NEW YORK - Patients with early Alzheimer’s disease who exercised regularly saw less deterioration in the areas of the brain which control memory, according to a study released Sunday at the 2008 International Conference on Alzheimer’s Disease in Chicago.

Magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) studies showed that exercise positively affected the hippocampus region of patients’ brains, an area which is important for both memory and balance. In Alzheimer’s, the hippocampus is one of the first parts of the brain to suffer damage.

Exercise and physical fitness have been shown to slow down age-related brain cell death in healthy older adults, and earlier this month a preliminary study was published showing that exercise may help slow brain shrinkage in people with early Alzheimer’s disease.

Now, researchers at the University of Kansas Medical Center in Kansas City, Kan., have used MRI and other neuroimaging tools to analyze how exercise affects the brains of those with early Alzheimer’s.

The researchers found that patients with early Alzheimer’s had a “significant relationship” between the size of key brain areas associated with memory and fitness, unlike healthy older adults. Those patients with better fitness ratings had less brain tissue atrophy and those with worse fitness had more brain damage.

“This is the first study to get an inside look into specifically where these changes occur in the brain - we’re able to locate the changes associated with fitness to the actual memory region, the hippocampus, which is a key area for Alzheimer’s-related atrophy,” said Robyn A. Honea, PhD, a lead investigator on the study. “This suggests that maintaining cardiorespiratory fitness may positively modify Alzheimer’s-related brain atrophy.”

The study was funded by the National Institute on Aging and National Institute on Neurological Disorders and Stroke.

Another report from ICAD 2008 showed that a 12-month home-based exercise program reduced falls and improved balance in patients with dementia. According to researchers from Western Medicine, a consultant physician service provider for Hollywood Hospital in Nedlands, Western Australia, people suffering from dementia fall up to three times more than those who have no cognitive impairment.

“Falls have a negative impact on a person’s quality of life, often resulting in nursing home placement, increased mortality and significant costs to the community,” said Megan J. Wraith, a speech pathologist at Western Medicine and a researcher on the study. “Targeting this high risk group may be a relatively cost effective way of having a significant impact on the overall rate of falling in the elderly.”

The study was funded by the Sir Charles Gairdner Research Foundation and Hollywood Private Hospital Research Foundation.

Currently, the prognosis for patients with Alzheimer’s is bleak. The Alzheimer’s treatment market is small, led by Pfizer Inc.’s Aricept, Forest Laboratories Inc.’s Namenda, Razadyne from Johnson & Johnson and Shire Ltd., Novartis AG’s Exelon and Sciele Pharma Inc.’s Cognex. But while those drugs fight Alzheimer’s symptoms, they can’t stop its ultimate progress.

Wyeth and Elan Corp. are currently developing a new kind of Alzheimer’s treatment, bapineuzumab, which is designed to actually slow progress of the disease. In June, study data showed that drug was shown to benefit Alzheimer’s patients who lacked a certain gene.

Source: http://www.breitbart.com/article.php?id=cp_g6kn7v7ss9&show_article=1

NBC’s show is designed to be a social experiment placing teenage couples in many different family situations, which includes “borrowing infants and toddlers for a few days to get a taste of parenthood.

The APA issued this statement:

“The American Psychiatric Association deplores the use of babies and toddlers as props or experimental subjects for a television program. It is inappropriate and sometimes harmful to remove very young children from their families and familiar environments, and the level of harm may not be apparent on simple observation. Since the program is meant to reveal whether or not the ‘borrowers’ are competent to care for these children, at least some of the children will have been exposed to incompetent and confused caregivers, and to whatever problematic situations arose as the caregivers struggled with each other. We urge NBC never to repeat this misuse of children; not to allow reruns to air; and to use every means to discourage the use of episodes in parenting classes or other venues where they might well be shown.”

The American Psychiatric Association is the nation’s leading medical specialty society whose more than 38,000 physician members specialize in diagnosis, treatment, prevention and research of mental illnesses including substance use disorders. Visit the APA at www.psych.org and www.HealthyMinds.org.

Included in the rising divorce rates are long-term marriages. Why, we ask, would someone get divorced after more than twenty years of marriage? Before we take a look at the top reasons for why some long-term marriages end in divorce, let’s first see why some long-term marriages succeed or just “go along to get along.” “Success” means that BOTH partners report being happy.

