11 research outputs found
Education in mental health promotion and its impact on the participants' attitudes and perceived mental health
<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Although the promotion of mental health (MHP) through education and training is widely accepted, there is scarce evidence for its effectiveness in the literature from outcome studies worldwide. The present study aimed to assess the effect of a three-semester MHP educational program on the recipients' opinions towards mental illness and on their own self-assessed health.</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>Respondents were 78 attendees who completed the assessment battery at the first (baseline) and the last session (end) of the training course. They were primary care physicians or other professionals, or key community agents, working in the greater Athens area. The course consisted of 44 sessions (4 h each), over a 3-semester period, focusing on the principles and methods of mental health promotion, the main aspects of major psychiatric disorders, and on relevant to health skills. Assessment instruments included the Opinion about Mental Illness (OMI) scale and the General Health Questionnaire (GHQ-28).</p> <p>Results</p> <p>The mean scores of three OMI factors, that is, social discrimination, social restriction and social integration, and the two GHQ-28 subscales, that is, anxiety/insomnia and social dysfunction, were significantly improved by the end of the training course.</p> <p>Conclusions</p> <p>The results of this study provide evidence, with limitations, for the short-term effectiveness of the implemented educational MHP program on an adult group of recipients-key agents in their community. Because interventions for strengthening positive opinions about mental illness and enhancing self-assessed health constitute priority aims of mental health promotion, it would be beneficial to further investigate the sustainability of the observed positive changes. In addition it would be useful to examine (a) the possible interplay between the two outcome measures, that is, the effect of opinions of recipients about mental health on their perceived health, and (b) the applicability of this intervention in individuals with different sociodemographic profiles.</p
The role of examples in Cognitive Apprenticeship
Abstract In this paper we demonstrate some examples of mathematics of everyday practice. In other words, we show examples of mathematics that if introduced in the teaching classroom, then they may be proved to be important instructional tools for the enhancement of teachinglearning process. The examples presented below, give a meaning to the purpose of learning mathematics, represent interesting problems, and attract students' interest to the learning of mathematics. One important thing is their instructional transformation and their transfer in the classroom, regarding the learning theory, and the context, in which, this theory should be used. In this paper we publish the results of a related research, where we employed the Cognitive Apprenticeship model as a learning theory
Education in mental health promotion and its impact on the participants' attitudes and perceived mental health
Background: Although the promotion of mental health (MHP) through
education and training is widely accepted, there is scarce evidence for
its effectiveness in the literature from outcome studies worldwide. The
present study aimed to assess the effect of a three-semester MHP
educational program on the recipients’ opinions towards mental illness
and on their own self-assessed health.
Methods: Respondents were 78 attendees who completed the assessment
battery at the first (baseline) and the last session (end) of the
training course. They were primary care physicians or other
professionals, or key community agents, working in the greater Athens
area. The course consisted of 44 sessions (4 h each), over a 3-semester
period, focusing on the principles and methods of mental health
promotion, the main aspects of major psychiatric disorders, and on
relevant to health skills. Assessment instruments included the Opinion
about Mental Illness (OMI) scale and the General Health Questionnaire
(GHQ-28).
Results: The mean scores of three OMI factors, that is, social
discrimination, social restriction and social integration, and the two
GHQ-28 subscales, that is, anxiety/insomnia and social dysfunction, were
significantly improved by the end of the training course.
Conclusions: The results of this study provide evidence, with
limitations, for the short-term effectiveness of the implemented
educational MHP program on an adult group of recipients-key agents in
their community. Because interventions for strengthening positive
opinions about mental illness and enhancing self-assessed health
constitute priority aims of mental health promotion, it would be
beneficial to further investigate the sustainability of the observed
positive changes. In addition it would be useful to examine (a) the
possible interplay between the two outcome measures, that is, the effect
of opinions of recipients about mental health on their perceived health,
and (b) the applicability of this intervention in individuals with
different sociodemographic profiles
Predicting Pediatric Posttraumatic Stress Disorder After Road Traffic Accidents: The Role of Parental Psychopathology
This study examined prospectively the role of parental psychopathology
among other predictors in the development and persistence of
posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) in 57 hospitalized youths aged 7-18
years immediately after a road traffic accident and 1 and 6 months
later. Self report questionnaires and semistructured diagnostic
interviews were used in all 3 assessments. Neuroendocrine evaluation was
performed at the initial assessment. Maternal PTSD symptomatology
predicted the development of children’s PTSD 1 month after the event, OR
= 699, 95% CI [1.049, 45.725]; the persistence of PTSD 6 months later
was predicted by the child’s increased evening salivary cortisol
concentrations within 24 hours of the accident, OR = 1.006, 95% CI
[1.001, 1.011]. Evaluation of both biological and psychosocial
predictors that increase the risk for later development and maintenance
of PTSD is important for appropriate early prevention and treatment
Elevated morning serum interleukin (IL)-6 or evening salivary cortisol concentrations predict posttraumatic stress disorder in children and adolescents six months after a motor vehicle accident
Background: This study examined prospectively the activity of the
hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal axis, the sympathetic nervous system and
inflammatory factors in children shortly after a motor vehicle accident
(MVA) in relation to later posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD)
development.
