Tag: psychotherapy

Reading of the Week: DBT for Youth with Bipolar – the New JAMA Psych Paper; Also, Involuntary Care and Dr. Gibbons on the Truths About Suicide

September 28, 2023 /

From the Editor

Nine! 

This month, the Reading of the Week celebrates a big birthday, its ninth. The first Reading was emailed out in September 2014. Many thanks for your ongoing interest and support. I’m looking forward to the next nine years.

Many young people with bipolar attempt suicide. What can be done to help them? In the first selection, Tina R. Goldstein (of the University of Pittsburgh) and her co-authors attempt to answer that question in a just-published JAMA Psychiatry paper. In their RCT involving youth with bipolar spectrum disorder, participants were enrolled in DBT or they received standard-of-care psychological support. “These findings support DBT as the first psychosocial intervention with demonstrated effects on suicidal behavior for adolescents with bipolar spectrum disorder.” We consider the paper and its clinical implications.

In the second selection, journalist and bestselling author Anna Mehler Paperny discusses coercive care in a new Quick Takes podcast interview. Mehler Paperny’s perspective on involuntary care is informed by her writing on the issue – and her lived experience. She worries that public debate may be driven by a desire to address public disorder rather than genuinely prioritizing the well-being of those with mental illness. “Coercive care is having a moment.”

And in the third selection, Dr. Rachel Gibbons (of the UK Royal College of Psychiatrists) considers suicide in a new BJPsych Bulletin paper. She opens by disclosing that three of her patients died by suicide early in her career. She then reviews “truths” about suicide. “In research we conducted, around two-thirds of psychiatrists and other clinicians felt it was their job to predict suicide. Our fantasy that we can do this, and our fear that we can’t, becomes a constant preoccupation in our work, distracts us from providing therapeutic care and closes our hearts to those in distress.”

DG

Continue reading

Reading of the Week: African Nova Scotian Youth & Stigma; Also, Engaging Health Care Workers (Psych Services) and Therapy & Psychiatry (Psych Times)

September 22, 2022 /

From the Editor

Many with mental disorders don’t engage in psychiatric care or, if they do, it is after significant delays – problematic for obvious reasons. Some groups are less likely to engage, including young Black individuals with psychosis.

Why the hesitation? What are the concerns of these patients and their larger communities? In the first selection, a paper just published by the Canadian Journal of Psychiatry, Ingrid Waldron (of McMaster University) and her co-authors take a qualitative interpretive narrative approach, to engage African Nova Scotians – including those in a first episode psychosis program – attempting to answer these questions and more. Among their key findings: “barriers include a lack of trust in health care services and a dearth of African Nova Scotian service providers.” We discuss the paper and its implications.

In this week’s second selection, Dr. Doron Amsalem (of Columbia University) and his co-authors aim to improve health care workers treatment seeking; in a paper for Psychiatric Services, they describe an RCT for a brief video intervention, finding positive results. They write: “This easily administered intervention could increase the likelihood of care seeking by proactively encouraging health care workers with mental health challenges to pursue treatment.”

Finally, in the third selection, Mark L. Ruffalo (of the University of Central Florida College of Medicine) and Dr. Daniel Morehead (of the Tufts Medical Center) consider psychotherapy and psychiatry. In an essay for Psychiatric Times, they argue that this is “the great divorce that never happened.” They write: “For decades, critics and leading psychiatrists have worried that psychotherapy among psychiatrists will one day die out and be forgotten. Yet for decades, reports of its demise have been greatly exaggerated.”

DG

Continue reading

Reading of the Week: After COVID – the New Lancet Psychiatry Paper; Also, Clark on Therapy (QT) and Physicians, Heal Thyselves (JAMA Net Open)

September 1, 2022 /

From the Editor

The first reported cases were almost three years ago. Yet, with this pandemic, many questions remain. No wonder. The patient experience is so varied. Some of our patients complain of time-limited, mild symptoms. Others seem affected by ongoing, non-physical symptoms. And many haven’t had any symptoms.

