The joint family forms an important and distinguishing characteristic ol' the Indian society. Desal (1964) says "H indus understood only one type of family and that was the joint family. The normat ive patterns of their actions was characterised by the orientation to this g roup" . Over the past two decades social scientists have expressed concern over the fate of the jo in t family when viewed...

STUDY DESIGN Cross-sectional study. OBJECTIVE To examine the sensitivity of 2 single-item questions compared with 2 longer questionnaires for screening depression and anxiety among patients with chronic low back pain (CLBP). SUMMARY OF BACKGROUND DATA Psychosocial factors are frequently identified as risk factors for developing CLBP and as predictors for treatment, and questionnaires are of...

From a sample of 499 patients admitted to hospitals for suicide attempts, a subsample of 182 suicide attempters who described histories of illicit activities or who were diagnosed with DSM-II anti-social, drug or alcohol personality disorders were compared with another sample of 109 suicide attempters diagnosed as having depressive disorders. The former group of unsocialized attempters obtained...

A. Verónica Araya1, Teresa Massardo2, Jenny Fiedler3, Luis Risco4, Juan C. Quintana5 and Claudio Liberman1 1Endocrinology Section, Clinical Hospital of the University of Chile 2Nuclear Medicine Section, Clinical Hospital of the University of Chile 3Faculty of Chemical and Pharmaceutical Sciences, University of Chile 4Psychiatric Clinic of the Clinical Hospital of the University of Chile 5Depart...

Molecular imaging is the visualization, characterization, and measurement of biologic processes at the molecular and cellular levels in humans and other living systems. Molecular imaging techniques such as MR spectroscopy and PET have been used to explore the molecular pathophysiology of depression and assess treatment responses. MR spectroscopy is a noninvasive technique that assesses the leve...

T relationship between alcohol­ to require treatment. When depressed or consequence of the person’s consump­ use disorders and psychiatric anxious alcohol­dependent people are tion of high doses of alcohol (i.e., the symptoms is both clinically im­ asked their opinions about cause and complaints are alcohol induced), then portant and very complex (Brady and effect, they often reply that they be...

Well conducted investigations into the long-term outcome of depressive disorders are rare. This issue of Psychological Medicine publishes two important papers reporting on different cohorts of depressed patients, one series from Japan (Kanai et al. 2003) and the other from Cambridge UK (Kennedy et al. 2003). Both were ascertained in the early 1990s and have been followed for 5–6 and 8–10 years ...

BACKGROUND Numerous studies have supported an association between maternal depression and child psychiatric outcomes, but few have controlled for the confounding effects of both maternal and offspring co-morbidity. Thus, it remains unclear whether the correspondence between maternal and offspring depressive and anxiety disorders is better explained by associations between shared features of mat...

We report a case of a woman with a depressive disorder with partial response to antidepressant treatment. Raloxifene, a Selective Estrogen Receptor Modulator (SERM) was added to the treatment, the patient achieving complete remission of her depressive symptoms. The interest of our case lies in the fact that it exemplifies the relationship between depressive disorders and hormonal changes during...

This study examines the rates of depressive symptoms and service use among caregivers whose children receive treatment for disruptive behavior disorders. Descriptive analyses examined preliminary baseline data from the Family Groups for Urban Youth with Disruptive Behaviors study for 212 caregivers to determine rates of caregiver depressive symptoms and lifetime mental health service use. Findi...