDD) has now been reported. PMDD is a very severe form of the more commonly known premenstrual syndrome, or PMS.

2 Oct 2007

Supreme Court declines to consider challenge to New York contraceptive coverage law

The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday said it will not consider a challenge to a New York law that requires employers who offer prescription drug plans to provide coverage for FDA-approved contraceptives for women, the New York Times reports (Greenhouse, New York Times, 10/2).

2 Oct 2007

Severe premenstrual syndrome and sleep quality

Women with severe premenstrual syndrome (PMS) perceive their sleep quality to be poorer in association with their symptoms in the late luteal (premenstrual) phase, despite there being no specific alterations in sleep structure associated with premenstrual symptoms, according to a study published in the October 1 issue of the journal SLEEP.

2 Oct 2007

Panic attacks may increase risk of heart attack or stroke in older women

Older women who experience at least one full-blown panic attack may have an increased risk of having a heart attack or stroke and an increased risk of death in the next five years, according to a report in the October issue of Archives of General Psychiatry, one of the JAMA/Archives journals.

2 Oct 2007

Poor health care access common among youth leaving foster system

Youth who have been homeless for any period of time after leaving the foster care system appear to have more problems accessing health care than those with stable housing situations, according to a report in the October issue of Archives of Pediatrics & Adolescent Medicine, one of the JAMA/Archives journals.

2 Oct 2007

More than half of U.S. adults have a mental or physical condition that impacts their work

The importance of role disability, that is, inability to work or carry out usual activities, has become increasingly recognized as a major source of indirect costs of illness because of its high economic impact on ill workers, their employers, and society.

2 Oct 2007