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Stigmatising attitudes towards persons with mental illness are commonly reported among health professionals. Familiarity with mental illness has been reported to improve these attitudes. Very few studies have compared future medical doctors' attitudes toward types of mental illness, substance use disorders and physical illness. A cross-sectional survey of 5th and 6th year medical students as well as recently graduated medical doctors was conducted in April 2011. The 12-item level of contact report and the Attitude towards Mental Illness Questionnaire were administered. Partici -pants endorsed stigmatising attitudes towards mental illness; with attitudes more adverse for schizophrenia compared to depression. Stigmatising attitudes were similarly endorsed for substance use disorders. Paradoxically, attitudes towards HIV/AIDS were positive and similar to diabetes mellitus. Increasing familiarity with mental illness was weakly associated with better attitudes towards depression and schizophrenia. Stigmatising attitudes towards depression and schizophrenia are common among future doctors. Efforts to combat stigma are urgently needed and should be promoted among medical students and recent medical graduates.

The coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) epidemic has caused stress for everyone and impacted the lives of people globally. Such stress increases troubles for the employees. Therefore, the aim of the paper is to identify symptoms of health problems that employees face during the COVID-19 epidemic. Also, the aim of the paper is to examine if there are statistically significant differences in the physical, emotional and behavioral symptoms of health problems among employees before the COVID-19 epidemic and employees during the COVID-19 epidemic.

The research is based on a survey of 950 employees in Slovenian companies. The factor analysis and the t-test for two independent samples were used to test the hypotheses of the research.

The results show that physical, emotional and behavioral symptoms of health problems of employees during the COVID-19 epidemic are intensified as compared to the before COVID-19 epidemic era.

The results highlight the measures with which companies can reduce the problem of different symptoms of employees during the COVID-19 epidemic. The results can be useful for employers and for managers who want to create an adequate working environment for employees during the COVID-19 epidemic.

This study aims to describe nurse leaders’ experiences of work-related well-being and its association with background variables, working conditions, work engagement, sense of coherence and burnout.

An electronic survey design was used. Data was collected between December 2015 and May 2016 with an instrument that included demographic questions and four internationally validated scales: the Utrecht Work Engagement Scale, QPS Nordic 34+, the shortened Sense of Coherence scale and the Maslach Burnout Inventory. Data was analysed using statistical methods.

A total of 155 nurse leaders completed the questionnaire, giving a 44% response rate. Most of them worked as nurse managers (89%). Participants’ work-related well-being scores ranged from 8 to 10. Statistically significant relationships were found between participants’ work-related well-being and their leadership skills, current position, sense of coherence and levels of burnout. In addition, there were statistically significant relationships between work-related well-being and all dimensions of working conditions.

This study underlines the fact that work-related well-being should not be evaluated based on a single factor. The participants’ perceived work-related well-being was high, although almost half of them reported always or often experiencing stress. The results suggest that nurse leaders may have resources such as good leadership and problem-solving skills, supportive working conditions and a high sense of coherence that prevent the experienced stress from adversely affecting their work-related well-being.

Schizophrenia is a devastating illness with a chronic and relapsing course. While Western countries may endorse, biological and psychosocial causes more commonly than supernatural causes, non-western cultures like Nigeria in contrast, tend to endorse supernatural causes. Belief in supernatural causes has been reported to have consequences for treatment seeking behavior. This study aimed to examine the causes of schizophrenia reported by family members of outpatients with schizophrenia in a neuropsychiatric hospital in Midwestern Nigeria. In this study, we recruited a convenient sample of 200 consecutive caregivers of patients visiting the outpatient department of the Psychiatric Hospital, Benin City, Nigeria. These primary caregivers were unpaid relatives who provided support to patients. The patients were service users who fulfilled the diagnostic criteria of the International Classification of Disease [ICD-10; World Health Organization 1993] for schizophrenia and had been on treatment for at least two years. Majority (72.0%) of caregivers endorsed supernatural causes as most important in the etiology of schizophrenia, while 28.0% endorsed natural causes. Every participant without formal education endorsed supernatural attribution. In our study, it was evident that participants embraced multiple causal attributions for schizophrenia.

Electroconvulsive therapy (ECT) is effective in the treatment of treatment-resistant major depression. The fear of cognitive impairment after ECT often deters patients from choosing this treatment option. There is little reliable information regarding the effects of ECT on overall cognitive performance, while short-term memory deficits are well known but not easy to measure within clinical routines. In this pilot study, we examined ECT recipients' pre- and post-treatment performances on a digital ascending number tapping test. We found that cognitive performance measures exhibited good reproducibility in individual patients and that ECT did not significantly alter cognitive performance up to 2 hours after this therapy was applied. Our results can help patients and physicians make decisions regarding the administration of ECT. Digital measurements are recommended, especially when screening for the most common side effects on cognitive performance and short-term memory.

