April 24, 2020
by Tina Arnoldi
During the 2003 SARS outbreak, health care workers had concerns about infecting others and experienced stigma because they were in close contact with sick patients. A new study in JAMA looked at the mental health of 1,257 health care workers attending to COVID-19 patients in China since COVID-19 is our current concern. A large percentage reported depression, anxiety, insomnia, and distress. Findings suggest that these health care workers are at a significant risk of developing mental illness.
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April 24, 2020
by Kimberly Lucey
Going to work every day to help save other people's lives, while putting their own on the line, is something first responders are faced with every day. But in the era of COVID-19 that daily risk is even higher, and now doctors and nurses are finding themselves on the front lines. The fear and uncertainty surrounding COVID-19 is taking a toll on everyone, but may hit these first responders especially hard.
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April 23, 2020
by Elizabeth Pratt
Experts around the world are racing to develop a vaccine for COVID19.
But there is a group of people who are unlikely to sign up: vaccine skeptics.
Vaccine skepticsm has become increasingly widespread, and researchers from Texas Tech University may have found the reason why.
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April 21, 2020
by Patricia Tomasi
A recent review published in the Journal of European Neuropsychopharmacology looked at nutritional psychiatry and whether mental health can be improved by what you eat. The popular press often provide advice to the general public about recommendations on how to improve one’s mental health by changing what we eat – specific diets, supplements or foods. A group of researchers wanted to set the record straight and explain in an informed balanced manner, the actual data behind common claims and misconceptions.
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Across cultures it is accepted that it is a terrible thing to die alone. During the present covid-19 epidemic the televised vision of refrigerated trucks filled with the dead has been especially disturbing. Why is that? Of course it is tragic when large numbers of people die. It is also frightening. Part of what appears to be at play here is that the fear of being unknown and alone is projected on to what an individual,who is a witness, has conjured up in his/her mind as a picture of lives uncelebrated and discarded.
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April 17, 2020
by Tina Arnoldi
Meena, featured on Google’s AI blog, is a chatbot trained in a conversational model. The concept is that it conducts conversations that are more sensible and specific than existing chatbots. This chatbot, trained with 2.6 billion parameters, is designed to offer more humanlike conversations.
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April 14, 2020
by Patricia Tomasi
A national survey by the Federal Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration found that 11.4 per cent of 12 to 17-year-olds were depressed in 2014. Ruby Walker was one of them. Her book, Advice I Ignored: Stories and Wisdom from a Formerly Depressed Teen is the only book on teenage mental health written by a teenager. It answers the question everyone's been asking her: What happened?
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April 10, 2020
by Tina Arnoldi
According to a human rights experts that performed psychological evaluations with immigrants, they stated that separation of families by immigration officials amounts to torture. In an investigation, “You Will Never See Your Child Again: The Persistent Psychological Effects of Family Separation,” Physicians for Human rights evaluated 17 adults and nine children from Central America who had been separated between 60 and 69 days.
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April 7, 2020
by Patricia Tomasi
A public opinion poll found that 44 per cent of Americans believe most poor people who receive welfare would prefer to stay on welfare rather than earn their own living. A new study published in the Journal of Nursing Education looked at the relationship between past experience, empathy, and attitudes toward poverty among nursing students. The results were surprising.
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April 3, 2020
by Tina Arnoldi
A new report by RAND showed that Los Angeles county could potentially divert up to two-thirds of their mentally ill inmates out of jails and into community-based treatment services. Diversion programs benefit individuals by giving them patient centered care while easing the burden on the jail system. But an increase in people with serious mental illness in the criminal justice system and the shortage of beds in outside mental health facilities make this a tough transition.
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