 
Article Date: 20 May 2010 – 1:00 PDT
Researchers at the University of Malaga (UMA) have analysed the presence of voice disorders in male and female teachers, in order to obtain a representative statistic: 62.7% of the Early Childhood and Primary Education teaching body suffer from these complaints on a daily or weekly basis.
Professions such as teaching require a high resistance to voice fatigue to be able to deal with vocal overload. “Our aim was to analyse the vocal problems of Early Childhood and Primary Education teachers, and the psychosocial dimensions associated with said disorders in Spain”, Rosa Bermúdez, main author of the study and researcher at UMA, explains to SINC.
Read in Full:Â http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/189342.php
 
The idea that the brain changes and adapts according to how you use it, including through adulthood, is now widely accepted in psychology and neuroscience. Some of the most striking examples of this have come from studies of musicians. It’s been shown, for instance, that string and keyboard players have more neural tissue given over to the control of the hands and fingers than do non-musicians. However, little researched until now is the brain re-organisation associated with professional singing.
Like the playing of a musical instrument, singing involves skilled muscle movements – indeed, more than 100 muscles are used – but there are also some differences between singing and instrument playing. For example, you can watch your own fingers tap out a tune on a keyboard but you can’t ‘see’ your muscle coordination whilst singing.
Boris Kleber‘s team had 10 professional opera singers, 21 singing students and 18 non-singer controls lie in a brain scanner and sing 6 phrases from the first stanza of the Italian aria ‘Cara mio ben’.
The most striking finding was that greater experience with opera singing was associated with more activation of the somatosensory cortex whilst singing. This part of the brain processes incoming signals from the body and the finding suggests that singing expertise is particularly associated with enhanced processing of where the vocal muscles are positioned in space. This makes sense given that you can’t ‘see’ yourself sing and must instead rely on feedback from the vocal muscles.
As you might expect, studies with people who can play musical instruments have generally found increased activation of the primary motor cortex – a key brain area involved in sending commands to the muscles. However, in the current study, it was only the most experienced opera singers who showed exaggerated activity in this brain area.
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The idea that the brain changes and adapts according to how you use it, including through adulthood, is now widely accepted in psychology and neuroscience. Some of the most striking examples of this have come from studies of musicians. It’s been shown, for instance, that string and keyboard players have more neural tissue given over to the control of the hands and fingers than do non-musicians. However, little researched until now is the brain re-organisation associated with professional singing.
Like the playing of a musical instrument, singing involves skilled muscle movements – indeed, more than 100 muscles are used – but there are also some differences between singing and instrument playing. For example, you can watch your own fingers tap out a tune on a keyboard but you can’t ‘see’ your muscle coordination whilst singing.
Boris Kleber‘s team had 10 professional opera singers, 21 singing students and 18 non-singer controls lie in a brain scanner and sing 6 phrases from the first stanza of the Italian aria ‘Cara mio ben’.
The most striking finding was that greater experience with opera singing was associated with more activation of the somatosensory cortex whilst singing. This part of the brain processes incoming signals from the body and the finding suggests that singing expertise is particularly associated with enhanced processing of where the vocal muscles are positioned in space. This makes sense given that you can’t ‘see’ yourself sing and must instead rely on feedback from the vocal muscles.
As you might expect, studies with people who can play musical instruments have generally found increased activation of the primary motor cortex – a key brain area involved in sending commands to the muscles. However, in the current study, it was only the most experienced opera singers who showed exaggerated activity in this brain area.
 
ScienceDaily (May 20, 2010) — Because people with depression often do not recognize they have a problem or are unable to describe their distress, many do not seek treatment. About a quarter of those with major depression are undiagnosed, according to several studies, and fewer than half receive treatment.
To improve recognition and treatment of depression, primary care physicians should do three things: help their patients name their distress, provide explanations for the depression that conform to patients’ experiences and reduce blame and stigma.
The recommendations for physicians, published in the Journal of General Internal Medicine, stem from research led by Ronald M. Epstein, M.D., professor of Family Medicine and Psychiatry at the University of Rochester Medical Center and director of the Rochester Center to Improve Communication in Health Care.
The researchers propose several steps to enhance patient-physician communication and to develop clinical, public health, and media interventions to improve depression care. These include:
- People experience depression in many different ways. Physicians should adjust their view to a patient’s experience and not maintain a one-dimensional concept of depression.