Good Reasons Why Some People Stay in Long-Term Marriages—What Makes These Good, Happy Marriages Work?

Good, happy marriages consist of people who:

1. Are both truly happy, optimistic people who know how to problem-solve.
2. Tended to get married when older and more settled in their careers/education and more mature.
3. Are financially comfortable.
4. Have college degrees or technical training.
5. Find ways to “renew” the marriage spark. Some couples do this by traveling, taking classes of some kind together, doing a large project together (building a dream house, etc.), volunteering together and basically finding a new shared interest etc.
6. Are happily involved with their grandchildren and/or adult children.
7. Have good health.
8. Don’t criticize and reject each other.
9. Respect and like each other.
10. Have more than “weathered or gotten through” major stresses such as affairs, financial or emotional problems. Instead, they triumph over these issues and grow.
11. Have a wildcard factor—a highly personalized reason for being happy and together!

Make a checklist of which ones are part of your marriage. Now let’s take a look at why some unhappy, long-term marriages continue.

Why Some Unhappy, Long-Term Marriages Continue

1. It’s been said that some marriages keep women off welfare, out of the poor house and out of the mental institution. So, some people stay in bad marriages because divorce or singlehood seems worse than their current situation.
2. Some couples agree to live separate lives while still being legally married. Usually, they agree to this arrangement because of financial and psychological reasons. Psychologically, the spouse serves as an “emotional safety net” in case a partner needs emotional and financial support. Or, the couple might be raising the grandchildren and need to stay together because of them. In fact, some grandparents agree to raise their grandchildren as a way to find joy and to put a “buffer zone” between them and their spouse.
3. The “shame” of divorce is worse than the marriage. Some couples feel social, religious and family pressure to stay married.

Why Some Long-Term Marriages End in Divorce

1. The marriage was never really very good, and they wait to divorce until after the children are older.
2. One person is having an affair—and is discovered. About 25-33% of marriages cannot recover from affairs.
3. One person falls in love with another person.
4. One spouse can no longer tolerate the abuse—verbal, physical or sexual. Abuse is still one of the highest reasons people divorce. Often, one spouse tolerates the abuse for a relatively long time. What makes that person say “enough” is: (a) maturity; the person is in therapy and the help kicks in; (b) one or more of the children are “little adults” who speak up; and (c) the legal system has finally listened or responded—there are charges, trials and/or prison sentences.
5. One person matures and grows out of the marriage. This maturity can be sparked by time, death of a parent or other close person, new job or completion of education/training that makes the more financially dependent spouse able to support him/herself.
6. One partner develops serious problems that do not change. These types of problems include substance abuse, mental instability, felonies and other illegal acts.

Did you see your top reasons in these sections? Think about what you want to do about it. Remember, every marriage is different.

###This article first appeared in www.helpstartshere.org, the award winning consumer Web site of the National Association of Social Workers. To read more articles by Dr. Wish on this site, please click here.

Herberman is basing his alarm on early, unpublished data. He says it takes too long to get answers from science and he believes people should take action now - especially when it comes to children.

“Really at the heart of my concern is that we shouldn’t wait for a definitive study to come out, but err on the side of being safe rather than sorry later,” Herberman said.

Herberman’s advice is sure to raise concern among many cellphone users and especially parents.

In the memo he sent to about 3,000 faculty and staff Wednesday, he says children should use cellphones only for emergencies because their brains are still developing.

Adults should keep the phone away from the head and use the speakerphone or a wireless headset, he says. He even warns against using cellphones in public places like a bus because it exposes others to the phone’s electromagnetic fields.

The issue that concerns some scientists - though nowhere near a consensus - is electromagnetic radiation, especially its possible effects on children. It is not a major topic in conferences of brain specialists.

A 2008 University of Utah analysis looked at nine studies - including some Herberman cites - with thousands of brain tumour patients and concludes “we found no overall increased risk of brain tumours among cellular phone users. The potential elevated risk of brain tumours after long-term cellular phone use awaits confirmation by future studies.”

Studies last year in France and Norway concluded the same thing.

“If there is a risk from these products - and at this point we do not know that there is - it is probably very small,” the Food and Drug Administration says on an agency website.

