No significant relationships.

Cinema constitutes an artistic presentation of the spectrum of human emotions and offers a number of examples of artistic vision of posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD). Cinema of the Russian director, Andriei Tarkovsky, alludes to the complexity of human psycho through poetic narration and cinematography. Particularly, Tarkovsky makes reference to such topics as trauma, depression, melancholy, and madness.

The aim of this study is to analyze Tarkovsky’s film “Ivan’s Childhood” from the perspective of psychiatry and psychology with the special attention to the topic of PTSD.

We identified elements of trauma and PTSD in line with the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-5). Furthermore, we analyzed manifestations of trauma in “Ivan’s Childhood” according to the trauma complex in Jungian perspective.

The main protagonist of the movie, Ivan, is treated as an archetype of a person exposed to trauma. The traumatic circumstance is the war in which he lost his loved ones. “Ivan’s Childhood” is a poetic presentation of this boy’s struggling to overcome his fears and his personal fight for dignity. Tarkovsky accomplishes it through a series of poetic images in which the director demonstrates flashbacks from Ivan’s life. Based on comparisons to Jung’s model of generic complexes, it is possible to define Ivan’s trauma complex as a set of psychological processes that are archaic and typical, i.e., “archetypal.”

“Ivan’s Childhood” is a moving portrait of a destroyed childhood and subsequent trauma as well as coping mechanisms such as rebellion, alienation, and transference.

The acts of violence committed by adolescents are becoming increasingly more common, generating problems of a diverse nature.

To study the main characteristics of violent adolescent examined in a forensic psychiatric assessment.

This is a retrospective study which examined the expert files of the subjects aged between 14 and 20 years charged with violence, which were examined in the context of criminal psychiatric expertise in the psychiatry department of Hedi Chaker University Hospital in Sfax (Tunisia), between January 2002 and December 2018.

Our study included 34 forensic psychiatric assessments. The male sex was predominant (94,1%). The mean age was 19,2 years. The perpetrators were unmarried (100%), with a primary school level or less (55,9%), and low socioeconomic level in all cases. They had personal criminal records in 20,6% One-fifth had experienced emotional deprivation in childhood. The father was described as violent in 20,6% of cases. The most common diagnosis were antisocial personality disorder (55,9%) and mental retardation (29,4%). The main offences were homicide and attempted homicide (47.1%), assault and battery (26,5%) and sexual offences (20,6%). The experts had concluded to a “non-criminal responsibility” in 38,2% of cases.

The knowledge of epidemiology of violence perpetrated by adolescents highlights the need for targeted research, policy and programming responses for its prevention.

No significant relationships.

Benzodiazepines (BZDs) and related drugs (BZRDs) are widely used to reduce agitation, anxiety and sleep disturbances in the elderly, despite concerns raised about their modest efficacy for such indications and risk of severe adverse effects, including acute consequences on cognition. Recently, some studies have also raised concerns about the long-term effect of BZDs, suggesting their association with an increased risk of cognitive decline and dementia.

To review published synthesis studies on the risk of dementia development due to BZDs/BZRDs use.

An electronic search was conducted in PubMed. Meta-analysis, systematic and non-systematic reviews examining the association between BZDs/BZRDs and subsequent dementia were included. No language nor publication date restrictions were applied. Search results other than synthesis studies were excluded. Studies were screened for relevance based on predefined inclusion and exclusion criteria.

Overall, 246 results were obtained. After initial screening, nine studies were included. From these, three were systematic reviews with meta-analysis of observational studies (cohort and/or case-control), one was a systematic review from observational studies and five were non-systematic reviews. Most studies found an association between BZDs/BZRDs and subsequent dementia, with meta-analysis studies reporting an increased risk (OR) between 1,38 and 1,78, even after controlling for protopathic bias. However, difficulties in establishing a causal relationship are reported due to the considerable clinical and methodological heterogeneity of the primary studies.

Most studies suggest an association between the use of BZDs/BZRDs and dementia risk, highlighting that their prescription should be cautious, prevented or reduced to attenuate this risk.

No significant relationships.

Research has shown the relationship between borderline personality disorder (BPD) and complex posttraumatic stress disorder (cPTSD), pointing out the overlapping nature and expression of both conditions. In order to understand their differences and similarities, we present a case of a 22-years-old patient with a history of repeated sexual trauma throughout all her adolescence, whose diagnose was changed from BPD to cPTSD after she was admitted in an acute inpatient mental health unit.