- Physicians should not rely on symptom checklists exclusively to detect depression.
- Discussions of depression-related concerns with primary care physicians should not require that the patient endorse a self-diagnosis of depression.
- Physicians should explain that personality, social and genetic factors make some people more vulnerable to depression, but that does not mean the patient is to blame.
- Many patients doubt that depression can be treated. Physicians should emphasize that depression responds to treatment.
In conducting the study, the researchers recruited 116 people in Rochester, N.Y, Austin, Texas, and Sacramento, Calif., who were English-speaking men and women, aged 25 to 64, and who reported a personal history of depression or experience with a close friend or relative. The participants filled out a detailed questionnaire and participated in focus group discussions. The researchers conducted line-by-line reviews of transcripts of the focus group discussions, coding remarks according to cognitive and communicative processes that hindered or enabled discussion of depression-related symptoms.
Many participants reported not knowing something was wrong, sometimes for years. Some who described themselves as “always dark,” “introspective,” and “always in a bad mood” had been so acclimated to being “gloomy” that it was difficult for them to appreciate their descent into depression. In the study, “naming” refers to how people find words to describe their distress.
“Naming is often a precondition for the contemplation phase of behavior change; conversely, not naming one’s distress as depression can contribute to “illness delay,” the temporal gap between deciding one is ill and seeking care,” the researchers state. “Many participants had difficulty naming their distress as depression because their experiences did not comport with their “common-sense” models of depression. Nor were many of these experiences likely to have been considered depression symptoms by their physicians, who held different but narrow models that did not encompass the protean ways in which people experience depression.”
Finding meaningful causal explanations for their distress allowed participants to organize their experiences and helped them discuss their problem with a physician or other health care professionals.
“Physicians, families, friends, and the media can prompt people who have depressive symptoms to seek care by adopting a multi-faceted understanding of the experience of depression from the patient’s perspective — and helping them find the words to bring their experiences and concerns to the attention of physician,” the researchers conclude. “In that way, a shared vision of the cause and treatment of depression can facilitate follow-through with a mutually-endorsed plan.”
In addition to Epstein, the study authors include: Paul R. Duberstein, Ph.D., professor of Psychiatry at the University of Rochester Medical Center; Mitchell D. Feldman, M.D., M.Phil., professor of Medicine at the University of California at San Francisco; Aaron B. Rochlen, Ph.D., associate professor of Educational Psychology at the University of Texas at Austin; Robert A. Bell, Ph.D., professor of Public Health Sciences at the University of California at Davis; Richard L. Kravitz, M.D., M.S.P.H., professor of Internal Medicine at the University of California at Davis; Camille Cipri, research assistant at the Center for Healthcare Policy and Research at the University of California at Davis; Jennifer Becker, M.P.H., of the Center to Improve Communication in Health Care; Patricia M. Bamonti of the Laboratory of Personality and Development at the University of Rochester Medical Center; and Debora A. Paternity, Ph.D., associate adjunct professor of Internal Medicine and Sociology at the University of California at Davis.
The research was supported by the National Institutes of Health.
Journal Reference:
- Ronald M. Epstein, Paul R. Duberstein, Mitchell D. Feldman, Aaron B. Rochlen, Robert A. Bell, Richard L. Kravitz, Camille Cipri, Jennifer D. Becker, Patricia M. Bamonti, Debora A. Paterniti. ‘I Didn’t Know What Was Wrong:’ How People With Undiagnosed Depression Recognize, Name and Explain Their Distress. Journal of General Internal Medicine, 2010; DOI: 10.1007/s11606-010-1367-0
Source: http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2010/05/100520112353.htm
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ScienceDaily (May 20, 2010) — Because people with depression often do not recognize they have a problem or are unable to describe their distress, many do not seek treatment. About a quarter of those with major depression are undiagnosed, according to several studies, and fewer than half receive treatment.
To improve recognition and treatment of depression, primary care physicians should do three things: help their patients name their distress, provide explanations for the depression that conform to patients’ experiences and reduce blame and stigma.
The recommendations for physicians, published in the Journal of General Internal Medicine, stem from research led by Ronald M. Epstein, M.D., professor of Family Medicine and Psychiatry at the University of Rochester Medical Center and director of the Rochester Center to Improve Communication in Health Care.