How common are neurological and psychiatric problems? Do they last? Are they less common with newer variants? This week, in the first selection, we consider a new Lancet Psychiatry paper; Max Taquet (of the University of Oxford) and his co-authors try to answer these questions and others. Drawing on the health records of almost 1.3 million people with a recorded diagnosis of COVID-19 and focusing on 14 different outcomes (including anxiety and mood disorders) across eight nations, they find: “post-COVID neurological and psychiatric outcomes followed different risk trajectories: the risk of cognitive deficit, dementia, psychotic disorder, and epilepsy or seizures remained increased at 2 years after a COVID-19 diagnosis, while the risks of other diagnoses (notably, mood and anxiety disorders) subsided early and showed no overall excess over the 2-year follow-up.” We look at the paper and its clinical implications.

In this week’s second selection, we consider a new Quick Takes podcast interview with David Clark (of the University of Oxford). Prof. Clark speaks about IAPT, the UK’s program to expand access to psychotherapy, which he co-founded. “We’ve still got some distance to go, though, but the IAPT services are seeing about a million people a year who wouldn’t have previously had psychological therapy.”

Primary care has an essential role in our health care system. In the third selection, Emily Rhodes (of the Ottawa Hospital Research Institute) and her co-authors mull physicians and their personal connection to primary care in a new JAMA Network Open paper. They find: physicians are less likely to be rostered with family docs, and less likely to visit them. They conclude: “Emphasis on the importance and improvement of access to primary care for physicians is a potential means to improve overall health for physicians and patients.”

DG

Continue reading

Reading of the Week: Lived Experience & Psychosis – the New World Psych Paper; Also, the Evidence for Cannabis (QT) and Bob Bell on Psychotherapy (Globe)

May 19, 2022 /

From the Editor

“Something as basic as grocery shopping was both frightening and overwhelming for me. I remember my mom taking me along to do grocery shopping as a form of rehabilitation… Everything seemed so difficult.”

So comments a patient on the experience of a relapse of psychosis.

Typically, we describe psychosis with lists of symptoms. But how do patients understand these experiences? In a new World Psychiatry paper, Dr. Paolo Fusar-Poli (of King’s College) and his co-authors attempt to answer this question with a “bottom-up” approach. As they explain: “To our best knowledge, there are no recent studies that have successfully adopted a bottom-up approach (i.e., from lived experience to theory), whereby individuals with the lived experience of psychosis (i.e., experts by experience) primarily select the subjective themes and then discuss them with academics to advance broader knowledge.” We discuss their paper.

In the second selection, we consider a new Quick Takes podcast. Dr. Kevin Hill (of Harvard University) reviews the cannabis literature and weighs the evidence. He notes the hazards of CBD, the lack of evidence for cannabis and sleep, and his fondness for the Chicago Bears. “There are very strong proponents for cannabis and there are people who are entirely sceptical about it. And the answers to a lot of these questions are somewhere in the middle.”

Finally, in the third selection, Dr. Robert Bell (of the University of Toronto) and his co-authors advocate for the expansion of public health care to cover psychotherapy. Dr. Bell, who is a former Deputy Minister of Health of Ontario, makes a clear case drawing on international examples. “Canadians understand that good health requires mental-health support, and co-ordinated investment in mental-health treatment would pay dividends in reducing the impact of mental-health disability on the economy.”

DG

Continue reading

Reading of the Week: Psychotherapy at a Distance; Also, Rakoff Remembered (Globe) and Horton on Her Brother (LA Times)

October 15, 2020 /

From the Editor

Mental health care has markedly changed since the pandemic began. What is the impact of COVID-19 on psychotherapy?

This week, we have three selections.