To gather the similarities between borderline personality disorder and complex posttraumatic stress disorder.

A narrative review of the literature through the presentation of a case. Articles were chosen based on its clinical relevance.

cPTSD merges the clinical features and symptoms of PTSD with affect dysregulation, negative self-perception, unstable relationships and somatization, also present in BPD. Furthermore, BPD is known to frequently have a traumatic etiology.

It is not always simple to draw a clear line between cPTSD and BPD conditions. However, each diagnosis may have a different impact on patient understanding and treatment.

No significant relationships.

what did we learn in 2020? Every year several thousand scientific papers on alcohol, drugs, and nicotine are published. The picking of five papers must obviously be arbitrary and subjective. However, the scientific literature of 2020 cannot be regarded without acknowledging the many papers concerning the COVID-19 pandemic. Some studies on alcohol, drug, and nicotine show a small increase, some a small decrease, but many no change. The addiction consequences of the pandemic and the societal lockdowns may thus be less dramatic than feared. This is true even if many papers reported higher mental distress during the pandemic and there is a close relationship between mental distress and substance use, a relationship that has been further confirmed in studies from the past year. Furthermore, a review concerning the addictive potential of cannabis has further alarmed us of the current liberalization also affecting Europe. A new figure of “1 in 3” cannabis users getting hooked may possibly replace the old “1 in 10”. Furthermore, the year has brought even more solid knowledge of the transition from substance-induced psychosis (SIP) to schizophrenia, teaching psychiatrists in acute psychiatry an important lesson on how to view SIP. As many as 1 in 3 patients with SIP will eventually receive a diagnosis of schizophrenia, making SIP the most powerful risk factor for schizophrenia known. Lastly, the lecture will present a very novel and unexpected finding regarding alcohol elimination, that may change how we treat intoxications with different alcohols.

No significant relationships.

Research has shown that negative affect leads to unhealthy eating, the top cause of death in the United States.

This project examined whether AR (Affect Regulation) can be applied to incidental negative affect to improve eating behavior.

We conducted four studies.

In Studies 1 and 2 (n=80), we developed a autobiographical negative affect induction, showed that it induces negative affect, and demonstrated that participants can learn to downregulate this negative affect. In Study 3 (n=40), participants completed a three-phase dietary food choice task. In phase 1, participants made food choices under neutral conditions. In phase 2, participants made food choices after receiving the negative affect induction from Studies 1 and 2. In phase 3, participants made food choices while downregulating the negative affect caused by the induction. In phase 2, participants placed less importance on health (b=-0.15, z=-5.99, p<.001) when making food choices than under neutral conditions (phase 1). In phase 3, participants successfully downregulated their negative affect (b=-1.2, t=-22.01, p<.001) and placed the same level of importance on health when making food choices as in phase 1, indicating that AR applied to incidental affect is an effective method for improving eating behavior. In Study 4 (n=120), we pre-registered and replicated our findings from Study 3. In addition, we fit drift-diffusion models to participants reaction time data and show that these results extent to the by-participant weights participants place on health when making food choices.

These results are a step towards scalable AR interventions to improve eating behavior.

No significant relationships.

Patients with substance use disorders (SUD) have higher alexithymia levels and present frequently suicidal ideation (SI) and suicide (SA) [1,2]. Beside, alexithymia has been related to suicidal behaviors in several psychiatric disorders[3]. Although, there are some studies on alexithymia and suicidality in SUD patients, to our knowledge there are no studies on this issue in Spanish population.

To compare the alexithymia levels in SUD patients with and without SI and SA in an outpatient addiction treatment center in Spain.

This is a cross-sectional study performed on 110 patients (74.3%males; mean age 43.6±14.5years old) for whom we had information from the Toronto Alexithymia Scale(TAS-20) and the presence or not of lifetime SI and SA.

Lifetime SI and SA were present in 55.5% and 35.5% of the sample respectively. The mean score of TAS-20, difficulties identifying feelings (DIF), difficulties describing feelings (DDT), and externally-oriented thinking(EOT) were 57.2±13.3, 20.0±7.0, 14.7±4.5, and 22.5±4.5 respectively.

