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When is depression not depression?
No one can dispute that depression is now a major public health issue, with incidences skyrocketing all over the Western world. A new piece of research by Fried et al., published in the Journal of Abnormal Psychology, seems to offer a glimmer of hope by suggesting that depression is being over-diagnosed among the bereaved. In…
Concerning children’s mental health
A recent government task-force review sheds some rather disturbing light on the state of child mental health services in England. The review focuses on concerns highlighted by a survey of Clinical Psychologists working across 43 separate specialist Child and Adolescent Mental Health Services (CAMHS) in 2014. According to the Psychologists, in the last three years…
Bedlam now on open display
This week, I heard the story of a mother whose son had been conscripted to Afghanistan with the Territorial Army. One of her anecdotes which particularly touched me was that of her son asking her to send, along with protein bars and practical sundries, a colouring-in book. She told of how, in a quiet moment,…
Valentine’s Day Special
I’ve been trying to figure out the connection between the original St Valentine, a Roman priest who was beheaded under Claudius II on 14 February in the year 270 AD, and the restaurant-and-rose-fest we practice every year in his name. Maybe it has something to do with him sheltering Christians from persecution and, in…
Getting up close and personalised
You may not have noticed it, but personalised medicine is about to be all the rage. It’s one of the biggest trends in modern medicine and what it may mean to the average punter is fewer side effects on medication. The idea is that the drug you will be prescribed will be tailored to your…
Depressed? Try popping an aspirin.
It’s a sad reality that depression is now being diagnosed in epidemic proportions, and equally sad that we seem so relatively helpless to treat it. According to popular figures, more than 50% of those who suffer from major depression do not respond to treatment. That’s why the latest piece of research from the Centre for…
STOP PRESS: Men and women are different!
We live in confusing times. So much so, that sometimes we lose track of the obvious. New research from the University of Basel is reassuringly supportive of something we women instinctively know to be true – that women experience a more potent response to emotional stimuli than men. This large scale study, the results of…
Of mice and men (and empathy)
Anyone who has trained in counselling knows that empathy is one of the most basic tenets of the therapeutic relationship. Psychologist Carl Rogers identified empathy and two other principles, congruence and unconditional positive regard, as the three essential pillars of his client-centred approach to psychotherapy. Empathy has recently been enjoying a relative resurgence of interest…
