Effectiveness of Social Skills Training Groups in Persons with Severe Mental Illness: A Pre-Post Intervention Study.

Background: The study aimed to evaluate the effectiveness of a social skills training program provided at the occupational therapy unit of a tertiary care center in India.

Methods: The study used a pre-post interventional design where 101 consecutive patients with a diagnosis of schizophrenia or bipolar affective disorder, between 18 and 60 years, who provided written informed consent, were assessed on the Vellore Assessment of Social Performance (VASP) during the first week of attendance (baseline). Subsequently, they were enrolled in a six-session social skills group training program for two weeks.

Intrinsic capacity and its associations with incident dependence and mortality in 10/66 Dementia Research Group studies in Latin America, India, and China: A population-based cohort study.

Background: The World Health Organization (WHO) has reframed health and healthcare for older people around achieving the goal of healthy ageing. The recent WHO Integrated Care for Older People (ICOPE) guidelines focus on maintaining intrinsic capacity, i.e.

Development and validation of Vellore Inventory of Life Skills among people with severe mental illness.

Background And Aim: Rehabilitation for people with severe mental illness is incomplete without life skills assessment and intervention. The aim of the study was develop a culturally specific performance-based measure assessing life skills of patients with severe mental illness.

Materials And Methods: The items for the Vellore Inventory of Life Skills (VILS) were drawn after consultation with a reference group and from existing standardized scales.

A Qualitative Study Exploring the Lived Experience of Unemployment Among People with Severe Mental Illness.

Background: Severe mental illnesses lead to deterioration in the life skills of the patient, resulting in socio-occupational dysfunction and low rates of employment. The purpose of this study was to explore attitudes, knowledge, and barriers to employment as experienced by patients and their caregivers in India.

Method: Patients with schizophrenia or bipolar affective disorder, aged between 18 and 60 and undergoing inpatient treatment and their caregivers, were approached for written informed consent and recruited for focus group discussions.

Development and validation of Vellore Assessment of Social Performance among clients with chronic mental illness.

Background: Social skills deficits are hallmark symptoms of chronic mental illness. The absence of a culturally sensitive instrument to measure social skills in the Indian population demands the need to develop and standardize such instruments.

Aim: The aim of this study was to develop and validate a context-specific, culturally relevant, and performance-based assessment scale for social performance.

Preoperative Anxiety in Adult Patients Undergoing Day Care Surgery: Prevalence and Associated Factors.

Background: There is a paucity of data related to anxiety levels in patients undergoing day care surgery in India.

Methods: Preoperative anxiety was assessed using Amsterdam Preoperative Anxiety and Information Scale (APAIS) 1 day before surgery and on the day of surgery, and the patients were categorized as cases (APAIS score ≥13) and controls (APAIS score <13). Sociodemographic characteristics, clinical features, and fears associated with anesthesia and surgery were also noted.

Insight in psychosis: A critical review of the contemporary confusion.

This commentary highlights the context, complexity, conflicting claims and the contemporary confusion related to insight in people with psychosis. Traditional psychiatric precepts suggests that good insight is inversely related to the severity of psychotic symptoms and directly related to depression scores, better clinical outcome, and treatment adherence. However, recent studies have recognised that insight does not predict outcomes, changes over time, and is dependent on the trajectory of the individual's illness and the social and cultural context arguing that "insight" is an explanatory model and a coping strategy.

Exploring the Prevalence of Clozapine Phenotypic Poor Metabolizers in 4 Asian Samples: They Ranged Between 2% and 13.

Purpose/background: Clozapine clearance is influenced by sex, smoking status, ethnicity, coprescription of inducers or inhibitors, obesity, and inflammation. In 126 Beijing inpatients, we measured repeated trough steady-state serum concentrations and identified 4% (5/126) who were phenotypical poor metabolizers (PMs); none were ultrarapid metabolizers (UMs). They were defined as being 2 SDs beyond the means of total clozapine concentration/dose ratios stratified by sex and smoking.

Idioms of distress, mental symptoms, syndromes, disorders and transdiagnostic approaches.

Euro-American idioms of distress and their corresponding symptom clusters have been universalised as mental disorders and are now the gold standard for psychiatric diagnosis around the globe. This paper discusses issues related to mental disorder diagnosis from a cultural perspective. It argues that psychiatric diagnoses, while having good inter-rater reliability, lack external validity.

Sexual Dysfunction in Drug-Naïve or Drug-Free Male Patients with Psychosis: Prevalence and Risk Factors.

Background: There is a growing body of literature on the high prevalence of sexual dysfunction in patients with psychotic disorders. However, most studies have focused on medication-related sexual side effects.

Material And Methods: Consecutive males with a diagnosis of acute psychosis or schizophrenia who were either drug-naïve or drug-free for six months were recruited to the study after obtaining informed consent.

"We sold the buffalo to pay for a brain scan" - a qualitative study of rural experiences with private mental healthcare providers in Uttar Pradesh, India.

The majority of persons with mental distress (PWMD) in India do not have access to care, and even those who seek care are pushed to attend private providers, given the weak and largely absent public mental health services framework. The aim of this study was to examine the experiences in help-seeking and with unethical health service provision among persons with mental distress in the Saharanpur and Bijnor districts of Uttar Pradesh. In-depth interviews were conducted with twenty persons with mental distress and their caregivers.

Knowledge and Attitudes toward Sexual Health and Common Sexual Practices among College Students - A Survey from Vellore, Tamil Nadu, India.

Background: Indian society is considered to have conservative attitudes regarding sex and is ambivalent about the concept of sex education. Previous reports suggest that a considerable proportion of Indian youth have inadequate sexual knowledge and hold a variety of sexual misconceptions. Methodological flaws limit the generalizability of some earlier studies.

Sexual Dysfunction among Men in Rural Tamil Nadu: Nature, Prevalence, Clinical Features, and Explanatory Models.

Background And Aim: There is a dearth of community data on nature, prevalence, clinical features, and explanatory models related to sexual dysfunction among men, particularly from rural India. This study attempted to examine different aspects of male sexual dysfunction and misconceptions in the community.

Materials And Methods: Villages in Kaniyambadi Block, Vellore district were stratified, and four were randomly selected.

Instrumental Activities of Daily Living Dysfunction among People with Schizophrenia.

Background: Life skills are the basic skills that are needed to live independently and that support meaningful, productive roles. The negative symptoms and cognitive dysfunction seen in schizophrenia may lead to deterioration in the life skills of the patient. The assessment of current life skills of the patient and subsequent intervention becomes necessary for comprehensive rehabilitation of people with mental illness.