The researchers propose several steps to enhance patient-physician communication and to develop clinical, public health, and media interventions to improve depression care. These include:
- People experience depression in many different ways. Physicians should adjust their view to a patient’s experience and not maintain a one-dimensional concept of depression.
- Physicians should not rely on symptom checklists exclusively to detect depression.
- Discussions of depression-related concerns with primary care physicians should not require that the patient endorse a self-diagnosis of depression.
- Physicians should explain that personality, social and genetic factors make some people more vulnerable to depression, but that does not mean the patient is to blame.
- Many patients doubt that depression can be treated. Physicians should emphasize that depression responds to treatment.
In conducting the study, the researchers recruited 116 people in Rochester, N.Y, Austin, Texas, and Sacramento, Calif., who were English-speaking men and women, aged 25 to 64, and who reported a personal history of depression or experience with a close friend or relative. The participants filled out a detailed questionnaire and participated in focus group discussions. The researchers conducted line-by-line reviews of transcripts of the focus group discussions, coding remarks according to cognitive and communicative processes that hindered or enabled discussion of depression-related symptoms.
Many participants reported not knowing something was wrong, sometimes for years. Some who described themselves as “always dark,” “introspective,” and “always in a bad mood” had been so acclimated to being “gloomy” that it was difficult for them to appreciate their descent into depression. In the study, “naming” refers to how people find words to describe their distress.
“Naming is often a precondition for the contemplation phase of behavior change; conversely, not naming one’s distress as depression can contribute to “illness delay,” the temporal gap between deciding one is ill and seeking care,” the researchers state. “Many participants had difficulty naming their distress as depression because their experiences did not comport with their “common-sense” models of depression. Nor were many of these experiences likely to have been considered depression symptoms by their physicians, who held different but narrow models that did not encompass the protean ways in which people experience depression.”
Finding meaningful causal explanations for their distress allowed participants to organize their experiences and helped them discuss their problem with a physician or other health care professionals.
“Physicians, families, friends, and the media can prompt people who have depressive symptoms to seek care by adopting a multi-faceted understanding of the experience of depression from the patient’s perspective — and helping them find the words to bring their experiences and concerns to the attention of physician,” the researchers conclude. “In that way, a shared vision of the cause and treatment of depression can facilitate follow-through with a mutually-endorsed plan.”
In addition to Epstein, the study authors include: Paul R. Duberstein, Ph.D., professor of Psychiatry at the University of Rochester Medical Center; Mitchell D. Feldman, M.D., M.Phil., professor of Medicine at the University of California at San Francisco; Aaron B. Rochlen, Ph.D., associate professor of Educational Psychology at the University of Texas at Austin; Robert A. Bell, Ph.D., professor of Public Health Sciences at the University of California at Davis; Richard L. Kravitz, M.D., M.S.P.H., professor of Internal Medicine at the University of California at Davis; Camille Cipri, research assistant at the Center for Healthcare Policy and Research at the University of California at Davis; Jennifer Becker, M.P.H., of the Center to Improve Communication in Health Care; Patricia M. Bamonti of the Laboratory of Personality and Development at the University of Rochester Medical Center; and Debora A. Paternity, Ph.D., associate adjunct professor of Internal Medicine and Sociology at the University of California at Davis.
The research was supported by the National Institutes of Health.
Journal Reference:
- Ronald M. Epstein, Paul R. Duberstein, Mitchell D. Feldman, Aaron B. Rochlen, Robert A. Bell, Richard L. Kravitz, Camille Cipri, Jennifer D. Becker, Patricia M. Bamonti, Debora A. Paterniti. ‘I Didn’t Know What Was Wrong:’ How People With Undiagnosed Depression Recognize, Name and Explain Their Distress. Journal of General Internal Medicine, 2010; DOI: 10.1007/s11606-010-1367-0
Source: http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2010/05/100520112353.htm
 
ScienceDaily (May 20, 2010) — Tai Chi, a low impact martial art, has been associated with reduced stress, anxiety and depression, and enhanced mood, in both healthy people and those with chronic conditions. A systematic review of the subject, published in the open access journal BMC Complementary and Alternative Medicine, found that although Tai Chi does appear to have positive psychological effects, more high quality, randomized trials are needed.
Dr. Chenchen Wang, Associate Professor, from Tufts Medical Center, Tufts University School of Medicine, Massachusetts, USA, worked with a team of researchers to pool the results of 40 studies, including 17 randomized controlled trials, into the mental health effects of Tai Chi. She said, “Tai Chi, the Chinese low impact mind-body exercise, has been practiced for centuries for health and fitness in the East and is currently gaining popularity in the West. It is believed to improve mood and enhance overall psychological well being, but convincing evidence has so far been lacking.”
