To examine the feasibility, efficacy, and effectiveness of PEGASUS, a group-based structured psychoeducation for adults with ADHD and their significant others.

A pragmatic parallel group add-on design multicenter randomized controlled trial was conducted, comparing an 8-session treatment with PEGASUS (allocated n = 97; 48 with ADHD and 49 with significant others) to treatment as usual (TAU, allocated n = 82; 39 with ADHD and 43 significant others). Participants (individuals with ADHD and significant others) were recruited from five psychiatric outpatient departments and block randomized to PEGASUS or TAU. Knowledge about ADHD was measured using the ADHD 20 scale pre- and post-intervention and served as primary outcome.

Knowledge about ADHD (d = 0.97 [95% CI: 0.61–1.31]) increased following PEGASUS participation compared to TAU. Improvements were also observed in secondary outcomes e.g. global life satisfaction (d = 0.25 [95% CI: from –0.09 to 0.59]). Overall treatment satisfaction was good. Over 90% of the participants completed the program. Post-intervention data was obtained from n = 89 in PEGASUS group and n = 70 in TAU group and analyses were conducted per protocol. No important adverse effects or side effects were observed.

Group-based structured psychoeducation PEGASUS for adults with ADHD and their significant others is a feasible, efficacious, and effective treatment option to increase ADHD knowledge and general life satisfaction in psychiatric outpatient care.

This study aimed to determine the knowledge of first year health sciences students at a South African university regarding hearing loss and symptoms attributable to personal listening devices and their practices concerning the use of personal listening devices.

This was a cross-sectional study carried out using an anonymous self-administered questionnaire.

Of 336 students, 269 (80.1 per cent) completed the questionnaire. While most participants could identify symptoms that could be caused by extensive use of personal listening devices, almost 30 per cent did not know that it could cause permanent hearing loss. Personal listening devices were used by 90.7 per cent of participants, with 77.8 per cent having used them for more than five years. Use was at a high volume in 14.9 per cent of participants and for more than 2 hours per day in 52.7 per cent.

The findings indicate the need for an educational programme to inform students as to safe listening practices when using personal listening devices.

The consequences of co-occurring persistent loneliness and late life depression are yet unknown. The aim of this study was to get a deeper insight into the mental health consequences of loneliness in older persons with depressive symptoms and their perspectives of emotional distress by using a mixed-methods study design.

Two hundred and forty nine community-dwelling older persons with depressive symptoms according to the Patient Health Questionnaire-9 (≥6) were included. A validated cut-off score on the Loneliness Scale was used to distinguish lonely elders from elders who were not lonely. Quantitative and qualitative data were used to examine differences in mental health and perspectives on emotional distress between lonely and not lonely older persons with depressive symptoms.

Loneliness was highly prevalent among older persons with depressive symptoms (87.8%). Lonely people suffered from worse mental ill-health (e.g., more severe depressive symptoms, more often a depressive disorder and a lower quality of life) compared to not lonely individuals. Depressive symptoms were regarded as a logical consequence of loneliness. Lonely people perceived little command over their situation: causes of loneliness were attributed externally to perceived deficits in their social networks and they mainly expressed the need to be listened to.

Our findings underline the importance of paying considerable attention to (severe) loneliness in older adults with depressive symptoms given its high prevalence and serious mental health consequences. Future studies should look into whether addressing loneliness when discussing depressive symptoms in clinical practice may provide an opportunity to better adjust to older persons’ depression perceptions and might therefore improve care utilization.

To evaluate self-assessed knowledge about diabetes mellitus, to assess determinants of health knowledge and to evaluate consequences of health knowledge on appraisal about consequences of the disease.

Population-based computer-assisted web interview survey, supplemented with a paper-and-pencil survey via post.

Representative sample of the general Austrian population aged 15 years and older.

Men (n 1935) and women (n 2065) with and without diabetes mellitus.

Some 20·5 % of men and 17·7 % of women with diabetes, and 46·2 % of men and 36·7 % of women without diabetes, rated their knowledge about diabetes mellitus to be ‘very bad’ or ‘rather bad’. Individuals with diabetes and individuals with a family member with diabetes rated their information level more often as ‘very good’ or ‘rather good’, with adjusted OR (95 % CI) of 1·7 (1·1, 2·8) and 2·1 (1·6, 2·7), respectively, in men and 2·7 (1·5, 4·8) and 2·7 (2·1, 3·5), respectively, in women. Additional significant influencing factors on diabetes knowledge were age and educational level in both sexes, and city size in men. Independent of personal diabetes status, diabetes knowledge was associated with a lower perception of restrictions on daily life of diabetes patients and with a lower probability of underestimating health consequences of diabetes.

Health knowledge is associated with fewer misconceptions and less underestimation of health consequences in individuals both with and without diabetes mellitus. Thus health information about diabetes is important on the individual level towards disease management as well as on the public health level towards disease prevention.

It is hypothesised that mothers' social networks can positively affect child nutrition through the sharing of health knowledge and other resources. The present study describes the composition of mothers' networks, examines their association with child nutrition, and assesses whether health knowledge is shared within networks.

Cross-sectional data for mothers of young children from Andhra Pradesh (south India) were combined with existing data from the Young Lives study, in which the mothers were participating (n = 282).

The composition of social networks varied between urban and rural areas, with urban networks being larger, more female, more literate and with a greater proportion of members living outside the household and being non-family. There was a positive association between child's height-for-age Z-score and mother's network size and network literacy rate. The association with network literacy was stronger among the poorest households. Women commonly reported seeking or receiving health advice from network members.

Big and literate social networks are associated with better child nutrition, especially among the poor. The dissemination of health knowledge between network members is a plausible way in which social networks benefit child nutrition in India. Further research into the underlying mechanisms is necessary to inform the development of interventions that channel health information through word of mouth to the most excluded and vulnerable families.