The gendered context of women charged with violent offences in the forensic psychiatric setting.

Background: Women charged with violent offences may be referred by courts for forensic psychiatric assessment to determine whether mental disorder or intellectual disability impacts their fitness to stand trial and/or criminal responsibility. The profile of these women is a poorly researched area in South Africa.

Aim: This study examined the socio-demographic, offence-related, and clinical profile of South African women charged with violent offences referred for forensic assessment.

Prior trauma experiences among state patients charged with murder: A retrospective records review.

Background: Trauma experiences, particularly in childhood, have been associated with criminality and mental illness. There is a paucity of research into the crime of murder, trauma and mental illness.

Aim: This research study focused on state patients charged with murder and sought to determine associations with prior trauma experiences, and specific types of traumas (sexual, physical and emotional).

Adverse childhood experiences, mental illness, HIV and offending among female inmates in Durban, South Africa.

Background: Childhood adversities and adult trauma are common among female inmates. Associations have been documented with childhood adversities and mental illness, personality disorders, human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) and violent offending. However, no such study had been conducted in South Africa (SA), despite the high prevalence of HIV and trauma in SA.

Coping strategies employed by public psychiatric healthcare workers during the COVID-19 pandemic in southern Gauteng, South Africa.

Within the context of the novel coronavirus pandemic and new challenges to a resource-constrained public healthcare system, many healthcare workers in South Africa have faced numerous stressors that have compromised their mental health. While the current literature on COVID-19 in South Africa highlights the widespread psychosocial stress experienced by healthcare workers during the pandemic, little is known about the coping strategies utilized to continue service delivery and maintain one's mental health and well-being during this ongoing public health emergency. In this study, we sought to explore the coping strategies used by healthcare workers employed in the public psychiatric care system in southern Gauteng, South Africa during the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic.

South Africa's Psychiatric training capacity in 2008 and in 2018. Has training capacity improved?

Background: There is a deficit of psychiatrists in South Africa, and to our knowledge, there is no situational analysis of training posts for psychiatrists in the country.

Aim: To compare the number of specialists and subspecialists in training and training posts available in 2008 and 2018.

Setting: South African medical schools with departments of psychiatry.

Mental illness and HIV amongst female inmates in Durban, South Africa.

Background: There is limited data regarding the prevalence of mental illness and human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) amongst female inmates in South Africa. Rehabilitation programmes can only be formulated once the needs of this population have been identified.

Aim: This study aimed to measure the prevalence of mental illnesses, borderline and antisocial personality disorders and HIV amongst female inmates.

Profile of the current psychiatrist workforce in South Africa: establishing a baseline for human resource planning and strategy.

The World Health Organization Global Health Observatory Data Repository reports South Africa with 1.52 psychiatrists per 100 000 of the population among other countries in Africa with 0.01 psychiatrists per 100 000 (Chad, Burundi and Niger) to more than 30 per 100 000 for some countries in Europe.

An HIV Narrative of Female Inmates With a Lifetime History of Mental Illness in Durban, South Africa.

South Africa (SA) has one of the highest prevalence rates of Human Immuno-deficiency Virus (HIV) globally, with women carrying a larger burden of the disease. Furthermore, female inmates have higher rates of HIV compared to their male counterparts, with an over-representation of mental illnesses among female inmates as well. Additionally, mental illnesses are highly prevalent in people living with HIV, with HIV and mental illness sharing a complex bidirectional relationship.

Characteristics of persons accused of intimate partner homicide amongst forensic psychiatric observations.

Background: Intimate partner homicide (IPH) is a global public health problem. One study conducted over 66 countries found that 13.5% of all homicides and 38.

Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19) and Psychiatric Sequelae in South Africa: Anxiety and Beyond.

Background: The 2019 coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic has brought unprecedented challenges to the health sector nationwide and internationally. Across all disciplines, unique and novel modes of presentation with substantial morbidity and mortality are being encountered, and growing evidence suggests that psychiatric comorbidity is likely among COVID-19 patients.

Objective: This article aims to broaden the current discussion on the psychiatric sequalae of COVID-19, which has largely focused on anxiety, and examine the recently documented psychiatric sequelae of COVID-19 infection, the secondary effects of the pandemic on public mental health, and future psychiatric conditions that may arise due to COVID-19.

Factors Affecting Specialist Psychiatry Training in South Africa: Are Psychiatry Residents Satisfied with Their Training?

Objective: The authors investigated South African psychiatry residents' satisfaction with their training, physical, and mental health to inform the development of a strategy to improve the quality and experiences of training.

Method: A cross-sectional online survey was undertaken to assess the factors affecting residents' satisfaction with their current training program. The authors conducted a comparative analysis of residents across the training institutions in South Africa.

Fronto-temporal cortical atrophy in 'nyaope' combination heroin and cannabis use disorder.

Sub-Saharan Africa is one of the top three regions with the highest rates of opioid-related premature mortality. Nyaope is the street name for what is believed to be a drug cocktail in South Africa although recent research suggests that it is predominantly heroin. Nyaope powder is most commonly smoked together with cannabis, a drug-use pattern unique to the region.

An Inverse Relationship Between Alcohol and Heroin Use in Heroin Users Post Detoxification.

Background: Given that fewer than 50% of countries provide Opioid Agonist Maintenance Therapies (OAMT), it is important to assess whether other substances act as a substitute for heroin in recovering heroin users who receive detoxification models of treatment. There is a dearth of prospective studies from low-and-middle-income countries evaluating these patterns of substance use.

