Non-pharmacological interventions can help prevent and reduce weight gain in...
The reduced life expectancy (15-20 years less) often faced by many people with schizophrenia is frequently a result of cardiovascular disease. Lifestyle choices (smoking, lack of exercise and poor...
View ArticleDepressed people on disability benefits do as well on CBT as people not...
I’ve read with interest a number of recent publications that suggest that cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT) may be less effective in patients receiving disability benefits versus other patients. The...
View ArticleCheck out the new BITE-sized mental health summaries from the NIHR CLAHRCs
Anyone who’s spent any time at all on the Mental Elf website, or any of the other National Elf Service sites, knows that we elves love succinct and focused summaries that are easy to read and quick to...
View ArticleNICE publish new evidence summary on psychosis with coexisting substance misuse
The NICE guideline on psychosis with coexisting substance misuse was published in 2011, which means it’s now nearly 3 years out of date. This is because guidelines take many months to produce, so by...
View ArticleProblem solving therapy may help people with adjustment disorders partially...
Work-related stress is everywhere these days. Obviously us elves are pretty much immune, but looking at the Bristol Stress and Health at Work Study (Smith 2000) I can see that more than 50% of human...
View ArticleNICE publish first guideline for psychosis and schizophrenia in children and...
Everyone who read the extracts from Michael Schofield’s memoir, published by the Guardian on January 19th, must surely have been moved by the sometimes harrowing description of his daughter Janni who...
View ArticleIndividual CBT, with or without family CBT, could be the best first line...
Schizophrenia is a debilitating illness that affects an estimated 25 million people worldwide. People with the condition can experience a huge amount of disability (both social, physical and...
View ArticleMindfulness shows promise as treatment for health anxiety
Most of us care about our health (something we elves encourage) but for up to 5% of people, worrying about health has become a significant problem in itself. Severe health anxiety, or hypochondriasis,...
View ArticleSo many treatments for major depression to choose from. How does individual...
Talking therapies for mental disorders are an ever-expanding field, with variations in treatments appearing all the time. It can be hard to know which treatment path to recommend to a patient, or which...
View ArticleTreatment of bipolar in specialised outpatient mood disorder clinics...
There is a limited amount of good quality research being published about bipolar disorder, particularly investigating the early stages. Bipolar is associated with a high risk of relapse and this risk...
View ArticleNew systematic review finds limited evidence for non-drug treatments for ADHD
Attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) is common with a prevalence of between 5 and 8%. It is often thought of as a problem with young people and is most commonly diagnosed in individuals...
View ArticleTreatment of excessive alcohol use in people with psychotic disorders:...
The literature on the efficacy of psychological treatments for excessive drinking is vast, but investigations into effectiveness of these treatments in individuals with other clinical diagnoses are...
View ArticleCochrane review cannot support training to recognise early signs of...
NICE Guidelines state that around three quarters of people with a diagnosis of schizophrenia experience a chronic illness: with recurrent episodes of remission and relapse. One way that chronic...
View ArticleCBT is better than nothing for older adults with depression, but so is any...
Depression is such a widely known issue now that it barely needs introduction. It’s something we Elves have covered with interest, looking at the effectiveness of various treatments, like...
View ArticleMeta-analysis finds insufficient evidence for treatments to improve insight...
Research suggests that many people with schizophrenia or related psychoses show a striking lack of insight into their condition (Dam, 2006). Poor insight can have a negative impact on several outcomes,...
View ArticlePsychosocial and psychological interventions can prevent postpartum...
The period after giving birth to a child can be difficult for women and in the first twelve weeks after childbirth 13-19% of women will experience post-partum depression (O’Hara 1996, Gaynes 2005)....
View ArticleNICE publish first clinical guideline on social anxiety disorder
I wonder if the timing of this publication was planned to be so close to the release of DSM-5, but this debut guidance on social phobia (now known as social anxiety disorder) is certainly going to...
View ArticleHow to reduce psychiatric readmission in young adults: opportunities and...
The successful transition from inpatient to outpatient psychiatric care is an important step along the road to recovery. It can be a difficult and turbulent time for patients, so much so that there is...
View ArticleFunctional remediation shows promise for enhancing functioning in patients...
Bipolar disorder is a term applied to conditions that are characterised by extreme mood swings. These swings in mood range from periods of overactive excited behaviour (known as mania) to deep...
View ArticleThe latest evidence from NICE on depression in children and young people
The NICE guideline for depression in children and young people was published way back in September 2005. Any elf worth his salt will tell you that a whole heap of evidence has been published since...
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