Thursday, December 30, 2004

Mental health in general practice and primary care (New Zealand)
Paper (in Adobe Acrobat format) in the New Zealand Family Physician - "Mental disorders are recognised as a major public health problem and the management of mental health problems places an increasing burden on health services. A World Health Organization (WHO) study of the global burden of disease assessed that mental disorders make up five of the 10 leading causes of disability worldwide. While the management of these problems takes place predominantly in general practice and primary care settings, historically there has been a reluctance to acknowledge the role and importance of general practitioners and to provide appropriate support for them to deliver effective services..."  
  

The Legacy of Madness
Column in the Hartford Advocate by Lisa Lieberman on the challenges of having a parent with mental illness - "...Children of the mentally ill live with the fear that we may be genetically prone to our parents' disorders. Some play it safe, as I have done, afraid to take risks, afraid that if we let ourselves go too much we might succumb to the family curse. Others choose not to have children, worried about passing on the genes for the disease. Such fears are not unfounded. Recent studies show that close relatives of people with bipolar disorder, schizophrenia, or major depression are more likely to develop these diseases than the average person, but scientists haven't succeeded in isolating the genes involved in the transmission of even the most common disorders. The genetic brew is too complex, and so we're left to worry and watch ourselves for the slightest sign of our parents' illnesses. At the same time, we're afraid to acknowledge the illnesses, afraid that we'll be judged on the basis of their disorders -- as the daughter of a schizophrenic father or the son of a depressed mother. Given the stigma that still surrounds mental illness in our society, who would want to be defined in that way? ..."  
  

Web-based tool to help clinicians make schizophrenia treatment decisions
Vanderbilt University Medical Center press release at EurekAlert - "A new Web-based tool will be available January 1, 2005 to help clinicians determine the best medication for patients with schizophrenia. An international team led by Vanderbilt University Medical Center's Herbert Meltzer, M.D., recently completed the new algorithms, or step-by-step protocols, which will provide clinicians a resource as they make treatment decisions. The value of the algorithms was recently acknowledged by the World Health Organization (WHO), which has committed to establishing a Web link to the algorithms from its Web site. This will allow clinicians and patients worldwide to access the algorithms."