Patients and methods: Fifty six children, aged 7-18, were studied after
an MVA and 1 and 6 months later; 40 subjects served as controls. Morning
serum cortisol and interleukin (IL)-6 and plasma catecholamine
concentrations were measured within 24h after the event. Salivary
cortisol was measured 5 times at defined time points during the same
day. PTSD diagnoses 1 and 6 months later were based on K-SADS interview.
Results: Morning serum IL-6 concentrations, measured within the first
24h after the accident, were higher in children that developed PTSD 6
months later than those who did not and those of the control group.
Longitudinal IL-6 measurements revealed normalization of IL-6 in the
PTSD group, white no differences between the three groups were detected
1 and 6 months later. Evening salivary cortisol and morning serum IL-6
after the accident were positively inter-related (r = 0.54, p<0.001) and
in separate regression analyses both predicted PTSD development 6 months
later. In contrast, morning serum IL-6 did nor correlate with morning
serum or salivary cortisol concentrations.
Conclusions: Immediate posttraurnatic alterations in neuroendocrine or
inflammatory factors-increased evening salivary cortisol and/or
increased morning serum IL-6 concentrations-are involved in subsequent
PTSD development in children and adolescents. (C) 2007 Elsevier Ltd. All
rights reserved
Breaking Bad News: Communication Around Parental Multiple Sclerosis With Children
This study investigates the relation of communication around parental
multiple sclerosis (MS) to family dysfunction and mental health problems
of the children in Greek families. Fifty-six families with a parent with
MS were studied regarding emotional well-being of children, parental
depression, family functioning, and illness’ related impairment,
correlated to the amount of information about parental illness provided
to children. Significant differences were found in three dimensions of
child psychopathology on maternal scores of Child Behavior Checklist,
between children who had partial information about parental illness and
the other two groups of children who had explicit or no information at
all. Differences were also observed in children’s scores on (Youth Self
Report) social problems between the same groups. The finding that
children who had only partial information about their parents’ illness
presented more problems, illustrates the importance of “how, what, and
how much” of information is communicated to children. Clinical
implications are discussed in terms of the families’ difficulties with
communicating parental illness with their children and possible need for
profesional support
Emotional and behavioural difficulties in children of parents with multiple sclerosis - A controlled study in Greece
Emotional and behavioural problems were investigated in children who
have a parent with multiple sclerosis (MS), in relation to factors such
as family dysfunction, parental depression and illness-related
characteristics. The participants were 56 MS patients, their spouses and
one randomly selected child aged 4-17 years, and a comparison group of
64 children and both their parents, none of whom reported somatic
illness. Emotional and behavioural problems in the children were
identified by reporting of both parents and self-report using the
Achenbach’s Child Behaviour Checklist and Youth Self Report
respectively. Parental depression and family dysfunction were explored
using the Beck Depression Inventory and Family Assessment Device,
respectively. The data were analysed using independent samples t-tests
for between-group comparisons, Pearson r correlations between children’s
problems and family dysfunction or parental depression, and multiple
regression analyses for identifying predictors for children’s problems.
Children whose parents, especially mothers, had MS presented greater
emotional and behavioural problems than comparison children. Children’s
problems were positively associated with maternal depression and family
dysfunction. Family dysfunction predicted children’s overall and
externalizing problems, while the severity of impairment of the ill
mother predicted children’s internalizing problems. Implications of
these findings for clinical practice are discussed
Gray matter and white matter changes in non-demented amyotrophic lateral sclerosis patients with or without cognitive impairment: A combined voxel-based morphometry and tract-based spatial statistics whole-brain analysis
The phenotypic heterogeneity in amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) implies that patients show structural changes within but also beyond the motor cortex and corticospinal tract and furthermore outside the frontal lobes, even if frank dementia is not detected. The aim of the present study was to investigate both gray matter (GM) and white matter (WM) changes in non-demented amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) patients with or without cognitive impairment (ALS-motor and ALS-plus, respectively). Nineteen ALS-motor, 31 ALS-plus and 25 healthy controls (HC) underwent 3D-T1-weighted and 30-directional diffusion-weighted imaging on a 3 T MRI scanner. Voxel-based morphometry and tract-based spatial-statistics analysis were performed to examine GM volume (GMV) changes and WM differences in fractional anisotropy (FA), axial and radial diffusivity (AD, RD, respectively). Compared to HC, ALS-motor patients showed decreased GMV in frontal and cerebellar areas and increased GMV in right supplementary motor area, while ALS-plus patients showed diffuse GMV reduction in primary motor cortex bilaterally, frontotemporal areas, cerebellum and basal ganglia. ALS-motor patients had increased GMV in left precuneus compared to ALS-plus patients. We also found decreased FA and increased RD in the corticospinal tract bilaterally, the corpus callosum and extra-motor tracts in ALS-motor patients, and decreased FA and increased AD and RD in motor and several WM tracts in ALS-plus patients, compared to HC. Multimodal neuroimaging confirms motor and extra-motor GM and WM abnormalities in non-demented cognitively-impaired ALS patients (ALS-plus) and identifies early extra-motor brain pathology in ALS patients without cognitive impairment (ALS-motor)