In the first, published in The American Journal of Psychiatry, Dr. John C. Markowitz (of Columbia University) and his co-authors write about psychotherapy and virtual care. The paper reviews the literature and also considers practical considerations. They note: “Therapists should acknowledge the crisis, and perhaps that teletherapy is a limited substitute for more direct contact.”

computer-image

In the second selection, reporter Wency Leung writes about Dr. Vivian Rakoff, who died earlier this month. In the Globe obituary, Leung writes about his various roles, including as psychiatrist-in-chief of the Clarke Institute (now part of CAMH). “To the many he inspired, he is remembered for his extraordinary intellect, kindness, sense of wonder and the agility with which he wove together ideas from a vast range of disciplines, from classic literature and philosophy to politics and pop culture.”

Finally, in our third selection, we consider an essay by Dr. Jillian Horton (of the University of Manitoba). In this LA Times essay, the internist writes about her brother and his mental illness, discussing the emotional and geographic distance of their relationship. “My brother died 40 years ago and he died in April.”

DG

Continue reading

Reading of the Week: Can Light Therapy Help with Bipolar Depression? Also, the Racism of COVID (BJP) & Gottlieb on the Toilet as the New Couch (NYT)

June 11, 2020 /

From the Editor

After his manic episode, the first patient I treated with bipolar disorder was low in mood for months, able to get out of bed, but not able to work. I remember him sitting in my office talking about feeling overwhelmed. For many people with bipolar disorder, the depressive episodes are long and debilitating. And for us clinicians, these episodes are difficult to treat. (I remember feeling overwhelmed, too.)

Can light therapy help?

The first selection seeks to answer that question. Light therapy, after all, has shown its utility in depression, including for those with a seasonal pattern to their lows. But bipolar depression? In a new Canadian Journal of Psychiatry paper, Dr. Raymond W. Lam (of UBC) and his co-authors do a systematic review and meta-analysis. They included seven papers. “This meta-analysis of RCTs found positive but nonconclusive evidence that light therapy is efficacious and well tolerated as adjunctive treatment for depressive episodes in patients with BD.”

phototherapy_1170336

Is the virus racist? In the second selection, we look at a provocative paper from The British Journal of Psychiatry written by Drs. Anuj Kapilashrami and Kamaldeep Bhui (both of Queen Mary University of London). Considering how COVID-19 affects certain groups more than others, they also note that mental illness is more common among minorities, and they argue that: “societal structures and disadvantage generate and can escalate inequalities in crises.” They offer a word of caution: “What is surprising is it takes a crisis to highlight these inequalities and for us to take note, only to revert to the status quo once the crisis is over. ”

Finally, we consider an essay from The New York Times. Lori Gottlieb, a psychotherapist, discusses her practice in a world of pandemic. “Suddenly, her sobs were drowned out by a loud whooshing sound.” She wonders if the toilet is the new couch.

DG

Continue reading

Reading of the Week: Can Machine Learning Improve Psychotherapy? The New JAMA Psychiatry Paper; Also, Santa Ono on His Mental Illness

September 12, 2019 /

From the Editor

“Compared with treatment of physical conditions, the quality of care of mental health disorders remains poor, and the rate of improvement in treatment is slow. Outcomes for many mental disorders have stagnated or even declined since the original treatments were developed.”

Are there two sentences more disappointing to read? One in five Canadians will experience a mental health problem this year – and yet we have basic problems with quality (and access).

Could AI and machine learning help?

In the first selection, we consider a new JAMA Psychiatry paper which opens with the two sentences above. The University of Cambridge’s Michael P. Ewbankand his co-authors don’t simply bemoan the status quo but seek to change it – they “developed a method of objectively quantifying psychotherapy using a deep learning approach to automatically categorize therapist utterances from approximately 90  000 hours of [internet-delivered CBT]…” In other words, by breaking therapy down into a couple of dozen techniques and then employing machine learning, they attempt to match techniques with outcomes (patient improvement and engagement), with an eye on finding what works and what doesn’t. And, yes, you read that right: they drew on 90 000 hours of therapy. They show: “factors specific to CBT, as well as factors common to most psychotherapies, are associated with increased odds of reliable improvement in patient symptoms.”

machinelearninginmarketing-1621x1000Can computers (and machine learning) improve human therapy?