SI and SA may be related to alexithymia levels. Hence, alexithymia should be further analyzed in SUD patients in longitudinal studies in order to analyze the bilateral association with suicidal spectrum behaviors. REFERENCES Rodríguez-Cintas L, et al. Factors associated with lifetime suicidal ideation and suicide attempts in outpatients with substance use disorders. Psychiatry Res. 2018;262:440-5. Morie KP, et al. Alexithymia and Addiction: A Review and Preliminary Data Suggesting Neurobiological Links to Reward/Loss Processing. Curr Addict Rep. 2016;3(2):239-48. Hemming L, et al. A systematic review and meta-analysis of the association between alexithymia and suicide ideation and behaviour. J Affect Disord. 2019;254:34-48.

In these unprecedented times, the medical workers particularly at the frontlines of the pandemic are vulnerable to psychological trauma rooted in the new demands of their work, as well as the prevailing sense of insecurity and safety concerns for themselves and their loved ones.

To explore the mental health impact of the covid-19 pandemic on the front-line health care workers in a tertiary care hospital in Rawalpindi, Pakistan

Frontline healthcare workers will include all doctors, nurses and paramedical staff performing duties that involve dealing directly with known or suspected cases of COVID-19 at triage clinics, ICUs and isolation wards. Depression Anxiety and Stress Scale (DASS) and Impact of events scale-revised (IES-R) were administered to them to assess the mental health of these frontlines.

A total of 94 frontlines were included in the study. 76(80.9%) had no significant depression while 18 (19.1%) had presence of significant depression. 62 (66%) had no significant anxiety while 32 (34%) had significant anxiety. Female gender and degree of contact with high clinical suspicion cases were significantly related with presence of anxiety and depression among the study participants. Being female, single, a nurse or a paramedic and degree of contact with high clinical suspicion cases was significantly related with presence of stress among the frontlines. People working in ICU or corona isolation unit had more chances of having trauma as compared to other frontlines.

Depression, anxiety, stress and trauma were common among the front liners fighting in this pandemic

Pandemic outbreak brings multiple challenges into everyday life, with high potential to affect all aspects of health. It was previously demonstrated that epidemic is harmful to mental health (MH) of a whole population producing long-lasting and significant burden for the person and the society. However, such an impact was less investigated in COVID-19 pandemic.

Investigate aspects of MH among healthy population during Spring 2020 lockdown due to COVID-19; detect factors affecting MH and their cumulative effect on health-related quality of life (QOL).

571 healthy volunteers completed electronic survey distributed through social networks. The survey contained standard tools for evaluation of (1) levels of stress, anxiety and depression, (2) objective and subjective parameters of participation in daily-life activities, (3) daily routines, (5) loneliness, (6) social connectedness, (7) self-efficacy and (8) quality of life.

We found high levels of stress, anxiety and depression among healthy population and low QOL in physical, psychological and social relationship domains. Employment, keeping daily routines, social connectedness, self-efficacy, enjoyment, satisfaction and meaning in daily-life activities were associated with better MH. All the aforementioned factors contributed significantly to QOL.

COVID-19 outbreak rise multiple health issues, among them affected MH of the healthy, not infected population. Public health strategies should be implemented to mitigate impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on MH given its personal and social burden and its contribution to QOL. Addressing participation in daily life activities can be a useful tool to cope with impact of COVID-19 on MH.

Autism is a neurodevelopmental disorder that is considered more common in males; however, ascertainment estimates of ASD in the UK population suggest a significant proportion of female cases of ASD go unrecognised and undiagnosed. This review examines whether the apparent underdiagnosis of girls may be attributed to gender sampling bias in the validation of diagnostic instruments routinely used to diagnose autism.

To compare the gender ratio in validation samples of commonly used diagnostic tools for autism to estimates of the gender distribution of children with autism in the UK population

A review of diagnostic tool manuals and a targeted literature search identified the gender of sample participants used to validate tools used by Scottish ASD services. Analysis of validation samples compared the mean percentage of female participants with ASD to estimates of the proportion of girls with ASD in the UK population.

Data on 7 tools was extracted. The mean percentage of female sample participants with ASD was significantly lower than the ascertainment estimate of females with ASD in the UK population (p=0.010, t(6)=-3.67) and significantly lower than the mean percentage of females in comparison groups (p=0.010, t(12)=-3.06).

