FACTORS INFLUENCING ‘BURN-OUT’ IN NEWLY-QUALIFIED COUNSELLORS AND PSYCHOTHERAPISTS: A CROSS-CULTURAL, CRITICAL REVIEW OF THE LITERATURE.

Mental health problems have been established as one of the leading causes of the global burden of disease. Approximately a quarter of all people worldwide will experience a mental disorder during their lifetime. With depression and anxiety becoming the leading causes of mental ill health globally, the numbers of people reporting mental health complaints are set to grow. The dramatic increase in reporting and diagnosis of mental health disorders has been in parallel to a decline in the ability to cope with mental health symptoms and a rise in the incidence of self-harm and suicidal ideation. Whilst mental health assessment and diagnoses are usually the responsibility of general practitioners (family doctors) or psychiatrists, the frontline provision of mental health care is often delegated to counsellors and psychotherapists. Publicly funded counselling and psychotherapy services vary across the globe, but are commonly under-resourced and lacking in adequate funding. This may lead to insufficient clinical supervision and compressed time to complete continuing professional development, which are both vital for new counsellors and psychotherapists to feel confident in providing care, and to learn new skills. Newly-qualified counsellors and psychotherapists may also experience emotional, physical, and mental exhaustion or ‘burn-out’. This position paper aims to critically appraise available cross-cultural literature on the experiences of ‘burn-out’ by newly-qualified counsellors and psychotherapists, globally. Finally, we shall make recommendations for how best to support the mental health and psychological wellbeing of newly-qualified practitioners

Young love: Romantic concerns and associated mental health issues among adolescent help-seekers

Over 50% of young people have dated by age 15. While romantic relationship concerns are a major reason for adolescent help-seeking from counselling services, we have a limited understanding of what types of relationship issues are most strongly related to mental health issues and suicide risk. This paper used records of 4019 counselling sessions with adolescents (10-18 years) seeking help from a national youth counselling service for a romantic relationship concern to: (i) explore what types and stage (pre, during, post) of romantic concerns adolescents seek help for; (ii) how they are associated with mental health problems, self-harm and suicide risk; and (iii) whether these associations differ by age and gender. In line with developmental-contextual theory, results suggest that concerns about the initiation of relationships are common in early adolescence, while concerns about maintaining and repairing relationships increase with age. Relationship breakups were the most common concern for both male and female adolescents and for all age groups (early, mid, late adolescence). Data relating to a range of mental health issues were available for approximately half of the sample. Post-relationship concerns (including breakups) were also more likely than pre-or during-relationship concerns to be associated with concurrent mental health issues (36.8%), self-harm (22.6%) and suicide (9.9%). Results draw on a staged developmental theory of adolescent romantic relationships to provide a comprehensive assessment of relationship stressors, highlighting post-relationship as a particularly vulnerable time for all stages of adolescence. These findings contribute to the development of targeted intervention and support programs

Smart textiles for healthcare and medicine applications (WG1): state-of-the art report, CONTEXT Project

The aim of this document is to provide information on the state-of-the-art related to the topics covered by each working group within the CONTEXT project. It provides information on materials and technologies used to develop smart textiles with targeted performance, general applications of smart textiles in the field, case-studies on the use of smart textiles, opportunities for smart textiles considering the needs of each field, trends on the development of smart textiles in terms of market and technical expectations. This paper gives an overview of the potential of smart textiles for healthcare & medicine, ongoing developments, state-of-the-art products and future developments

The happiness imperative: exploring how women narrate depression and anxiety during pregnancy

This article explores how women account for their experiences of pregnancy distress in light of cultural imperatives to be the perfect, happy mother. Our analysis is based on the accounts of 18 Australian women, interviewed during pregnancy on the basis of their reports of experiencing depression and/or anxiety. Working within a feminist discursive framework, we focus on the discourses that informed (and threatened) women’s positions as a good mother. In particular, we focus on the discourses women relied on to explain their distress and the discursive strategies they used in the construction of their (“distressed”) maternal identity(ies). We ask how women articulate and label distress, and with what rhetorical effects. Our analysis explores how women’s experiences of negative moods and distress were in direct opposition to cultural imperatives for mothers to stay happy and positive during pregnancy and beyond, posing rhetorical challenges to women’s accounts and hence their capacity to make meaning of their (negative) experiences. Three discursive strategies are explored: distancing from the depressed self, speaking between/around/without words, and in search of a balance. We close by considering the implications of the complex ways in which women account for idealised motherhood and how this serves to oppress vulnerable women

The experience of psychological distress, depression, and anxiety during pregnancy: A meta-synthesis of qualitative research

Objective: to systematically review qualitative research that explores the experience of maternal antenatal psychological distress, such as depression, anxiety and stress during pregnancy