Life events, depression and social support in dementia.

Objectives: Recent research has highlighted the influence of psychosocial factors on the course of dementia, and previous studies have demonstrated an association between the experience of life events and depression. This study aimed to investigate the interrelationships between life events, depression and social support in people with dementia.

Design: Participants were 72 people with dementia and their carers.

Characteristics of teams, staff and patients: associations with outcomes of patients in assertive outreach.

Background: Little is known about what characteristics of teams, staff and patients are associated with a favourable outcome of severe mental illness managed by assertive outreach.

Aims: To identify predictors of voluntary and compulsory admissions in routine assertive outreach services in the UK.

Method: Nine features of team organisation and policy, five variables assessing staff satisfaction and burn-out and eleven patient characteristics taken from the baseline data of the Pan-London Assertive Outreach Study were tested as predictors of voluntary and compulsory admissions within a 9-month follow-up period.

Prevalence and correlates of self-reported psychotic symptoms in the British population.

Background: The psychosis phenotype is generally thought of as a categorical entity. However, there is increasing evidence that psychosis exists in the population as a continuum of severity rather than an all-or-none phenomenon.

Aims: To investigate the prevalence and correlates of self-reported psychotic symptoms using data from the 2000 British National Survey of Psychiatric Morbidity.

Psychosis, victimisation and childhood disadvantage: evidence from the second British National Survey of Psychiatric Morbidity.

Background: Adverse early circumstances may be more common in people who later develop psychotic disorders.

Aims: To use data from the second British National Survey of Psychiatric Morbidity to examine associations between psychotic disorders and a number of early victimisation experiences.

Method: Psychiatric disorders were identified through structured assessment of adults resident in private households in Britain (n=8580).

Life events and survival in dementia: a 5-year follow-up study.

Objectives: To examine the relationship between life events and survival for people with dementia. To investigate whether this relationship differs from that for people without dementia. To identify which psychiatric and social factors are associated with survival in people with dementia.

Why do people with delusions fail to choose more realistic explanations for their experiences? An empirical investigation.

Delusions can be viewed as explanations of experiences,. By definition, the experiences are insufficient to merit the delusional explanations. So why have delusions been accepted rather than more realistic explanations? The authors report a study of alternative explanations in 100 individuals with delusions.

Social factors and depression in carers of people with dementia.

Background: Research has highlighted the influence of psychosocial factors on the wellbeing of carers of people with dementia. This study aimed to investigate the interrelationships between life events, depression and social support in carers of people with dementia.

Method: Participants were 72 carers of people with dementia.

Expressed emotion at first-episode psychosis: investigating a carer appraisal model.

Background: Even at the first episode of psychosis, high expressed emotion (EE) characterises over half of patient-carer relationships. This study compared a carer appraisal model of EE with the ability of illness factors to predict EE at the first episode.

Aims: To investigate the utility of a carer appraisal model of EE in first-episode psychosis.

Can virtual reality be used to investigate persecutory ideation?

The use of virtual reality permits individuals' reactions to standard controlled environments to be studied. It may therefore provide a means for understanding the interpretations of experience relevant to clinical disorders. The use of this technology for understanding persecutory ideation has not been investigated.

Assertive outreach teams in London: patient characteristics and outcomes. Pan-London Assertive Outreach Study, part 3.

Background: Although the model of assertive outreach has been widely adopted, it is unclear who receives assertive outreach in practice and what outcomes can be expected under routine conditions.

Aims: To assess patient characteristics and outcome in routine assertive outreach services in the UK.

Method: Patients (n=580) were sampled from 24 assertive outreach teams in London.

Assertive outreach teams in London: staff experiences and perceptions. Pan-London Assertive Outreach Study, part 2.

Background: The job satisfaction, burn-out and work experiences of assertive outreach team staff are likely to be important to the model's sustainability.

Aims: To describe self-reported views and work experiences of staff in London's 24 assertive outreach teams and to compare these with staff in community mental health teams (CMHTs) and between different types of assertive outreach team.

Method: Confidential staff questionnaires in London's assertive outreach teams (n=187, response rate=89%) and nine randomly selected CMHTs (n=114, response rate=75%).

Lone mothers, social exclusion and depression.

Background: In this paper, data from the British National Survey of Psychiatric Morbidity are used to assess depressive disorders and markers of social disadvantage in women bringing up children on their own.

Method: The household component of the British National Surveys of Psychiatric Morbidity was based on a stratified random sample of > 10000 subjects. This paper reports on 5281 women interviewed in person.

