News

New findings in epidemiology, developmental psychiatry, and neuroscience offer the opportunity for a new perspective on the problems of juvenile delinquency and bring to bear the insights of modern psychiatry in the treatment and successful rehabilitation of juvenile offenders.

The inclusion of parents in their children's treatment for eating disorder is not universally accepted. However, recent studies suggest that families should be included in treatment and that they are often a powerful resource for helping their children recover.

Friendship with patients, particularly those with serious mental illness, may seem anathema for a psychiatric ethicist, yet there is a long and rich history of physician-patient friendship in medical ethics.

While social anxiety disorder (SAD) may cause observable signs of anxiety and social awkwardness in some, many others suffer silently. Cognitive-behavioral therapy can be helpful for most patients with SAD, with alternative therapies such as psychodynamic therapy and interpersonal therapy filling the gaps.

The capacity of cognitive neuroscience to inform clinical practice has stimulated both excitement and controversy.

Particularly because 25% to 50% of patients with conversion disorder eventually have a nonpsychiatric illness that explains their symptoms, it behooves us as psychiatrists to remember that we are physicians too.

The numbers of patients with Alzheimer disease (AD), as well as those with severe cognitive impairment caused by traumatic brain injury and stroke, are continuing to increase. This article includes some nonconventional treatment approaches for which the evidence is limited.

Treating Parkinson disease with dopamine receptor agonists puts patients at risk for a number of symptoms over and above classic motor disturbances.

A young mother has just learned from her gynecologist that she is 2 months pregnant. She has had 7 major depressive episodes over the past 8 years, 3 of which were accompanied by serious suicide attempts. She is asking you if she should stop taking the antidepressant at this time. What do you advise?

Stalking is defined as repeated and persistent unwanted communications and/or approaches that produce fear in the victim. Stalking intrudes on the victim's privacy and evokes a fear of violence. Such fears are justified, as threats, property damage and assault occur all too frequently in association with stalking.

Research conducted over the past 30 years leads to the conclusion that televised violence does influence viewers' attitudes, values and behavior.

DSM-IV-TR emphasizes that patients with borderline personality disorder (BPD) show a "instability of interpersonal relationships, self-image, and affects, and marked impulsivity beginning by early adulthood and present in a variety of contexts," and any five out of nine listed criteria must be present for the diagnosis to be made.

Because personality is shaped by experiences during childhood and adolescence, it is likely that mental disorders occurring during these years may have an influence on personality development.

Paraphilias as defined by DSM-IV, are sexual impulse disorders characterized by intensely arousing, recurrent sexual fantasies, urges and behaviors (of at least six months' duration) that are considered deviant with respect to cultural norms and that produce clinically significant distress or impairment in social, occupational or other important areas of psychosocial functioning. The common paraphilias described include exhibitionism (exposure of genitals to a stranger), pedophilia (sexual activity with a prepubescent child, generally 13 years of age or younger), voyeurism (observing others' sexual activities), fetishism (use of inert objects, such as female undergarments), transvestic fetishism (cross-dressing), sexual sadism (inflicting suffering or humiliation), sexual masochism (being humiliated, beaten, bound or made to suffer) and frotteurism (touching, rubbing against a nonconsenting person).

While dementia is marked by such cognitive deficits as disorientation, memory loss and changes in intellectual functioning, these are not the symptoms that cause the most distress to caregivers.

The obvious sometimes bears repeating: Sick people have trouble thinking. They may be suffering from a delirium, a dementia or a more subtle disturbance of cognition caused by fever, drugs, infection, inflammation, trauma, hypoxemia, metabolic derangement, hypotension, tumor, intracranial pathology, pain and so forth.

Many highly regarded clinicians have built careers working with patients they believe to have dissociative identity disorder (DID). Other distinguished practitioners consider DID to be a bogus diagnostic tag.

College students are far less likely to kill themselves than are nonstudent peers, according to a 10-year research study examining suicide rates at 12 Midwestern campuses.

After the recent decade of the brain and in the present era of evidence-based practice, psychoanalytic treatment of personality disorder is being challenged.

Splitting, archetypally imbedded in a patient's psychic structure, acts as a powerful unconscious force to protect against the ego's perception of dangerous anxiety and intense affects. Rather than providing real protection, splitting leads to destructive behavior and turmoil in patients' lives.

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What does the term “polypharmacy” actually mean? Dr Pies likens polypharmacy to fire: just as the latter may either heat your house or burn it down, polypharmacy may either help or harm the patient.

A discussion of the pharmacologic management of bipolar depression, including emerging treatments and expert recommendations.

Patients with OCD generally respond best to cognitive-behavioral therapy (CBT). At the core of the behavior therapy program is a technique known as exposure and ritual prevention (ERP).

While the ban on same-sex marriage is hotly debated between conservative groups and lesbians and gay men, several psychiatrists are researching and discussing how denial of same-sex marriage impacts mental health.

A look at how to use the spectrum concept to promote understanding and acceptance of bipolar II and soft bipolar diagnoses. In this article, you will find 5 tools for fostering what has been called “concordance” or, more simply, “buy-in.”

Can sociodemographic and clinical variables predict outcome in cases of schizophrenia? Results from studies related to prognostic variables for schizophrenia have yielded interesting yet inconsistent results.

Although psychosis is rare in adolescent patients with anorexia nervosa restricting type, the possibility should be explored because it may be the underlying cause of the eating disorder.

Could the content of television shows give you a common platform for discussing interests and experiences with your patients?