Low self-esteem and psychiatric patients: Part II – The relationship between self-esteem and demographic factors and psychosocial stressors in psychiatric patients

BACKGROUND: The objective of the present study was to identify the effects and relative importance of demographic factors and psychosocial stressors on self-esteem of psychiatric patients. METHOD: The present study was carried out on a consecutive sample of 1,190 individuals attending an open-access psychiatric outpatient clinic. Patients were diagnosed according to DSM III-R diagnostic criteria following detailed assessments. At screening, patients and controls completed two self-esteem questionnaires, the Rosenberg self-esteem scale and the Janis and Field Social Adequacy scale. In addition, a large amount of demographic and psychosocial data was collected on all patients. RESULTS: Significantly increased self-esteem was observed with an increase in age, educational achievement and income. Employed patients showed significantly higher self-esteem compared to unemployed patients. Female patients had a significantly lower self-esteem compared to male patients. The self-esteem of psychiatric patients did not vary significantly with their marital status. No relationship was detected between acute stressors and the self-esteem of psychiatric patients, although severe enduring stressors were associated with lower self-esteem in psychiatric patients. CONCLUSION: The results of this large study demonstrate that the self-esteem of adult psychiatric patients is affected by a number of demographic and psychosocial factors including age, sex, educational status, income, employment status, and enduring psychosocial stressors

The Epidemiology of Skin Cancer in Queensland: The Incidence

The age specific incidence rates of skin cancer in four coastal cities in Queensland are calculated and discussed. On the assumption that ultraviolet radiation is the causative factor, it is suggested that the only difference in response to the stimulus by the four populations is one of frequency of incidence. This arises from the observation that the curves are parallel for each of the four cities. Several methods of fitting lines to the data are described. This investigation was carried out while one of us held a Medical Research Fellowship at the University of Queensland. We are indebted to Dr. A. G. S. Cooper, Director of the Queensland Radium Institute, who allowed free use of the records of the Institute, and who helped with the numerous problems that arose during the course of the survey

Atomoxetine treatment for nicotine withdrawal: a pilot double-blind, placebo-controlled, fixed-dose study in adult smokers

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Many effective treatments for nicotine addiction inhibit noradrenaline reuptake. Three recent studies have suggested that another noradrenaline reuptake inhibitor, atomoxetine, may reduce smoking behaviors.</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>The present double-blind, placebo-controlled, fixed-dose study was carried out over 21 days during which administration of 40 mg atomoxetine was compared to placebo in 17 individuals. Of these, nine were randomized to atomoxetine and eight to placebo. Baseline and weekly measurements were made using the Cigarette Dependence Scale (CDS), Cigarette Withdrawal Scale (CWS), Questionnaire of Smoking Urges (QSU), reported number of cigarettes smoked, and salivary cotinine levels.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>The study results showed that all those on placebo completed the study. In marked contrast, of the nine individuals who started on atomoxetine, five dropped out due to side effects. In a completer analysis there were statistically significant differences at 14 and 21 days in several measures between the atomoxetine and placebo groups, including CDS, CWS, QSU, number of cigarettes smoked (decreasing to less than two per day in the treatment group who completed the study), and a trend towards lower mean salivary cotinine levels. However, these differences were not seen in a last observation carried forward (LOCF) analysis.</p> <p>Conclusions</p> <p>In summary, this is the first study to examine the use of atomoxetine in non-psychiatric adult smokers for a period of more than 7 days, and the findings suggest that atomoxetine might be a useful treatment for nicotine addiction. However, the dose used in the current study was too high to be tolerated by many adults, and a dose-finding study is required to determine the most appropriate dose for future studies of this potential treatment for smoking cessation.</p

Low self-esteem and psychiatric patients: Part I – The relationship between low self-esteem and psychiatric diagnosis

