Deconstructing the 'black box' of the Camberwell assessment of need score in mental health services evaluation.

Objective: The aim of the study was to examine an alternative way of scoring the Camberwell Assessment of Need (CAN) for the purpose of service evaluation, using the by us defined Social Services (SI) and Psychiatric Services (PI) subindices.

Methods: CAN assessments in 1997 and 1999 of 262 outpatients (mean age 45 years, 77.1% psychotic disorders) were reanalysed to fit the SI and the PI, which were compared to the full CAN.

Functional characterization of tyrosine transport in fibroblast cells from healthy controls.

Human fibroblast cells are an advantageous model to study the transport of amino acids across cell membranes, since one can control the environmental factors. A major problem in all earlier studies is the lack of precise and detailed knowledge regarding the expression and functionality of tyrosine transporters in human fibroblasts. This motivated us to perform a systematic functional characterization of the tyrosine transport in fibroblast cells with respect to the isoforms of system-L (LAT1, LAT2, LAT3, LAT4), which is the major transporter of tyrosine.

Aberrant amino acid transport in fibroblasts from children with autism.

Autism is a developmental, cognitive disorder clinically characterized by impaired social interaction, communication and restricted behaviours. The present study was designed to explore whether an abnormality in transport of tyrosine and/or alanine is present in children with autism. Skin biopsies were obtained from 11 children with autism (9 boys and 2 girls) fulfilling the DSM-IV diagnostic criteria for autistic disorder and 11 healthy male control children.

The Camberwell assessment of need as an outcome measure in routine mental health care.

Background: Subsidiary findings in several studies indicate that the standard summary scores (total number of needs, met needs and unmet needs) of the Camberwell Assessment of Need (CAN) may conceal important differences among patient populations at the item level of the measure. The aim of this study was to investigate whether changes in need and need status at the item level are adequately reflected by changes in the summary scores.

Methods: In a longitudinal design assessments of need in 1997 and 2003 of 192 outpatients (mean age 45.

The Need of Support and Service Questionnaire (NSSQ): a brief scale to assess needs in clients with long-term mental disabilities.

We present the Need of Support and Service Questionnaire (NSSQ), a new instrument developed to provide professionals in psychiatric care and community social services with a tool to assess needs of support and service in mentally disabled clients. The final version of the instrument was designed after comments from professionals in psychiatric care, community social services, and the clients and their relatives. A reliability study (test-retest, n=77), inter-rater (n=69) and a validity study (n=529) were performed.

Tyrosine transport in fibroblasts from healthy volunteers and patients with schizophrenia.

Aberrant tyrosine transport across the fibroblast membrane, as measured by lower Vmax and/or lower Km is a repeated finding in patients with schizophrenia. The aim of this study was to investigate the importance of two major transporters, the L- and A-systems and tyrosine transport in fibroblast cell lines from patients with schizophrenia and healthy volunteers. Fibroblast cell lines, n=6 from healthy volunteers and n=6 from patients with schizophrenia, were included in the study.

Support for limited brain availability of tyrosine in patients with schizophrenia.

Several mechanisms have been suggested to account for altered dopaminergic neurotransmission in schizophrenia. The brain is the only organ for which amino-acid transport is limited and competition for transport over the blood-brain barrier (BBB) occurs at physiological plasma concentrations. One line of research suggests that patients with schizophrenia have altered brain levels of the essential amino acid tyrosine, the precursor for the synthesis of dopamine.

Needs assessed by psychiatric health care and social services in a defined cohort of clients with mental disabilities.

Background: The identification of needs for support and service in clients with long-term mental disabilities is usually not done by staff personnel from both psychiatric care and social services. However, such a process is probably necessary in order to provide adequate psychiatric care and social services.

Aims: To estimate the prevalence of mentally disabled clients and investigate whether staff from psychiatric care and social services identified the same individuals and the same number of needs in the same areas.

Kinetics of tyrosine transport and cognitive functioning in schizophrenia.

Background: Tyrosine supplementation in humans has been shown to improve cognitive functioning. Several studies have demonstrated a decreased maximal transport capacity of tyrosine (Vmax) across the cell membrane and an increased affinity (Km) of tyrosine to membrane binding sites in schizophrenic patients. A lack of tyrosine for dopamine synthesis with impairment of dopaminergic transmission could impair cognitive functioning.

Factor structure in the Camberwell Assessment of Need.

Background: In order to define needs for care of people with severe mental illness, the Camberwell Assessment of Need (CAN) is focused on measuring personal and social functioning. However, previous studies of the CAN have given inconsistent results in terms of what variables are actually being measured.

Aims: To investigate the factor structure of the CAN.

Clients with long-term mental disabilities in a Swedish county--conditions of life, needs of support and unmet needs of service provided by the public health and social service sectors.

Objective: The purpose of the study was to identify and describe conditions of life and needs of support and public service for clients with a mental disability in a Swedish county population.

Methods: Public health care and social service providers identified clients and completed a questionnaire concerning the clients' conditions of life and their special needs. A consecutively recruited sample of clients completed a similar questionnaire.

No association between a putative functional promoter variant in the dopamine beta-hydroxylase gene and schizophrenia.

Objective: Disturbances in catecholamine transmission have been implicated in schizophrenia. Dopamine beta-hydroxylase catalyses the conversion of dopamine to norepinephrine in noradrenergic cells. We attempted to investigate a putative functional promoter polymorphism in the dopamine beta-hydroxylase gene (DBH) for association with schizophrenia.

Dopamine D3 receptor gene Ser9Gly variant and schizophrenia: association study and meta-analysis.

Objective: To further evaluate the controversial putative association between a Ser9Gly variant in the first exon of the dopamine D3 receptor gene (DRD3) and schizophrenia.

Methods: Swedish patients with schizophrenia ( n=156) and control subjects ( n=463) were assessed for the DRD3 Ser9Gly variant. Meta-analyses including previous and the present Swedish case-control results were performed.

Association study between dopamine D3 receptor gene variant and personality traits.

Dopamine receptor gene variation has been hypothesized to influence personality traits characterized by novelty seeking and related traits. We analyzed a dopamine D(3) receptor gene (DRD3) variant in a Swedish population (n = 373) investigated with one or more of several personality questionnaires. No significant relationships were found between DRD3 genotypes and any of the 15 Karolinska Scales of Personality (KSP) and five Health-relevant Personality 5 factor inventory (HP5i) scales.