Still, Herberman cites a “growing body of literature linking long-term cellphone use to possible adverse health effects including cancer.”

“Although the evidence is still controversial, I am convinced that there are sufficient data to warrant issuing an advisory to share some precautionary advice on cell phone use,” he wrote in his memo.

A driving force behind the memo was Devra Lee Davis, the director of the university’s centre for environmental oncology.

“The question is do you want to play Russian roulette with your brain?” she said in an interview that she did from her cellphone. “I don’t know that cellphones are dangerous. But I don’t know that they are safe.”

Of concern are the still-unknown effects of more than a decade of cellphone use, with some studies raising alarms, said Davis, a former health adviser in the Clinton Administration.

She said 20 different groups have endorsed the advice the Pittsburgh cancer institute gave, and authorities in England, France, India and Canada have cautioned children’s use of cellphones.

Ontario Premier Dalton McGuinty recently advised parents to limit their children’s use of cellphones after Toronto Public Health issued an advisory telling parents to take precautions to minimize their children’s exposure to radio frequency waves from cellphones until more research is done. Toronto public health officials said children under eight should use land lines whenever they can and should use a cellphone only for essential purposes. They also advised that older children and teens should limit their cellphone use whenever possible.

Herberman and Davis point to a massive ongoing research project known as Interphone, involving scientists in 13 nations, mostly in Europe. Results already published in peer-reviewed journals from this project aren’t so alarming, but Herberman is citing work not yet published.

The published research focuses on more than 5,000 cases of brain tumours. The National Academy of Sciences in the U.S., which isn’t participating in the Interphone project, reported in January that the brain tumour research had “selection bias.” That means it relied on people with cancer to remember how often they used cellphones. It is not considered the most accurate research approach.

The largest published study, which appeared in the Journal of the National Cancer Institute in 2006, tracked 420,000 Danish cellphone users, including thousands who had used the phones for more than 10 years. It found no increased risk of cancer among those using cellphones.

A French study based on Interphone research and published in 2007 concluded that regular cellphone users had “no significant increased risk” for three major types of brain tumours. It did note, however, that there was “the possibility of an increased risk among the heaviest users” for one type of brain tumour, but that needs to be verified in future research.

Earlier research also has found no connection.

Joshua E. Muscat of Penn State University, who has studied cancer and cellphones in other research projects partly funded by the cellphone industry, said there are at least a dozen studies that have found no cancer-cellphone link. He said a Swedish study cited by Herberman as support for his warning was biased and flawed.

“We certainly don’t know of any mechanism by which radiofrequency exposure would cause a cancerous effect in cells. We just don’t know this might possibly occur,” Muscat said.

Cellphones emit radiofrequency energy, a type of radiation that is a form of electromagnetic radiation, according to the National Cancer Institute. Though studies are being done to see if there is a link between it and tumours of the brain and central nervous system, there is no definitive link between the two, the institute says on its website.

“By all means, if a person feels compelled that they should take precautions in reducing the amount of electromagnetic radio waves through their bodies, by all means they should do so,” said Dan Catena, a spokesman for the American Cancer Society. “But at the same time, we have to remember there’s no conclusive evidence that links cellphones to cancer, whether it’s brain tumours or other forms of cancer.”

Joe Farren, a spokesman for the CTIA-The Wireless Association, a trade group for the wireless industry, said the group believes there is a risk of misinforming the public if science isn’t used as the ultimate guide on the issue.

“When you look at the overwhelming majority of studies that have been peer reviewed and published in scientific journals around the world, you’ll find no relationship between wireless usage and adverse health affects,” Farren said.

Frank Barnes, who chaired a recent National Research Council report looking into what studies are needed to assess the health effects of wireless communications, said Wednesday that “the jury is out” on how hazardous long-term cellphone use might be.

Speaking from his cellphone, the professor of electrical and computer engineering at the University of Colorado at Boulder said he takes no special precautions with his own cellphone. And he offered no clear advice to people worried about the matter.

It’s up to each individual to decide what, if anything, to do. If people use a cellphone instead of having a land line, “that may very well be reasonable for them,” he said.

Susan Juffe, a 58-year-old Pittsburgh special education teacher, heard about Herberman’s cellphone advice on the radio earlier in the day.

“Now, I’m worried. It’s scary,” she said.