There is low representation of females in validity samples of tools, which may reduce their sensitivity to the female phenotype and contribute to diagnostic disparities. Future research is warranted on why instruments are poorer detectors of ASD in girls and how female features of ASD could be better represented in their structure.

The first stage of interdisciplinary studying (EEG, IQ, immunology, psychology, neuropsychology) of cognitive development of children with IVF, conducting at the Mental Health Research Center (Moscow, Russia) is presenting. A small number of studies analyzing the cognitive development of children in a wide age range, determined the design of this study.

Assessment of the capabilities of the neuropsychological approach in qualifying the cognitive development of children with IVF.

20 children aged 7 to 15 years old, born with IVF, studying in school. Neuropsychological diagnosis according to A.R. Luria-L.S.Tsvetkova. All participants signed voluntary consent to participate in the study.

1. Neuropsychological approach and methods of neuropsychological diagnostics are effective in qualifying the neurocognitive development of children with IVF 2. The overwhelming majority of the examined children (90%) had energy factor dysfunction (at the level of brain stem structures in 65%, at the level of diencephalic structures in 82%, combined disorders at both levels in 52%) 3. Regulatory inhibitory control (impulse control - suppression of the dominant reaction) was impaired (functionally unformed) in 58% of the subjects 4. A gross violation of the kinetic factor was found in 46% of the examined children and adolescents IVF 5. The development of speech and visual memory is variable.

The conclusions are preliminary and require testing on a wider sample of children born because of IVF and other assisted reproductive technologies. It is necessary to study the functional state of other neuropsychological factors, to expand the number of participants.

No significant relationships.

Web Journal Club as a collaborative learning method, is an effective method to enhance the knowledge base of nursing students, their presentation skills, problem-solving skills and ability to critically appraise literature.

To describe the experience of a online journal club on education of MHN undergraduate students.

We implemented a journal club in the online classroom with a total of 24 portuguese undergraduate students enrolled in clinical training of MHN (sixth semester). Over a two-week period, five 2-hour online journal club sessions were conducted in April 2020. During each session, five journal articles were presented synchronously to a live online audience via the Zoom Classroom technology. After all sessions, students were invited by e-mail to complete an anonymous and voluntary online questionnaire via Google Forms.

All students were all very positive about the journal club sessions and found the opportunity to discuss and reflect on practice issues in depth very helpful. They found the sessions supportive, they helped to bond the group, they learnt a great deal from each others experiences, and they felt that they gained in confidence as a group. Survey results also indicated that few participants experienced technical difficulties during sessions.

This pedagogical practice enhances gains in the various actors involved: 1) in students, contributing to their learning process and acquisition of competences, articulating research and clinical practice; and 2) lastly, even more indirectly, in people receiving care, since a evidence-based practice ensures safe and quality of nursing care delivery.

No significant relationships.

Obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) is associated to a wide range of symptomatic expression and treatment response variability [1]. Sensory perception has been identified as an emerging factor in this process [2]. Sensory vulnerability and atypical sensory experience were identified as risk factors for the development of OCD [3] and a sensory subtype of the disease was proposed in which there is a positive correlation with early onset sensory symptoms, male gender and family background [4]. Adding to the atypical sensory profile, obsessions are frequently experienced as partially perceptual.

Our main goals are to characterize the sensory perception in OCD patients; assess the prevalence and intensity of the sensory properties of the obsessive thoughts and explore the how sensory perception, obsessive thoughts and obsessive dimensions/clusters are interrelated.

Patients with OCD diagnosis, aged 18 to 65 years and no comorbid mental disorder (except depression) will be recruited. The study battery will include participant form with demographical and clinical features, assessment of depressive and anxiety symptoms (HAM-A and HAM-D) evaluation of clinical outcome measures and obsessive dimensions/clusters (Yale-Brown Obsessive-Compulsive Scale (Y-BOQS) and Obsessive Beliefs Questionnaire-44 (OBQ-44)), assessment of sensory perception and sensory properties of obsessive thoughts (Sensory Perception Quotient (SPQ 21) and Sensory Properties of Obsessive Thoughts Questionnaire (SPOQ)).