Wang and her colleagues found that practicing Tai Chi was associated with reduced stress, anxiety, depression and mood disturbance, and increased self-esteem. The quality of the studies identified was generally modest, however. In particular, rigorous, prospective, well controlled randomized trials with appropriate comparison groups and validated outcome measures are generally lacking.
Wang said, “More detailed knowledge about the physiological and psychological effects of Tai Chi exercise may lead to new approaches to promote health, treat chronic medical conditions, better inform clinical decisions and further explicate the mechanisms of successful mind-body medicine.”
Journal Reference:
- Chenchen Wang, Raveendhara Bannuru, Judith Ramel, Bruce Kupelnick, Tammy Scott and Christopher H Schmid. Tai Chi on psychological well-being: systematic review and meta-analysis. BMC Complementary and Alternative Medicine, 2010; (in press) [link]
Source: http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2010/05/100520213106.htm
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ScienceDaily (May 20, 2010) — Tai Chi, a low impact martial art, has been associated with reduced stress, anxiety and depression, and enhanced mood, in both healthy people and those with chronic conditions. A systematic review of the subject, published in the open access journal BMC Complementary and Alternative Medicine, found that although Tai Chi does appear to have positive psychological effects, more high quality, randomized trials are needed.
Dr. Chenchen Wang, Associate Professor, from Tufts Medical Center, Tufts University School of Medicine, Massachusetts, USA, worked with a team of researchers to pool the results of 40 studies, including 17 randomized controlled trials, into the mental health effects of Tai Chi. She said, “Tai Chi, the Chinese low impact mind-body exercise, has been practiced for centuries for health and fitness in the East and is currently gaining popularity in the West. It is believed to improve mood and enhance overall psychological well being, but convincing evidence has so far been lacking.”
Wang and her colleagues found that practicing Tai Chi was associated with reduced stress, anxiety, depression and mood disturbance, and increased self-esteem. The quality of the studies identified was generally modest, however. In particular, rigorous, prospective, well controlled randomized trials with appropriate comparison groups and validated outcome measures are generally lacking.
Wang said, “More detailed knowledge about the physiological and psychological effects of Tai Chi exercise may lead to new approaches to promote health, treat chronic medical conditions, better inform clinical decisions and further explicate the mechanisms of successful mind-body medicine.”
Journal Reference:
- Chenchen Wang, Raveendhara Bannuru, Judith Ramel, Bruce Kupelnick, Tammy Scott and Christopher H Schmid. Tai Chi on psychological well-being: systematic review and meta-analysis. BMC Complementary and Alternative Medicine, 2010; (in press) [link]
Source: http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2010/05/100520213106.htm
 
ScienceDaily (May 20, 2010) — Researchers from Mount Sinai School of Medicine have identified a drug that improves communication between nerve cells in a mouse model of Phelan-McDermid Syndrome (PMS). Behavioral symptoms of PMS fall under the autism spectrum disorder category. The research will be presented May 21 at the International Meeting for Autism Research (IMFAR) in Philadelphia.
Previous research has shown that a gene mutation in the brain called SHANK3 can cause absent or severely delayed language abilities, intellectual disability, and autism. Mount Sinai researchers developed mice with a mutant SHANK3 gene and observed a lapse in communication between nerve cells in the brain, which can lead to learning problems. This communication breakdown indicated that the nerve cells were not maturing properly.
The researchers then injected the mice with a derivative of a compound called insulin-like growth factor-1 (IGF1), which is FDA-approved to treat growth failure in children. After two weeks of treatment, nerve cell communication was normal and adaptation of nerve cells to stimulation, a key part of learning and memory, was restored.
“The result of IGF1 treatment of these mice is an exciting development on the road to ultimate therapies for individuals with PMS,” said Joseph Buxbaum, PhD, Director of the Seaver Autism Center for Research and Treatment at Mount Sinai School of Medicine. “If these data are further verified in additional preclinical studies, individuals with a SHANK3 mutation may benefit from treatments with compounds like this one.”
