Psychosocial distress screening implementation in cancer care: an analysis of adherence, responsiveness, and acceptability.

Purpose: The American College of Surgeons Commission on Cancer has mandated implementation of a systematic protocol for psychosocial distress screening and referral as a condition for cancer center accreditation beginning in 2015. Compliance with standards requires evidence that distress screening protocols are carried out as intended and result in appropriate referral and follow-up when indicated. The purpose of this study was to examine the fidelity of distress screening protocols at two tertiary cancer treatment centers.

Addressing patient sexual orientation in the undergraduate medical education curriculum.

Objective: This study aims to estimate the number of hours dedicated to lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender content in one medical school's undergraduate curriculum, compare it to the national average, and identify barriers to addressing this content.

Methods: Course and clerkship directors were asked to estimate how many hours they spent on lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender content, how many hours would be ideal, and what barriers they perceived to teaching this content.

Results: Faculty members identified lack of instructional time, lack of relevance to their course content, and lack of professional development on this topic as major barriers.

Medical decision-making by psychiatry residents.

Objective: Several conspiring factors have resulted in an increase in the level of medical burden in psychiatric patients. Psychiatry residents require increasing levels of medical sophistication. To assess the medical decision-making of psychiatry residents, the authors examined the outcome in subjects initially seen in the emergency psychiatric service and referred to the medical emergency department for medical evaluation and treatment.

Antipsychotic medications in the treatment of bipolar disorder.

Antipsychotic medications have been used to treat acute phases, and prevent relapses in, bipolar illness since their introduction into psychiatric practice. With the introduction of second generation antipsychotic medications, there has been renewed interest in the utility of this class of medications in managing manic-depression. It appears that all antipsychotic agents investigated have a potent acute antimanic property.

Elevated interleukin-6 in the cerebrospinal fluid of a previously delineated schizophrenia subtype.

Evidence of immune activation has occasionally, but not consistently, been reported in schizophrenia. Investigations of cytokine abnormalities in serum, and occasionally in CSF, have yielded inconsistent results, which have been difficult to resolve. In such studies, schizophrenia has been assumed to consist of a single process rather than a group of disorders.