Monday, June 30, 2003

News and Trends Affecting Behavioral Health Care
An overview of several different developments in research from Drug Benefit Trends at Medscape, including items on an NIMH campaign on depression in men, suicide rates, PET scans and Alzheimers, screening for depression and dementia among the elderly and the use of Lamotrigine to treat bipolar disorder. [Viewing Medscape resources requires registration, which is free].  
  

Adult ADHD Often Undiagnosed by Primary Care Physicians
PR Newswire story reprinted at the NAMI web site- "Inadequate clinical training, inexperience and the lack of a well-validated screening tool are major barriers prohibiting primary care physicians from diagnosing ADHD in adults, according to a national survey released today by New York University School of Medicine. The survey also revealed that primary care physicians would take a more active role in treating adult ADHD if these issues were addressed."  
  

Mental ailments in children being linked to strep
Boston Globe story on "a growing body of research, though still controversial" which suggests that "one child in every 1,000 suffers from obsessive compulsive disorder linked to strep. ... among children who do have OCD, up to one-half of those cases could be strep-related, said one specialist, Dr. Tanya Murphy of the University of Florida."  
  

Russia's mental health revolution
BBC story - "Doctors in Russia are spearheading a revolution in the way patients with mental illnesses are treated. In the days of communism, people who were diagnosed as mentally ill were locked up in psychiatric hospitals and denied contact with the outside world. Today, the situation is much different . ... A law passed in January 1993 protected the rights of mentally ill patients for the first time. A series of reforms have seen the focus of psychiatric care change. Sprawling, stark asylums are being replaced with modern hospitals, with patients allowed to live in the community as much as possible."  
  

Net-friendly courthouses spark public-access debate
AP story in the Boston Globe - "Courthouses have long been considered stodgy institutions, foreign to the public they serve. The Internet has made them a little less detached, offering the ability to pay tickets, attend traffic school, even monitor dockets online. But most of the documents that are freely available at the courthouse are not online, either for lack of funding and technology or due to concerns that not all public records should be so easily available. ... California was one of the first states to adopt an online courthouse policy, and now offers a variety of features on its website, including opinions by the state Supreme Court and its six appellate courts. An online self-help center even offers advice for litigants without lawyers, including how to obtain restraining orders. The state still prohibits its trial courts from posting criminal case files, divorce cases, guardianship cases, and mental health files -- many of which are publicly available at the courthouse -- online."