Systematic review of intervention practices for depression in the workplace.

Design: Systematic Review.

Objective: To determine which intervention approaches to manage depression in the workplace have been successful and yielded value for employers in developed economies.

Data Sources: We searched MEDLINE, EMBASE, CINAHL, Central, PsycINFO, and Business Source Premier up to June 2010 using search terms in four broad areas: work setting, depression, intervention, and work outcomes.

Cost of privatisation versus government alcohol retailing systems: Canadian example.

Introduction And Aims: Alcohol retail monopolies have been established in many countries to restrict alcohol availability and thus, minimise alcohol-related harm.The aim of this study was to estimate the impact of the privatisation of alcohol sales on the burden and direct health-care, law enforcement costs and indirect costs (lost productivity due to disability or premature mortality) in Canada.

Design And Methods: Simulation modelling.

Depressive symptoms as a determinant of breast and cervical cancer screening in women: a population-based study in Ontario, Canada.

The objective of this study was to investigate the relationship between depression and screening for breast and cervical cancer. The study sample included Ontario female respondents to the Canadian Community Health Survey Cycle 1.2, Mental Health and Well Being component (2002).

Avoidable cost of alcohol abuse in Canada.

Aims: To estimate avoidable burden and avoidable costs of alcohol abuse in Canada for the year 2002.

Methods: A policy effectiveness approach was used. The impact of six effective and cost-effective alcohol policy interventions aimed to reduce alcohol consumption was modeled.

Depression and self-reported functional status: impact on mortality following acute myocardial infarction.

Objective: The cause of increased post-AMI (acute myocardial infarction) mortality associated with depression remains poorly elucidated. The objective of this study was to examine the extent to which self-reported cardiac functional status accounted for depression-mortality associations following AMI.

Methods: Using a prospective cohort design (n = 1941), the authors obtained self-reported measures of depression and developed profiles of the patients' pre-hospitalization cardiac risks, co-morbid conditions and drugs and revascularization procedures during or following index AMI hospitalization.

Parallel Lines Do Intersect: Interactions between the Workers' Compensation and Provincial Publicly Financed Healthcare Systems in Canada.

The authors of this paper use a case study approach to document and analyze the interactions that arise between two healthcare payers in Canada: the provincial public healthcare insurance plans and the provincial workers' compensation boards. Through a documentary review and semi-structured key-respondent interviews, the study identified a set of policy events and decisions undertaken by each payer that had consequences for the other. These events, which included changes to governance, funding and service delivery within each system, generated interactions transmitted through the political, institutional and economic environments (primarily through competition for the same resources) and cross-system learning.

The relationship between depressive symptoms, health service consumption, and prognosis after acute myocardial infarction: a prospective cohort study.

Background: The use of cardiovascular health services is greater among patients with depressive symptoms than among patients without. However, the extent to which such associations between depressive symptoms and health service utilization are attributable to variations in comorbidity and prognostic disease severity is unknown. This paper explores the relationship between depressive symptoms, health service cardiovascular consumption, and prognosis following acute myocardial infarction (AMI).

Parallel payers and preferred access: how Canada's Workers' Compensation Boards expedite care for injured and ill workers.

Canada's workers' compensation boards (WCBs) finance healthcare for injured and ill workers in parallel with provincial health insurance plans. Parallel systems of healthcare finance can create preferred access for some. WCBs have in recent years pursued a number of strategies to expedite or improve the quality of care for injured or ill workers, including in-house provision in WCB-owned facilities; contracting with private, for-profit clinics; contracting with publicly funded hospitals and clinics for use of facilities "off-hours"; and supporting specialized clinics within publicly funded hospitals.

Physician peer assessments for compliance with methadone maintenance treatment guidelines.

Introduction: Medical associations and licensing bodies face pressure to implement quality assurance programs, but evidence-based models are lacking. To improve the quality of methadone maintenance treatment (MMT), the College of Physicians and Surgeons of Ontario, Canada, conducts an innovative quality assurance program on the basis of peer assessments. Using data from this program, we assessed physician compliance with MMT guidelines and determined whether physician factors (e.

The costs of alcohol, illegal drugs, and tobacco in Canada, 2002.

Objective: The aim of this study was to estimate costs attributable to substance use and misuse in Canada in 2002.

Method: Based on information about prevalence of exposure and risk relations for more than 80 disease categories, deaths, years of life lost, and hospitalizations attributable to substance use and misuse were estimated. In addition, substance-attributable fractions for criminal justice expenditures were derived.

Depression and activity limitations: examining gender differences in the general population.

Background: This study examines the relationship between major depression, subclinical depressive symptomatology and activity limitation in a representative sample of Canadian men and women, with a particular emphasis on examining gender differences.

Methods: Over a 4-year period, the three waves of data were collected from a representative sample of Canadian adults aged 18-60 beginning in 1994. A brief diagnostic interview for major depression, current limitations in home, work, and other activities (e.

Small signal, big noise: performance of the CIDI depression module.

Objectives: With the release of data from the Canadian Community Health Survey: Mental Health and Well-Being (Cycle 1.2), researchers have, for the first time, information on several psychiatric disorders from a nationally representative sample of Canadians residing in households. This survey used the Composite International Diagnostic Interview (CIDI) to identify persons with one or more psychiatric disorders.

Factors predicting 2-year retention in methadone maintenance treatment for opioid dependence.

Factors predicting 2-year retention in methadone maintenance and the impact of repeat treatment episodes on retention are examined. Data (n=9555 episodes) were drawn from a population-based treatment registry and analyses were performed using episode-weighted data. We estimated a binary logistic regression model with a duration of 730 days or greater as the dependent variable.

Research priorities are critical.

Building on the review by Goldner et al., I argue that the first research tasks for disability management in Canada should be to articulate conceptual models; define promising disability management interventions and characterize the current longitudinal health and labour market trajectories of Canadians disabled by mental conditions. Research should next emphasize pilot studies of novel interventions and observational studies that examine the relationship between treatment, workplace interventions, work environments and disability outcomes.

Medication management of depression: the impact of comorbid chronic medical conditions.

Objective: This paper addresses the following question: Does quality of care for depression differ between depressed persons with and without chronic medical conditions (CMCs)?

Methods: We used a population-based mental health survey to identify respondents aged 18 to 64 with the diagnosis of major depression in the past year (N = 278). In our model, the dependent variable was guideline-level medication management of depression. Determinants for guideline-level care were modeled using multivariate logistic regression.

Antidepressants and the risk of breast cancer.

Background: A recent national newspaper article highlighted 2 published research papers that suggest an association between antidepressants and an increased risk of breast cancer. The authors of the 2 papers recommend switching or avoiding the antidepressants implicated in their studies.

Method: We critically review these papers and, based on our review, consider what clinical practices, if any, should be modified as a result of their findings.