Youth mental health interventions: umbrella review presents efficacy and acceptability data

Close,Up,Of,Pre-teen,Friends,In,A,Park,Smiling,To

In his debut blog, Nick Meader tackles a huge umbrella review of youth mental health interventions, which presents the efficacy and acceptability of 72 different approaches to help children and young people.

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Navigating the long-term effects of Electroconvulsive Therapy (ECT): a qualitative meta-synthesis

The,Word,Hiv,Is,Written,On,Wooden,Cubes,Near,A

Amelia Talbot reviews a qualitative meta-synthesis on the long-term effects of Electroconvulsive Therapy (ECT) reported by people who have received it.

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Pregnancy and bipolar disorder: international prescribing consensus?

Pregnant woman with drugs

Dean Connolly looks at an international study which asks: Is there consensus across evidence-based guidelines for the psychotropic drug management of bipolar disorder during the perinatal period?

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ECT for depression in the elderly

Depression and anxiety are quite common in people with dementia and mild cognitive impairment.

Andrew Shepherd reports on a post-hoc analysis of pre-existing trial data, which does little to convince him that ECT is a safe and effective treatment option for older people with severe depression.

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New guideline says lithium still appears to have the most robust evidence base as a long-term treatment for bipolar disorder

Bipolar

Bipolar disorder features as one of the top ten disabling disorders for working age adults. There are numerous risks including suicide, increased mortality and reduced social functioning associated with the disorder. Key to enabling recovery is preventing acute episodes from occurring, with each episode increasing the risk of future ones. Therefore ensuring long-term maintenance treatment [read the full story…]

New Clinical Evidence chapter on depression sees no significant changes to drug and physical treatment recommendations

Black Dog

The BMJ have published an up to date guideline on the treatment of depression with drugs and physical interventions.  It provides a good overview of the effectiveness and safety of antidepressants, electroconvulsive therapy, exercise, lithium augmentation, pindolol augmentation, and St John’s wort. The authors found 88 systematic reviews, RCTs, or observational studies and performed a [read the full story…]