Harvard Mental Health Letter articles from August 2007

Harvard Mental Health Letter archives from August 2007

Rethinking posttraumatic stress disorder.
August 1, 2007... What is a traumatic event, and how does it produce symptoms? "It could go on for years and years, and has, for centuries," wrote the author of the Sumerian epic of Gilgamesh in the third millennium, B.C., describing the suffering of a...

Antipsychotic drugs in dementia.
August 1, 2007... Antipsychotic drugs are officially approved mainly for the treatment of schizophrenia and bipolar disorder, but they are also used for many other purposes, and one of the most controversial is reducing disruptive behavior among elderly people...

In Brief; Treatment for bipolar depression: New studies.
August 1, 2007... Depression in bipolar disorder is a condition that lasts longer than mania and causes more suffering and disability. Because the symptoms of bipolar depression often combine despair with agitation and impulsiveness, it is an important cause of...

In Brief; Torture by any other name.
August 1, 2007... Interviews with torture survivors in the former Yugoslavia have shown that humiliation, attacks on personal integrity, and other kinds of abuse have much the same effect as torture that involves the infliction of physical pain. All forms of...

Commentary; The Clock gene and bipolar disorder.
August 1, 2007... A mutant strain of mice may help us to understand the origins of the manic phase of bipolar disorder. Researchers studied mice with a variant form of the Clock gene, which is instrumental for regulating their circadian (daily, or 24-hour)...