She says she’ll think twice about allowing her 10-year-old daughter Jayne to use the cellphone.

“I don’t want to get it (brain cancer) and I certainly don’t want you to get it,” she explained to her daughter.

Sara Loughran, a 24-year-old doctoral student at the University of Pittsburgh, sat in a bus stop Wednesday chatting on her cellphone with her mother. She also had heard the news earlier in the day, but was not as concerned.

“I think if they gave me specific numbers and specific information and it was scary enough, I would be concerned,” Loughran said, planning to call her mother again in a matter of minutes. “Without specific numbers, it’s too vague to get me worked up.”

-

Jennifer Yates reported from Pittsburgh. Science Writer Seth Borenstein reported from Washington. Reporter Ramit Plushnick-Masti contributed from Pittsburgh and Science Writer Malcolm Ritter contributed from New York.

Source: http://www.breitbart.com/article.php?id=cp_g68blsksu44&show_article=1

The study’s findings are in the July issue of the Journal of Counseling Psychology, which is published by the American Psychological Association. This is the first time psychologists have examined the link between academic performance and depressive cognitions for African-American children living in an urban setting. The study’s lead author Keith Herman, PhD, says his findings are similar to previous studies findings on white children and children from other ethnic backgrounds.

“Given the well-documented achievement disparities between African-American children and other groups of children in the United States, these findings have strong implications for identifying and treating academic problems in African-American children,” said Herman. “Educators and parents need to understand that academic problems early on can be warning signs of distress. Mental health problems are less likely to develop if children are shown how to manage, or overcome, their anxiety, sadness and frustration from their academic challenges.”

Psychologists examined data from a longitudinal study of 474 African-American boys and girls in nine Baltimore public schools. The students were assessed in first, sixth and seventh grades for the study.

The authors examined the students’ performance on a basic skills test administered in first grade to determine how well the students were doing in reading and mathematics. The first-graders were also asked how frequently they felt sad, anxious or upset. The authors compared these findings with the students’ self-reports of depressive symptoms after they had entered seventh grade. The authors noted that prior research found that depressive symptoms in children and adolescents predicted the likelihood of using mental health services, of contemplating suicide, and of being diagnosed with depression later in life.

The authors found that the students who performed below average on the basic skills test in first grade were more likely to experience depressive symptoms by the time they had entered seventh grade, while controlling for conduct, attention and social problems.

The authors also looked at data collected in sixth grade, which measured how much control the students felt they had over their academic, social and behavioral skills. Using this information, the researchers determined that first-graders who were struggling in school were most likely to believe that they had less influence over important outcomes in their life. These beliefs, in turn, served as risk factors for depressive symptoms. The negative effects of low academic skills on future self-beliefs were roughly twice as strong for girls as for boys.

“Girls tend to internalize academic problems more than boys,” said Herman. “It is critical for counselors and psychologists who are working with underachieving African-American youth to find ways to highlight their nonacademic skills, such as social, music or art abilities, and work with their parents and teachers to do the same. This may help improve their present and future emotional well-being.”

Article: “Low Academic Competence in First Grade as a Risk Factor for Depressive Cognitions and Symptoms in Middle School,” Keith C. Herman, PhD and Wendy M. Reinke, PhD, University of Columbia – Missouri; Sharon F. Lambert, PhD, George Washington University; Nicholas S. Ialongo, PhD, Johns Hopkins University, School of Public Health; Journal of Counseling Psychology, Vol. 55, No. 3.

(Full text of the article is available from the APA Public Affairs Office and at http://www.apa.org/journals/releases/cou553400.pdf ). Contact Keith Herman; his phone number is 573-884-2419.

The American Psychological Association (APA), in Washington, DC, is the largest scientific and professional organization representing psychology in the United States and is the world’s largest association of psychologists. APA’s membership includes more than 148,000 researchers, educators, clinicians, consultants and students. Through its divisions in 54 subfields of psychology and affiliations with 60 state, territorial and Canadian provincial associations, APA works to advance psychology as a science, as a profession and as a means of promoting human welfare.

CATIE compared the newer atypical medications quetiapine (Seroquel), olanzapine (Zyprexa), risperidone (Risperdal) and ziprasidone (Geodon) with the older antipsychotic perphenazine. Previously reported results showed that perphenazine was no less effective in treating schizophrenia symptoms than the newer atypicals. This new analysis examined whether any of the medications specifically reduced the frequency of violence, a rare symptom associated with the disorder.