A parent who continuously physically abuses her/his child doesn't aim to kill the child but commits an accidental filicide in a more violent outburst of anger. Fatal abuse deaths are prevented by recognition of signs of battering in time. Out of 200 examined intra-familial filicides, 23 (12%) were caused by child battering and 13 (7%) by continuous battering. The medical and court records of the victim and the perpetrator were examined. The perpetrator was the biological mother and the victim was male in 69 per cent of the cases. The abused children were either younger than one year or from two-and-a-half to four years old. Risk factors of the victim (being unwanted, premature birth, separation from the parent caused by hospitalization or custodial care, being ill and crying a lot) and the perpetrator (personality disorder, low socioeconomic status, chaotic family conditions, domestic violence, isolation, alcohol abuse) were common. The injuries caused by previous battering were mostly soft tissue injuries in head and limbs and head traumas and the battering lasted for days or even an year. The final assault was more violent and occurred when the parent was more anxious, frustrated or left alone with the child. The perpetrating parent was diagnosed as having a personality disorder (borderline, narcissistic or dependent) and often substance dependence (31%). None of them were psychotic. Authorities and community members should pay attention to the change in child's behavior and inexplicable injuries or absence from daycare. Furthermore if the parent is immature, alcohol dependent, have a personality disorder and is unable to cope with the demands the small child entails in the parent's life, the child may be in danger.

Delirious mania is an understudied psychiatric disorder with a mortality rate as high as 75%. Previous case studies suggest that electroconvulsive therapy (ECT) may be an effective treatment for delirious mania, though this procedure may not always be a viable option. We describe the case of a 20-year old patient, with no previous psychiatric history, who developed delirious mania over the course of four months. ECT was not a viable option for this patient due to his religious beliefs, so alternative treatment modalities were explored. After failing trials of risperidone and olanzapine, significant improvements in symptoms were exhibited with a trial of clozapine. We propose that clozapine may be an effective option in cases of delirious mania, when ECT is not a viable option. Additional research is still necessary to understand the pathology of this condition and potential treatment modalities.

The purpose of this study is to evaluate the effectiveness of an online psychological support group on patients with coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) in a Thai field hospital.

A prospective controlled trial was conducted at a Thai field hospital and included patients with confirmed COVID-19 who were over the age of 18 and able to use an online communication application. Patients were free to decide whether to participate in the online group. The group provided a space for participants to communicate with each other and a mental health service team. The everyday activities were designed to enable group support via texting or livestreaming through the LINE application. Psychoeducation via video clips or articles regarding stress management were provided. Outcomes were measured by an online self-reported questionnaire based on the twenty-one-item Depression, Anxiety and Stress Scale (DASS-21) on the first and fourteenth day of admission to the field hospital.

Forty-six patients participated in this study. Forty participants completed the secondary assessment, with 21 in the intervention group and 19 in the control group. From multilevel mixed-effects regression analysis, adjusted for gender, age and education, participation in the intervention group significantly decreased total DASS scores and anxiety subdomain scores compared to those in the control group (p = 0.038 and 0.008).

The online psychological support group offered benefits for patients with COVID-19 who were isolated in the field hospital. It could be an effective alternative measure to distribute psychological care during a pandemic situation. However, a small sample size was a limitation of this study.

Assistance to suicidal patients is problematic both at the hospital and community care level. Inadequacy of facilities, pressured personnel, long waiting time, and professional and social stigmatization are just some of the many issues that interfere with successful treatment. The goal of this paper is to present the functioning of the Life Promotion Clinic (LPC), Australia, and describe its users. The LPC is the first specialized outpatient service in Australia dedicated to the treatment of individuals with suicidal thoughts and behaviors. A description of the service and characteristics of its clients (demographic, psychopathology, risk of suicide) are herein presented. Data were collected for 63 male and 175 female patients who attended the LPC over a three-year period. Patients were mostly single females, aged up to 44 years, poorly educated, unemployed or on a pension/benefit. The majority of patients reported at least one suicide attempt, severe depression and anxiety scores, moderate-severe feelings of hopelessness, and high impulsiveness scores. Compared to females, male patients presented with more active desire to kill themselves and higher level of suicidal ideation. We can conclude that establishing a specialist service for treatment of individuals at increased risk for suicide requires consideration of both patient and clinicians needs. The LPC presents an innovative model of community service, capable of engaging patients with serious mental health issues, while making the service accessible to people from various social categories.