Preventive and Therapeutic Mental Health Care after the Earthquake- Expert Opinion from the Psychiatric Association of Turkey.

Two major earthquakes hit Turkey at the Kahramanmaraş region on February 6th 2023. The earthquakes affected almost 15 million individuals, resulting in more than forty thousand deaths, thousands of wounded and the destruction of ancient cities of humankind. Immediately after the earthquakes, the Psychiatric Association of Turkey organized an educational event to address the needs for a guidance on how to approach a trauma of such a big scale.

Clinical Follow-up of Two Adolescents Diagnosed with Gender Dysphoria.

Rapid physical, psychological and sexual changes in adolescents due to the developmental process differentiate the approach to adolescents with gender dysphoria (GD) from the approach to adults. In this article, two adolescents who applied for GD and followed up for a long time are presented. The first case was assigned male at birth and defined herself as female.

Gender Dysphoria and Perceived Social Support: A Matched Case-Control Study.

Background: In people diagnosed with Gender Dysphoria (GD), low perceived social support from their families and society has been suggested to be associated with poor quality of life and mental well-being.

Aim: To compare the perceived social support in individuals with GD with that in individuals without GD matched for age and gender.

Methods: The study group (n = 50) consisted of individuals diagnosed with GD via psychiatric evaluation.

Mobbing at Workplace -Psychological Trauma and Documentation of Psychiatric Symptoms.

Objectives: Mobbing at the workplace refers to such cases as verbal harassment, aggressive words, sarcasm, slander or social isolation repeatedly targeted at a specific person at a specific period of time. Previous studies indicate that wellness and health of the victims who have been subjected to mobbing at workplace were affected adversely. Recently, there has been an increase in mobbing cases in Turkey.

Effects of Gender Reassignment on Quality of Life and Mental Health in People with Gender Dysphoria.

Objective: Our purpose was to compare the life style, family and social relationships (social adaptation) and the quality of life in people with gender dysphoria with and without history of sex reassignment surgery.

Method: Twenty  individuals (SR group) who were earlier followed   in Istanbul University Psychiatry Department Psychoneurosis and Psychotherapy Unit with gender dysphoria diagnosis in  order  to  have confirmative reports for the sex reassignment (SR) surgery were interviewed at least one year after the surgery. For comparison, 50 individuals with gender dysphoria (NSR group) who had recently applied to the same unit were interviewed.

The relationship between adulthood traumatic experiences and psychotic symptoms in female patients with schizophrenia.

Background: Previously, research aiming to investigate the effects of interpersonal traumatic experiences on psychotic symptoms mainly focused on adverse experiences in childhood. As mentioned above, patients with schizophrenia, particularly women, are at high risk for physical and sexual abuse in adulthood. In this study we aimed to investigate the effects of adulthood trauma in a sample of patients with schizophrenia who did not report childhood trauma.

Does Illness Perception Predict Posttraumatic Stress Disorder in Patients with Myocardial Infarction?

Introduction: Myocardial infarction (MI) as a life-threatening event, carrying high risk of recurrence and chronic disabling complications, increases the risk of developing acute stress disorder (ASD), posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD), or both. The aim of this study was to investigate the relationship between illness perceptions and having ASD, PTSD, or both in patients after MI.

Method: Seventy-six patients diagnosed with acute MI were enrolled into our prospective study.

Family attitudes toward transgendered people in Turkey: experience from a secular Islamic country.

Objective: In Turkey, an individual with gender identity disorder is stigmatized and isolated from society. The family largely reflects and reinforces these negative views because gender crossing poses a threat to the normatively sanctioned gender classification.

Methods: We examined the acceptance of gender identity differences by the families in 47 relatives of 39 transgendered individuals who applied to a psychiatry clinic for sex reassignment.