Dr. Buxbaum and his team at the Seaver Autism Center will continue to evaluate the efficacy of IGF1 in mice. Patrick Hof, MD, Professor of Neuroscience at Mount Sinai School of Medicine, will specifically evaluate the effects of the compound on neuroanatomical changes. Additionally, Jacqueline Crawley, PhD, Senior Investigator at the National Institutes of Health, will study the effects on behavioral changes in the mice.
The study was supported by grants from the Seaver Foundation to Dr. Buxbaum, from the Simons Foundation to Drs. Buxbaum, Crawley, Hof, and Zhou, and from William G. Gibson and Paulina Rychenkova, PhD, to Dr. Buxbaum.
Source: The Mount Sinai Hospital / Mount Sinai School of Medicine (2010, May 20). First drug to demonstrate therapeutic effect in a type of autism. ScienceDaily. Retrieved May 21, 2010, from http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2010/05/100520131547.htm
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ScienceDaily (May 20, 2010) — Researchers from Mount Sinai School of Medicine have identified a drug that improves communication between nerve cells in a mouse model of Phelan-McDermid Syndrome (PMS). Behavioral symptoms of PMS fall under the autism spectrum disorder category. The research will be presented May 21 at the International Meeting for Autism Research (IMFAR) in Philadelphia.
Previous research has shown that a gene mutation in the brain called SHANK3 can cause absent or severely delayed language abilities, intellectual disability, and autism. Mount Sinai researchers developed mice with a mutant SHANK3 gene and observed a lapse in communication between nerve cells in the brain, which can lead to learning problems. This communication breakdown indicated that the nerve cells were not maturing properly.
The researchers then injected the mice with a derivative of a compound called insulin-like growth factor-1 (IGF1), which is FDA-approved to treat growth failure in children. After two weeks of treatment, nerve cell communication was normal and adaptation of nerve cells to stimulation, a key part of learning and memory, was restored.
“The result of IGF1 treatment of these mice is an exciting development on the road to ultimate therapies for individuals with PMS,” said Joseph Buxbaum, PhD, Director of the Seaver Autism Center for Research and Treatment at Mount Sinai School of Medicine. “If these data are further verified in additional preclinical studies, individuals with a SHANK3 mutation may benefit from treatments with compounds like this one.”
Dr. Buxbaum and his team at the Seaver Autism Center will continue to evaluate the efficacy of IGF1 in mice. Patrick Hof, MD, Professor of Neuroscience at Mount Sinai School of Medicine, will specifically evaluate the effects of the compound on neuroanatomical changes. Additionally, Jacqueline Crawley, PhD, Senior Investigator at the National Institutes of Health, will study the effects on behavioral changes in the mice.
The study was supported by grants from the Seaver Foundation to Dr. Buxbaum, from the Simons Foundation to Drs. Buxbaum, Crawley, Hof, and Zhou, and from William G. Gibson and Paulina Rychenkova, PhD, to Dr. Buxbaum.
Source: The Mount Sinai Hospital / Mount Sinai School of Medicine (2010, May 20). First drug to demonstrate therapeutic effect in a type of autism. ScienceDaily. Retrieved May 21, 2010, from http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2010/05/100520131547.htm
 
19 May 2010 12:28 UK
Scottish government targets to halt the rise in anti-depressant prescriptions are too simplistic, MSPs have warned.
Amid a quadrupling of the prescription rates in the past 15 years, ministers pledged to reduce the increase.
But Holyrood’s public audit committee raised concerns that data on the issue was not being properly collected, and questioned how the target could be met.
Ministers have said the prescription of drugs was a clinical decision to be made by doctors.
The government says drugs can help patients live normal lives instead of being “disabled”, in conjunction policies to improve access to non-drug treatments, such as talking therapies.
‘Closer monitoring’
Publishing a report on the issue, the public audit committee said the reasons for the rise in anti-depressant prescriptions remained unclear.
Its convener, the Labour MSP Hugh Henry, said: “The committee is concerned the Scottish government does not currently collect information on the number of people taking anti-depressants and the data collected does not explain why the level of anti-depressant prescribing continues to increase.
“The committee therefore questions whether the Scottish government target to reduce the increase of anti-depressant prescribing can be achieved.”
MSPs also expressed concern about some of the reasons given for the variations in prescribing in different areas, including that female GPs were more likely to prescribe anti-depressants compared with older doctors.
The committee also called for closer government monitoring of how cash was used to fund mental health services.
Source:Â http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/scotland/scotland_politics/8691759.stm