In the second selection, we consider the comments of University of British Columbia President Santa Ono about school and the stresses of school. Ono speaks about his own struggle with depression. “I’ve been there at the abyss.”

DG

 

Continue reading

Reading of the Week: Care – At the System Level, At the Individual Level

July 25, 2019 /

From the Editor

As stigma fades, there is increasing interest in mental health care. But how can we best help those who need help?

This week, we consider three selections. From an opinion piece written by a politician to a study in a leading journal, there is a common thread: how to improve care, whether at the individual level or at the system level.

In our first selection, we consider a new paper from The Canadian Journal of Psychiatry. Evgenia Gatov (a senior epidemiologist at ICES) and her co-authors consider trauma in the inpatient population, with a big finding. “In this population-based study of adult psychiatric inpatients in Ontario, Canada, almost one in three individuals reported prior experiences of interpersonal trauma.”

19609_mainInpatient Care: a need for trauma care?

In our second selection, Dr. Adam Philip Stern (of Harvard Medical School) discusses the challenges of being a patient and a psychiatrist. Dr. Stern – ill with cancer – is in psychotherapy. He discusses much, including the value of connectedness.

And, in our third selection, we look at an essay by Boris Johnson (the new Prime Minister of the United Kingdom) who discusses depression and work. He advocates for tax changes making it easier for companies to help mentally ill employees.

Enjoy.

DG

Continue reading

Reading of the Week: Dr. Norman Doidge’s Essay on Psychotherapy, and Responses

April 18, 2019 /

From the Editor

Earlier this month, the University of Toronto Department of Psychiatry held a one-day conference on the Future of Psychotherapy. Speakers included Harvard University’s Dr. Vikram Patel, who has worked to expand access to care in low-income countries, and the University of Oxford’s Dr. David Clark, who has co-led the world’s largest program to improve access to evidence-based psychotherapy.

Here in Ontario, the future of psychotherapy will be influenced by several factors, including government payment. The day after the conference, when Drs. Patel and Clark were travelling home, a long essay ran in The Globe and Mail discussing a provincial government proposal to limit physician compensation for psychotherapy to 24 sessions a year; currently, there are no restrictions on the number of psychotherapy sessions billable per patient, allowing public funding of psychoanalysis. Dr. Norman Doidge, a psychoanalyst with affiliation with both the University of Toronto and Columbia University, argues strongly against the proposal. Psychiatry, he writes, will be left with “diagnose, and adios” – or worse, “diagnose, overdose, and adios.” Dr. Doidge – a bestselling author who has written on topics as diverse as the Palestinian conflict and brain plasticity, and who wrote the introduction to Jordan Peterson’s popular book – puts forward a well-crafted case.

terapia-kxsb-u11004258755405xyb-1024x576lastampa-itThe past of psychotherapy – but not its future?

In this Reading, we consider Dr. Doidge’s essay and some responses to it.

DG

Continue reading

Reading of the Week: Appointment Letters & Focused Therapies – Thinking Outside the Box

August 30, 2018 /

From the Editor

When we speak of improving the quality of mental health care, we often think about cutting-edge innovation – wearables, virtual reality, genetics, to name a few things.

This week, there are two selections. Both discuss innovations aimed at improving care – but neither could be considered particularly “cutting edge.”

In the first selection, researchers sought to improve outpatient appointment attendance with a decidedly low-tech idea: appointment letters reminding patients of the importance of follow up. Spoiler alert: it worked.

In the second selection, drawn from The New York Times, reporter Andrea Petersen discusses clinics that use a short, intense version of CBT.

Thinking outside the box

Together, these two selections illustrate some thinking outside the box.

DG

 
Continue reading