Jeffrey Swanson, Ph.D., and Marvin Swartz, M.D., of Duke University and colleagues examined data from the 1,445 CATIE participants for which baseline information on violent behavior was available. They found that among the 653 participants who completed six months of treatment on their initially assigned medication, the frequency of violent acts declined from 16 percent to 9 percent overall. None of the atypical medications outperformed perphenazine, and quetiapine specifically appeared to be less effective than perphenazine.

Those who took their medication as directed were less likely to be violent, except for those who had a history of childhood conduct problems. Moreover, those who lived with others, had substance use problems, had been victimized in the past, and were of lower economic status were more likely to have problems with violent behavior, regardless of medication usage.

The researchers conclude that, contrary to some previous studies, the atypical antipsychotics have no advantage over the older medication in reducing violence. In addition, violence associated with circumstances unrelated to the disorder, such as a history of conduct problems, likely will not be treated effectively with antipsychotics alone. Rather, more intensive psychosocial or family-based supportive therapy may be needed to reduce violent behavior in people with these other risk factors.

Reference

Swanson JW, Swartz MS, Van Dorn RA, Volavka J, Monahan J, Stroup TS, McEnvoy JP, Wagner HR, Elbogen EB, Lieberman JA for the CATIE investigators. Comparing antipsychotic medication effects on reducing violence in persons with schizophrenia. British Journal of Psychiatry. 2008 Jul; 193: 37-43.

Comparing a group of adolescents and young adults who had recently had their first bout of schizophrenia with a group of healthy peers, researchers found that this loss of tissue began around the same time and in the same brain areas in both groups. But the rate of loss was more pronounced and covered a greater area of the brain’s surface in the youth with schizophrenia.

The new finding adds to evidence that changes in brain development which lead to schizophrenia aren’t limited to the prenatal stage and early childhood, but also occur during the late-teen and young-adult years - the ages when symptoms usually begin to appear.

To conduct their studies, the researchers performed magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) in 16 adolescents and young adults, ages 17 to 30, with recent-onset schizophrenia and in 14 healthy people in the same age range. The MRI studies were repeated two years later, to look for changes. Advanced techniques helped ensure the validity of the results.

The scans showed the expected loss of brain volume in both the healthy group and the group with schizophrenia, an indication that the normal tissue loss was taking place. Compared with healthy youth, however, those with schizophrenia had more tissue loss on the surface of one of the last areas of the brain to develop - the prefrontal lobe, which controls higher functions like thinking, judgment, and memory. These functions are impaired in people with schizophrenia.

The timing of the excessive tissue loss in this late-developing brain area corresponds with the age that schizophrenia symptoms usually begin, the researchers note.

The youth with schizophrenia also had more evidence of tissue loss on the surface of the brain’s parietal lobes, which help process sensory information coming in from the outside world, such as visual or tactile information. Abnormal sensory perceptions are common in people with schizophrenia, who often see and hear things that aren’t there, or misinterpret what they see and hear to mean something else.

In both the prefrontal and parietal lobes, the excess pruning progressed over the two years in the group with schizophrenia. Overall, the group with schizophrenia group had 1.6 times more evidence of tissue loss in the surfaces of these lobes, compared with the healthy group.

Other studies of schizophrenia have implicated variations in certain genes in the disease. The authors of the new study note that these genes are known to affect the connections between brain cells.

The study was a collaboration between investigators at the University of Melbourne, headed by Christos Pantelis, MD, and Patrick McGorry, PhD, and investigators at the University of California, Los Angeles, headed by Tyrone Cannon, PhD, Arthur Toga, PhD, and Paul Thompson, PhD.

Reference

Sun D, Stuart GW, Jenkinson M, Wood SJ, McGorry PD, Velakoulis D, van Erp TGM, Thompson PM, Toga AW, Smith DJ, Cannon TD, Pantelis C. Brain surface contraction mapped in first-episode schizophrenia: A longitudinal MRI study. Molecular Psychiatry 10.1038/mp.2008.34.

