Common mental health disorders linked with increased risk of violent reoffending in ex-prisoners

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Ian Cummins considers the implications of a new cohort study of convicted prisoners in Sweden, which links psychiatric disorders with violent reoffending.

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Varenicline is not associated with an increased risk of suicide or criminal behaviour

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Abi Rose summarises a recent cohort study, which concludes that the smoking cessation drug varenicline is not associated with increased risk of suicidal or criminal behaviour, and association with psychiatric disorders are likely due to other factors.  

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Disabled people’s experiences of violent and hate crime

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Hannah Morgan examines a secondary analysis of the UK Life Opportunities Survey which explores disabled people’s experiences of violent and hate crime.

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Depression to blame for violent crime? The curse of the headline writers

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Laurence Palfreyman highlights a population study from researchers at Oxford University, which investigates the links between depression and violent crime. The study finds that people with depression were three times more likely to have been convicted of violent crime than those without depression, but we need to be careful about how we interpret these relative risk figures.

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Away from crime and into treatment: diversion and aftercare for drug-using offenders

The review showed some evidence of publication bias

Can we steer drug-using offenders away from crime and into treatment? Chris Sampson explores a study of the cost-effectiveness of diversion and aftercare programmes for offenders using class A drugs.

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People with severe mental illness are more likely to be victims of violent and non-violent crime

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Vishal Bhavsar summarises a recent cross-sectional study of violent and non-violent crime against adults with severe mental illness, which finds that service users were five times more likely to be victims of assault, and three times more likely to be victims of household acquisitive crime.

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Schizophrenia and violent crime: perpetrators or victims?

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Debut blogger Vishal Bhavsar summarises an Israeli population-based study that explores the links between schizophrenia and violent crime. He calls on researchers to focus on people with schizophrenia as victims rather than perpetrators of crime.

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Bipolar disorder, suicide and criminality

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Elena Marcus summarises a double case-cohort study, which investigates the risk of suicide and criminal behaviours in people with bipolar disorder and their siblings, compared with the general population.

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Can environmental changes reduce fear of crime and improve mental health and well-being?

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Kathryn Walsh summarises a recent systematic review on crime, fear of crime and mental health, which highlights a number of interventions that are not effective in reducing the fear of crime.

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Antipsychotics and mood stabilisers may reduce violent crime

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John Baker reports on the first population based report of the positive effects of antipsychotic medication and mood stabilisers on reducing the risk of a conviction for violent crime, published in the Lancet in May.

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