Psychiatric morbidity and substance use in young people aged 13-15 years: results from the Child and Adolescent Survey of Mental Health.

Background: Psychoactive substance use is strongly associated with psychiatric morbidity in both adults and adolescents.

Aims: To determine which of alcohol, nicotine and cannabisis mostclosely linked to psychiatric disorders in early adolescence.

Method: Data from 2624 adolescents aged 13-15 years were drawn from a national mental health survey of children.

The reluctance to seek treatment for neurotic disorders.

In previous papers from the National Survey of Psychiatric Morbidity in Great Britain, we have demonstrated that people with neurotic disorders rarely present their symptoms to primary care physicians and when they do, are quite likely not to be given treatment. In this paper, we examined survey respondents' reports of specific instances of reluctance to seek help in relation to sociodemographic, socio-economic and clinical attributes of our subjects. All people in the National Household Survey assessed as having a neurotic disorder were asked if at any time in the previous year they had avoided seeking appropriate treatment.

Unequal access and unmet need: neurotic disorders and the use of primary care services.

In this paper we use data from the National Survey of Psychiatric Morbidity to examine how many people with neurotic disorders receive professional evaluation, and how this is affected by clinical and sociodemographic differences. We hypothesized that psychiatric symptoms and attendant dysfunctions would both have an effect on contacting, and that key demographic variables would not. The household component of the British National Surveys of Psychiatric Morbidity was based on a random sample of >10,000 subjects.

Neurotic disorders and the receipt of psychiatric treatment.

Access to psychiatric treatment by people with neurotic disorders in the general population is likely to be affected both by the severity of disorder and by sociodemographic differences. In the household component of the National Surveys of Psychiatric Morbidity >10,000 subjects in Great Britain with psychiatric symptoms were interviewed using the CIS-R. They were also asked about difficulties experienced in performing seven types of everyday activity.

Socio-economic status, standard of living, and neurotic disorder.

Evidence on the association between socio-economic status and the prevalence of neurotic disorder is contradictory. We studied the association between three elements of socio-economic status and the prevalence of neurotic psychiatric disorder in a representative sample of adults aged 16-64 living in private households in the UK. A cross-sectional survey of 10,108 adults aged 16-65 resident in private households in the UK was selected by a multi-stage, clustered, random-sampling design.

The influence of age and sex on the prevalence of depressive conditions: report from the National Survey of Psychiatric Morbidity.

Women are consistently reported to have a greater prevalence of depressive disorders than men. The reason for this is unclear, and is as likely to be social as biological. There is some evidence that the excess of depression is greater during women's reproductive lives.

Nicotine, alcohol and drug dependence, and psychiatric comorbidity--results of a national household survey.

There is a well-recognized relationship between substance use disorders and other psychiatric disorders. This relationship has been well documented in a range of population-based studies. This study aims to report on consumption patterns of and dependence on nicotine, alcohol, and non-prescribed drugs and to report on the levels of psychiatric morbidity in these groups.

Substance misuse and psychiatric comorbidity: an overview of the OPCS National Psychiatric Morbidity Survey.

There have been a number of national surveys of psychiatric morbidity, which have included questions on drugs, alcohol, and tobacco. These surveys have helped delineate the overlap between substance use and dependence and other psychological morbidity. There is a strong association reported between high substance consumption and other measures of psychological problems.

The National Psychiatric Morbidity Surveys of Great Britain--initial findings from the household survey.

This paper describes the Household Survey from the National Survey of Psychiatric Morbidity. This covered a sample drawn at random from the population of Britain, with the exception of the Highlands and Islands of Scotland. The Postcode Address File was used as the sampling frame.

The National Psychiatric Morbidity Surveys of Great Britain--strategy and methods.

This paper describes the rationale and methodology of the first National Psychiatric Morbidity Surveys to be carried out in Great Britain. The objectives of the surveys were to estimate the prevalence of psychiatric morbidity among adults aged 16-64 living in Great Britain; to identify the nature and extent of social disabilities associated with psychiatric morbidity; to describe the use of health and social services by people with psychiatric morbidity and to investigate the association between mental illness and potential environmental risk factors in a household sample. Four separate surveys were carried out in order to meet the objectives; a private household sample (n = 10,108), a sample of institutions caring for the mentally ill (n = 1191), a sample of homeless people (n = 1166), and a supplementary sample of patients with psychosis living in private households (n = 350).