ALEXANDRIA, VA. (July 1, 2008)-The reports today of the death of a mental health patient in the Kings County Hospital psychiatric emergency room are deeply troubling and demand further investigation to determine the root cause of this incident.  Given the problems that were first raised in a federal lawsuit filed a year ago, it should also spur greater scrutiny of the hospital’s administration and practices.

Mental Health America’s fear is that this incident reflects a broader public attitude that devalues individuals with severe mental health conditions who are served in public systems.   We call on people who share our abhorrence at these acts to continue to combat the ignorance and discrimination that still exists toward people with mental illnesses.  If appropriately treated people, even with the most severe illnesses, can and will recover.  Hope and respect are central components of this treatment.  Devaluing people further prolongs their disability and likely contributes to the 25 years of lost life for persons with severe mental illnesses that are served in public systems. 

This incident is also a tragic illustration of systemic problems in public mental health, where needed mental health care is too often provided as a last resort instead of a first response, and where medical problems too often go unrecognized and untreated.   

Those systemic problems go far deeper than breakdowns in psychiatric emergency services.  By their very nature, emergency services are not adequate alternatives for the many people whose illness could be managed before it becomes a crisis

Rather, this tragic incident underscores a real crisis in mental health service-delivery - the failure to invest adequately in early-intervention and other community-based services and supports, even as hospitals have reduced psychiatric bed capacity.  The facts are that over two-thirds of adults and over half of children with a diagnosable mental health condition do not receive the mental health treatment and services they need.  At the same time, people with serious mental illnesses served in the public system die, on average, 25 years early from preventable health problems such as heart disease and diabetes. 

As we discuss and debate “health care reform,” these shocking data highlight the importance of making mental health reform a key component of needed health reform. 

Mental Health America is the country’s leading nonprofit dedicated to helping all people live mentally healthier lives.  With our more than 320 affiliates nationwide, we represent a growing movement of Americans who promote mental wellness for the health and well-being of the nation - everyday and in times of crisis.

Contact: Steve Vetzner (703) 797-2588 or svetzner@mentalhealthamerica.net

According to news reports, a woman who was suffering from agitation and psychosis, was kept waiting in the emergency room for almost 24 hours because the hospital reportedly did not have a bed available for psychiatric patients. She collapsed onto the floor and then lay there for approximately one hour before emergency room personnel tried to revive her. Tragically, the woman died of causes that have yet to be determined.

“The question is how and why hospital personnel could ignore a person who fell to the floor in an emergency room and stood by or walked around her while she died,” said APA president Nada Stotland, M.D. “Still, the lack of emergency services for psychiatric patients is only one part of an overall health care crisis, which extends to and includes mental health services.”

Stotland pointed to a lack of state and community-centered mental health services that can intervene earlier, circumventing a crisis that would lead to the person seeking help at an emergency room that is ill-equipped to handle such crises. The fact is that most hospitals lose money on psychiatric services, and that may play a subtle role in how high a priority the hospital places on mental health cases.

“Incidents like this reflect a complete breakdown of the mental health system,” Stotland said. “There is little continuity of care, and there are few, inadequately funded outpatient services, resulting in repeated mental breakdowns, emergency room visits, and the need for hospitalization in the sickest individuals. Emergency rooms designed and staffed to treat patients with heart attacks and broken bones are faced with hundreds, sometimes thousands, of patients with critical psychiatric problems, often complicated by general medical disorders, homelessness, abuse and a lack of insurance coverage.”

A lack of funding has led to an ongoing shrinkage of the number of hospital beds for these individuals. At the same time, many times hospitals have no emergency room physician on duty that is qualified to handle mental health problems. The difficulty of accessing needed services may only intensify the sense of stigma many patients feel in seeking help for a psychiatric problem in the first place.

“The time to intervene is long before a person finds herself in the position of needing emergency help from a hospital that is ill-equipped to care for her,” Stotland said. “The tragedy is that we know how to help these individuals recover and remain productive members of society; this suffering is needless and ends up costing society as much or more than adequate care would cost. Our society is failing to provide the most basic safety net for our most vulnerable citizens.”

About the American Psychiatric Association: The American Psychiatric Association is the nation’s leading medical specialty society whose more than 38,000 physician members specialize in diagnosis, treatment, prevention and research of mental illnesses including substance use disorders. Visit the APA at www.psych.org and www.HealthyMinds.org

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