BACKGROUND: The objective of the current study was to determine the prevalence and the degree of lowered self-esteem across the spectrum of psychiatric disorders. METHOD: The present study was carried out on a consecutive sample of 1,190 individuals attending an open-access psychiatric outpatient clinic. There were 957 psychiatric patients, 182 cases with conditions not attributable to a mental disorder, and 51 control subjects. Patients were diagnosed according to DSM III-R diagnostic criteria following detailed assessments. At screening, individuals completed two questionnaires to measure self-esteem, the Rosenberg self-esteem scale and the Janis and Field Social Adequacy scale. Statistical analyses were performed on the scores of the two self-esteem scales. RESULTS: The results of the present study demonstrate that all psychiatric patients suffer some degree of lowered self-esteem. Furthermore, the degree to which self-esteem was lowered differed among various diagnostic groups. Self-esteem was lowest in patients with major depressive disorder, eating disorders, and substance abuse. Also, there is evidence of cumulative effects of psychiatric disorders on self-esteem. Patients who had comorbid diagnoses, particularly when one of the diagnoses was depressive disorders, tended to show lower self-esteem. CONCLUSIONS: Based on both the previous literature, and the results from the current study, we propose that there is a vicious cycle between low self-esteem and onset of psychiatric disorders. Thus, low self-esteem increases the susceptibility for development of psychiatric disorders, and the presence of a psychiatric disorder, in turn, lowers self-esteem. Our findings suggest that this effect is more pronounced with certain psychiatric disorders, such as major depression and eating disorders

Control system design using optimization techniques Final report

Optimization techniques for control of fuel valve systems for air breathing jet engines and 40-60 inlet control problem

Resummation of Nonalternating Divergent Perturbative Expansions

A method for the resummation of nonalternating divergent perturbation series is described. The procedure constitutes a generalization of the Borel-Pad\'{e} method. Of crucial importance is a special integration contour in the complex plane. Nonperturbative imaginary contributions can be inferred from the purely real perturbative coefficients. A connection is drawn from the quantum field theoretic problem of resummation to divergent perturbative expansions in other areas of physics.Comment: 5 pages, LaTeX, 2 tables, 1 figure; discussion of the Carleman criterion added; version to appear in Phys. Rev.

Terminal deoxynucleotidyl transferase is found in prothymocytes

Terminal deoxynucleotidyl transferase is an enzyme which has the unique property of polymerizing polydeoxynucleotides onto a primer in the absence of a template (1,2). This enzyme is found both in the thymus and the bone marrow of birds, rodents, and humans (3-7). Whether the marrow cells that contain terminal transferase are related to thymocytes, or are on a separate pathway of differentiation, is not yet known (7,8). To determine the lineage of the murine bone marrow cells that have terminal transferase, we have investigated whether these cells have the antigen Thy-1 induced on the cells by treatment with thymopoietin (9). Thymopoietin is known to induce a set of characteristic T-cell markers including the Thy-1 alloantigen on the surface of a subpopulation of bone marrow cells committed to T-cell differentiation (prothymocytes) (10). Destruction of Thy- 1-positive cells after exposure to thymopoietin allows elimination of a substantial fraction of those bone marrow cells that can repopulate an irradiated thymus (11). We find that such an elimination after induction with the thymic polypeptide removes a substantial amount of terminal transferase from the bone marrow cell population, suggesting that at least one-half of the marrow cells bearing this enzyme are related to those found in the thymus

The Incidence Of Depression, And Its Effects Upon Outcome, In Four Life-Threatening Illnesses

PhD thesisThe M.D. Thesis study was an attempt to test the hypothesis that inpatients with medical illness who are depressed have worse outcomes, in terms of morbidity and mortality, than similar patients who are not depressed. This hypothesis was tested in four groups of patients who presented with life-threatening illness; myocardial infarction (n=100); sub-arachnoid haemorrhage ( n=41); pulmonary embolism ( n=40); and acute upper gastro-intestinal bleeding (n=30). The patients entered into the trial underwent initial cognitive examination using the Mini-Mental State examination (MMS), to exclude patients with cognitive deficeits. This was followed by the Montgomery-Asberg Rating Scale for depression (MARS). These tests were repeated on alternate days until discharge, or 21 days post admission, whichever occurred sooner. The degree of pain experienced by the various groups of patients was measured using a simple Pain Rating Scale. The severity of illness for each individual patient was also computed, using currently available prognostic indicators. Four different cut-off points on the MARS were then used to determine the presence of depression. These cut-off points were 7, 14, 21 and 7 when the somatic components of the MARS were excluded (7-SCE). The results showed that the depressed patients were not more seriously ill than the non-depressed group, regardless of the cut-off point used. There were also no significant diffences in age, sex, or pain experienced. Despite this equal prognosis for both the depressed and non-depressed groups, the former did significantly worse in all four conditionsn both in terms of morbidity and mortality. The most significant findings however, were when the patient populations were combined. Of the 211 patients, 55% were depressed when the cut-off point was 7, 41% when it was 14, 18% when it was 21 and 33% when it was 7-SCE. The 7-SCE group also consistently showed the most statistically significant differences between depressed and non-depressed patients in terms of outcome in all groups. In the 7-SCE group 46% had a poor outcome and 22% died, compared with 10% who did poorly and <2% who died in the non depressed group. In studying the individual items of the MARS in patients who scored less than 14, then 80% of their score was due to somatic items which were likely to reflect the underlying illness. In the other cut-off points for depression this was approximately 50%. This risk of bias is inherent when using rating scales validated in the psychiatrically ill to detect depression in those with physical problems. The 7-SCE group is that in which the least likelihood of being affected by bias occurs. The results also showed that the depressed patients experienced more pain, although this difference was not statistically significant. A further finding was the possibility that aneurysms of the right internal carotid artery were particularly associated with depression in those patients presenting with sub-arachnoid haemorrhage. It was also clear from the change in the MARS over time that the phenomenon outlined above could more accurately be termed an adjustment reaction with depression rather than depressive illness

