Publications by authors named "Anton Scamvougeras"

Objective: The fentanyls have emerged as a significant public health threat in North America but much less so in Australia. We sought to identify reasons for this discrepancy and highlight harm reduction approaches that may mitigate a future Australian fentanyl epidemic.

Conclusions: Differences in drug use 'culture' and a supply of cheap high-quality methamphetamine in Australia may be reasons for the observed difference in fentanyl-related harm.

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Objective: North American and other jurisdictions have seen an alarming rise in the abuse of the fentanyls, with related overdose deaths. We sought to review this group of drugs to alert Australian psychiatrists and drug and alcohol clinicians to their clinical effects and potential harms.

Conclusions: The extreme potency of the fentanyls underlie their lethality.

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Objective: Medically unexplained somatic complaints are highly prevalent, and lead to significant impairment and disability. The number of effective treatment modalities for somatic symptom and related disorders (SSDs) or somatoform disorders (SDs) remains limited. To date, there is no formal indication for electroconvulsive therapy (ECT) in SSD or SD.

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The results of several studies have shown that homosexual men have an increased prevalence of non-right-handedness and atypical patterns of hemispheric functional asymmetry. Non-right-handedness in men has been associated with increased size of the corpus callosum (CC), particularly of the isthmus, which is the posterior region of the callosal body connecting parietotemporal cortical regions. We hypothesized that isthmal area would be greater in homosexual men, even among right handers.

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Conversion disorder consists of involuntary sensory or motor symptoms and deficits that cannot be explained by a general medical condition. There are several treatment options, although none has emerged as the treatment of choice. The present case study examined the effects of adding cognitive behaviour therapy to neuropsychiatric management of conversion disorder (motor subtype).

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The factors determining the large variation seen in human corpus callosum (CC) morphology are as yet unknown. In this study heritability of CC size was assessed by comparing the concordance of CC midsagittal area in 14 monozygotic and 12 dizygotic twin pairs with a mean age of 27 years, using magnetic resonance imaging and various methods of calculating trait heritability. Heritability was high regardless of method of assessment.

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