Methods: 300 heroin users from the Gauteng province of South Africa were assessed on entry into inpatient detoxification and then followed-up 3 and 9 months after leaving treatment.

Absconding from a psychiatric hospital in Johannesburg, South Africa: Are we seeing a decrease since the implementation of the ?

Background: Absconding from psychiatric facilities, the aetiology and impact of which have major socio-economic implications, has a multifactorial aetiological basis. Absconding patients are at higher risk of self-harm, violence, non-adherence, relapses, substance use and negative media attention. Most health professionals associate absconding with the escape of potentially dangerous psychiatric patients.

Smoking heroin with cannabis versus injecting heroin: unexpected impact on treatment outcomes.

Background: In several countries, especially in Africa, the dominant method of heroin intake is smoking a joint of cannabis laced with heroin. There is no data exploring the impact of smoking heroin with cannabis on treatment outcomes.

Aim: To compare treatment outcomes between people who inject heroin and people who smoke heroin with cannabis.

A Qualitative Study of Mentally Ill Women Who Commit Filicide in Gauteng, South Africa.

Filicide is the deliberate act of a parent killing his/her own child and a major contributor to child homicide rates. In order to prevent future homicides of this nature and aid in the rehabilitation of those mentally ill women who perpetrate these crimes, it is important to gain a better understanding of the dynamics that may result in filicide and the association of the mental illness with filicide. It is also important to explore how the rehabilitation processes are experienced and the impact they have had.

A prospective observational study of heroin users in Johannesburg, South Africa: Assessing psychiatric comorbidities and treatment outcomes.

Background: Despite the rise in heroin use in sub Saharan-Africa opioid agonist maintenance treatment (OAMT) is still not state-funded in South Africa and many other African countries. In South Africa there has been little data published on the profile of heroin users and the outcomes of treatment for those who attend public treatment services.

Methods: 300 heroin users from two state-funded rehabilitation centres in Johannesburg were studied at entry into rehabilitation and 3-months after treatment.

The psycho-social and clinical profile of women referred for psycho-legal evaluation to forensic mental health units in South Africa.

Background: There is a paucity of research on women offenders in the South African context, particularly those referred for forensic psychiatric observation. Little is known about their life histories, the nature of their offences or the psycho-social contexts that enable, or are antecedents to, women's criminal offending.

Aims: This research study, the largest of its kind in South Africa, examined the psycho-social contexts within which women offenders referred for psychiatric evaluation come to commit offences.

Changes in mood after screening for antenatal anxiety and depression.

Background: Screening programmes with referral are a valuable strategy for mitigating consequences of perinatal depression on mothers and their families. The effectiveness of these screening programmes needs to be measured. One potential problem in assessing outcomes is measurement reactivity where the actual measure results in changes in the people being measured.

Towards a culturally appropriate trauma assessment in a South African Zulu community.

Objective: To develop a culture specific screening tool for trauma, and to determine whether it would significantly increase the probability of eliciting traumatic events and associated symptoms when added to a Western diagnostic tool for trauma.

Method: A convenience sample of 1 hundred Zulu speaking volunteers was recruited in the North-Eastern KwaZulu-Natal region of South Africa. A demographic questionnaire, the Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) section of the Structured Clinical Interview for DSM Disorders, Axis I, Research Version (SCID-I RV), and a Zulu Culture-Specific Trauma Experience Questionnaire (Z-CTEQ) designed for this study were administered to the participants.

Validation of the Whooley questions for antenatal depression and anxiety among low-income women in urban South Africa.

Background/objective: In South Africa, approximately 40% of women suffer from depression during pregnancy. Although perinatal depression and anxiety are significant public health problems impacting maternal and infant morbidity and mortality, no routine mental health screening programmes exist in the country. A practical, accurate screening tool is needed to identify cases in these busy, resource-scarce settings.

Assessing the usefulness of electroencephalography in psychiatry: Outcome of referrals at a psychiatric hospital.

This retrospective study was conducted at Sterkfontein psychiatric hospital in Gauteng. The objectives included investigating reasons for referral to conduct an electroencephalography (EEG) and to determine whether EEG findings have impact on clinical management. Source data included EEG reports over an 18-month period and clinical records.

Schizoaffective Disorder in an acute psychiatric unit: Profile of users and agreement with Operational Criteria (OPCRIT).

Background: Schizoaffective Disorder is a controversial and poorly understood diagnosis. Experts disagree on whether it is a discrete disorder; whether it is on a spectrum between Bipolar Disorder and Schizophrenia or whether it even exists. Lack of individual research attention given to this disorder, changing diagnostic criteria and hence poor diagnostic stability have all contributed to the dearth of knowledge surrounding Schizoaffective Disorder.

Depressive and post-traumatic stress symptoms following termination of pregnancy in South African women: A longitudinal study measuring the effects of chronic burden, crisis support and resilience.

Background: Termination of pregnancy (TOP) remains a controversial issue, regardless of legislation. Access to services as well as psychological effects may vary across the world.

Objectives And Methods: To better understand the psychological effects of TOP, this study describes the circumstances of 102 women who underwent a TOP from two socioeconomic sites in Johannesburg, South Africa, one serving women with few economic resources and the other serving women with adequate resources.