Journal of psychosomatic research
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Depression is a disorder seen commonly in general and specialty medical settings. Screening has been advocated as a means of ensuring that depressed patients are identified and receive appropriate treatment. ⋯ Further, we identify costs to screening that are not readily apparent and that may negatively affect both patient outcomes and health-care delivery systems. We offer suggestions for how screening instruments might be used to improve the outcomes of depressed persons while minimizing negative effects on health care.
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Comparative Study
Psychological distress of conservative and nonconservative uterine surgery: a prospective study.
The aim of the present study is to evaluate the psychological reaction to conization before and after the operation compared to hysterectomy. To study the incidence of psychological stress related to conization, 60 women undergoing conization were compared to 40 women who had undergone hysterectomy. ⋯ In general, the results of the present study show that the conservative and nonconservative uterine surgery determines a good psychological prognosis in the short- and long-term postoperative periods.
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Randomized Controlled Trial Clinical Trial
The efficacy of mindfulness-based stress reduction in the treatment of sleep disturbance in women with breast cancer: an exploratory study.
The diagnosis of breast cancer, the most common type of cancer among American women, elicits greater distress than any other diagnosis regardless of prognosis. Therefore, the present study examined the efficacy of a stress reduction intervention for women with breast cancer. ⋯ MBSR appears to be a promising intervention to improve the quality of sleep in woman with breast cancer whose sleep complaints are due to stress.
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The alpha-EEG sleep anomaly has been associated with chronic benign pain syndromes. Although controversial, the anomaly is believed by some to be an important biologic correlate of certain otherwise poorly explained painful conditions (e.g., fibromyalgia and chronic fatigue syndrome). To shed further light on this phenomenon, this study compared the sleep and psychological characteristics of chronic pain patients who exhibited the alpha-EEG sleep anomaly with pain-free psychiatric and medical patients who also were found to exhibit the alpha-EEG anomaly. ⋯ These findings challenge the notion that alpha-EEG sleep is of direct etiological significance in producing the pain complaint among patients with chronic pain since the alpha-EEG sleep was not a sufficient condition for pain.
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Alexithymia is elevated among patients with chronic pain, but the relationship of alexithymia to the severity of pain among chronic pain patients is unclear. Also, studies have rarely examined whether alexithymia is unique from other, more widely studied constructs in the chronic pain literature (i.e., self-efficacy, catastrophizing, and depression), and research has not examined how alexithymia relates to the sensory versus affective dimensions of pain. ⋯ Although alexithymia is not related to the sensory component of pain, it is correlated positively with the affective or unpleasantness component of pain, independent of self-efficacy or catastrophizing. The emotional regulation deficits of alexithymia may lead to depression, which appears to mediate alexithymia's relationship to affective pain. Alexithymia's relationship with physical impairment appears to be better accounted for by self-efficacy or catastrophizing.