Psychological medicine
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Psychological medicine · Nov 2008
Comparative StudyAge patterns in the prevalence of DSM-IV depressive/anxiety disorders with and without physical co-morbidity.
Physical morbidity is a potent risk factor for depression onset and clearly increases with age, yet prior research has often found depressive disorders to decrease with age. This study tests the possibility that the relationship between age and mental disorders differs as a function of physical co-morbidity. ⋯ CIDI-diagnosed depressive and anxiety disorders in the general population decrease with age, despite greatly increasing physical morbidity with age. Physical morbidity among persons with mental disorder is the norm, particularly in older populations. Health professionals, including mental health professionals, need to address barriers to the management of physical co-morbidity among those with mental disorders.
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Psychological medicine · Sep 2008
Ecstasy use and higher-level cognitive functions: weak effects of ecstasy after control for potential confounds.
Although there have been several reports linking ecstasy use with lowered cognitive function, much previous research suffers from substantial methodological limitations. The present study aimed to examine associations between ecstasy use and higher-level cognitive functions, using a larger sample size than most previous research and better controlling for a range of potential confounds. ⋯ Although the results suggest that heavy use of ecstasy is associated with some lowering of higher-level cognitive functions, they do not indicate a clinical picture of substantial cognitive dysfunction.
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The attention-grabbing properties of drugs to drug-using individuals have been well documented and recent research has begun to suggest that such attentional bias may be related to the severity of drug dependency. Dependence on ketamine has been reported anecdotally but no systematic study has investigated this phenomenon. We aimed to explore attentional biases to incentive stimuli in different populations of ketamine users. ⋯ These data support incentive models of drug use and demonstrate the ability of the attentional bias paradigm to discriminate recreational drug users from those with more dependent patterns of use. Ketamine is a potentially dependence-forming drug.
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Psychological medicine · Aug 2008
Scholastic achievement at age 16 and risk of schizophrenia and other psychoses: a national cohort study.
There is abundant evidence that schizophrenia is associated with cognitive deficits in childhood. However, previous studies investigating school performance have been inconclusive. Furthermore, there are several biological and social factors that could confound the association. We investigated whether school performance at age 16 is associated with risk of adult schizophrenia and other psychoses in a large national cohort, while controlling for multiple confounders. ⋯ Poor school performance across all domains is strongly associated with risk for schizophrenia and other psychoses.
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Psychological medicine · Jul 2008
Chronic fatigue syndrome and related disorders in UK veterans of the Gulf War 1990-1991: results from a two-phase cohort study.
The aim was to determine the prevalence of chronic fatigue syndrome (CFS), chronic fatigue and fibromyalgia in UK military personnel after the Gulf War 1990-1991. ⋯ Symptoms in keeping with CFS account for a significant part of the symptomatic distress in Gulf veterans.