The results will help us understand the interaction between perceptual and cognitive processes in OCD.

Better definition of OCD psychopathology and the establishment of a sensory subtype may indicate the need of specific therapeutic indications or a different escalation of treatment measures.

No significant relationships.

Negative thought disorders are found in various diagnoses in clinical practice. These symptoms may show a possible psychosis continuum and may be taken into account when assessing schizophrenic risk. Neurocognitive functioning of patients with negative thought disorders need to be clarified.

Aim of the study is to identify and validate the differences of executive functions between patients with negative thought disorders and patients without thought disorders.

Used a standardized neuropsychological test battery. There were 15 patients with negative thought disorders (affective disorders, personality disorders, schizophrenic spectrum disorders) and 18 patients with depressive episode without thought disorders in the research. Patients aged 17-25 years. The Mann–Whitney U test and ANOVA were used for statistical analysis.

Significant results were obtained from The Verbal Fluency Test, The Design Fluency Test, The Digit span, The Rey-Osterrieth Complex Figure and Bidstrup’s drawings (All tests have p-values less than 0.05). In the methods listed above, the results in the group of patients with negative thought disorders are significantly lower than in the group of patients without thought disorders.

The data indicate a violation of Executive functions among patients with negative thought disorders: inhibitory control, planning and regulation, working memory, difficulty switching, which related to left frontal lobe dysfunction. A lack of simultaneity and understanding figurative language, which is associated with right hemisphere dysfunction.

The reported study was funded by RFBR, project number 20-013-00772

Spirituality and religiousness are not so far extensively investigated in patients after stroke.

The aim of this preliminary study is to explore whether self-reports in two questionnaires measuring the personal experience of spirituality and religiousness can influence cognition and more specifically performance on neuropsychological tests examining attention.

Fifteen male stroke patients participated voluntarily one year after their hospitalization. The mean age of the patients was 75.58 years (SD = 7.50, range 61-90), level of education 15.47 years (SD = 3.82). In addition to that, fifteen controls with similar demographics, free of physical and mental diseases, were also examined. Depressive symptoms of the participants were assessed with the 15-item Geriatric Depression Scale. The Daily Spiritual Experience Scale, the Systems of Belief Inventory (SBI-15R) and a number of standardized tests examining attention were administered: Trail Making Test-Part A (TMT-A) time to completion, the Digit Span (WAIS-III) greatest forward span, the Ruff 2 & 7 Selective Attention Test automatic detection speed (ADS) and controlled search speed (CSS).

indicated that there was a statistically significant difference between the control group and the stroke group in attention. No statistically significant difference was found between the two groups regarding the levels of spirituality and religiousness.

Although spirituality and religiousness may be related with quality of life, cognitive functioning such as attention does not seem to be influenced by these variables one year post-stroke. Future research should further investigate the possible influence of the abovementioned factors in post-stroke recovery and rehabilitation.

An important aspect of depression relapse prevention programs is identifying personalized warning signals (PWS). These PWS are typically defined as depressive symptoms. Yet, no study has investigated to what extend PWS fit within the diagnostic classification framework, and how this compares to a more transdiagnostic, integrative approach towards depression.

To examine how well PWS reflect depressive symptoms, describe the remaining PWS, and examine how well PWS can be assigned to domains of an existing transdiagnostic and integrative framework, the positive health concept.

162 PWS of 66 individuals with a history of depression were labeled as one or more symptoms of depression or to a residual category. The same process was repeated for labeling the domains of the positive health model. Labeling was done by three independent reviewers (inter-rater percent agreement: symptoms: 0.83 & positive health domains: 0.73). Disagreements were resolved by discussion.

The three most commonly reported depressive symptoms were insomnia/hypersomnia, anhedonia and fatigue/loss of energy. However, sixty-five percent of the PWS were not depressive symptoms, but other symptoms (e.g. irritability, rumination) or aspects of functioning (e.g. withdrawing, managing time). The positive health domains captured all the PWS. However, 44% of PWS were labeled as multiple positive health domains, whereas labeling as symptoms of depression resulted in almost no such overlap.

A more transdiagnostic and integrative approach seems necessary to capture PWS. Depending on one’s purpose, one may consider expanding the definition with other symptoms and aspects of functioning, or using the positive health concept.