Color Gradients Detected in the HD 15115 Circumstellar Disk

We report HST/NICMOS coronagraphic images of the HD 15115 circumstellar disk at 1.1\micron. We find a similar morphology to that seen in the visible and at H band--an edge-on disk that is asymmetric in surface brightness. Several aspects of the 1.1\micron data are different, highlighting the need for multi-wavelength images of each circumstellar disk. We find a flattening to the western surface brightness profile at 1.1\micron interior to 2\arcsec (90 AU) and a warp in the western half of the disk. We measure the surface brightness profiles of the two disk lobes and create a measure of the dust scattering efficiency between 0.55-1.65\micron at 1\arcsec, 2\arcsec, and 3\arcsec. At 2\arcsec the western lobe has a neutral spectrum up to 1.1\micron and a strong absorption or blue spectrum $>$1.1\micron, while a blue trend is seen in the eastern lobe. At 1\arcsec the disk has a red F110W-H color in both lobes.Comment: 4 pages, 4 figures, emulateapj; accepted to ApJ

Lithium alters brain activation in bipolar disorder in a task- and state-dependent manner: an fMRI study

BACKGROUND: It is unknown if medications used to treat bipolar disorder have effects on brain activation, and whether or not any such changes are mood-independent. METHODS: Patients with bipolar disorder who were depressed (n = 5) or euthymic (n = 5) were examined using fMRI before, and 14 days after, being started on lithium (as monotherapy in 6 of these patients). Patients were examined using a word generation task and verbal memory task, both of which have been shown to be sensitive to change in previous fMRI studies. Differences in blood oxygenated level dependent (BOLD) magnitude between the pre- and post-lithium results were determined in previously defined regions of interest. Severity of mood was determined by the Hamilton Depression Scale for Depression (HAM-D) and the Young mania rating scale (YMRS). RESULTS: The mean HAM-D score at baseline in the depressed group was 15.4 ± 0.7, and after 2 weeks of lithium it was 11.0 ± 2.6. In the euthymic group it was 7.6 ± 1.4 and 3.2 ± 1.3 respectively. At baseline mean BOLD signal magnitude in the regions of interest for the euthymic and depressed patients were similar in both the word generation task (1.56 ± 0.10 and 1.49 ± 0.10 respectively) and working memory task (1.02 ± 0.04 and 1.12 ± 0.06 respectively). However, after lithium the mean BOLD signal decreased significantly in the euthymic group in the word generation task only (1.56 ± 0.10 to 1.00 ± 0.07, p < 0.001). Post-hoc analysis showed that these differences were statistically significant in Broca's area, the left pre-central gyrus, and the supplemental motor area. CONCLUSION: This is the first study to examine the effects of lithium on brain activation in bipolar patients. The results suggest that lithium has an effect on euthymic patients very similar to that seen in healthy volunteers. The same effects are not seen in depressed bipolar patients, although it is uncertain if this lack of change is linked to the lack of major improvements in mood in this group of patients. In conclusion, this study suggests that lithium may have effects on brain activation that are task- and state-dependent. Given the small study size and the mildness of the patient's depression these results require replication