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Biomedical subjects

A R Favazza

Publications and source records attributed to A R Favazza.

16 recordsLinked to original sources
PubMed1989

Female habitual self-mutilators.

Data are presented on 240 female habitual self-mutilators. The typical subject is a 28-year-old Caucasian who first deliberately harmed herself at age 14. Skin cutting is her usual practice, but she has used other methods such as skin burning and self-hitting, and she has injured herself on at least 50 occasions. Her decision to self-mutilate is impulsive and results in temporary relief from symptoms such as racing thoughts, depersonalization, and marked anxiety. She now has or has had an eating disorder, and may be concerned about her drinking. She has been a heavy utilizer of medical and mental health services, although treatment generally has been unsatisfactory. In desperation over her inability to control her self-mutilative behavior this typical subject has attempted suicide by a drug overdose.

Adolescent↗
PubMed1989

Why patients mutilate themselves.

Self-mutilation, the deliberate destruction or alteration of body tissue without conscious suicidal intent, occurs in a variety of psychiatric disorders. Major self-mutilation includes eye enucleation and amputation of limbs or genitals. Minor self-mutilation includes self-cutting and self-hitting. The author examines patients' explanations for self-mutilation which frequently focus on religions or sexual themes, and discusses scientific explanations that draw on biological, psychological, social, and cultural theories. Although no one approach adequately solves the riddle of such behaviors, habitual self-mutilation may best be thought of as a purposeful, if morbid, act of self-help.

Adolescent↗
PubMed1989

Self-mutilation and eating disorders.

Patients with eating disorders are at high risk for self-mutilation (e.g., skin cutting and burning), and vice versa. Evidence for this linkage comes from a literature review, from patient interviews, from responses to an instrument we have developed (the Self-Harm Behavior Survey), and from three instructive case reports. Even if the self-mutilation in these patients is regarded as a Borderline Personality Disorder symptom, DSM-IV should list it as an associated feature or a complication of Anorexia Nervosa/Bulimia Nervosa. In lieu of a dual diagnosis, we postulate that the combination of self-mutilation, anorexia, bulimia, and other symptoms (such as episodic alcohol abuse and swallowing foreign objects) may be manifestations of an impulse control disorder known as the "deliberate self-harm syndrome."

Adult↗
PubMed1978

Overview: foundations of cultural psychiatry.

The authors demonstrate the significance of adding the cultural dimension to basic psychiatric concepts. They point out the areas in which the work of anthropology and social psychology are relevant to psychiatry, including understanding mental health and illness, child-rearing practices and their effects on personality, cognition, family and social networks, sex roles and behavior, alcohol use, communication, and therapy. They also present some of the major conceptual foundations of cultural psychiatry, which include ethnography, emic and etic approaches, the cross-cultural approach, and the study of subjective culture.

Alcohol Drinking↗
PubMed1978

Hypoglycemia: an overview.

Hypoglycemia was not described as a human clinical syndrome until exogenous insulin was discovered. Much of our current knowledge of the symptoms of hypoglycemia derived from the reactions of schizophrenics to insulin coma therapy in the late 1920's. The diagnosis of hypoglycemia cannot be made simply on the basis of a blood glucose level since many asymptomatic persons have levels below 50 mg/100 ml. The diagnosis should be made only if symptoms occur at the glucose nadir and are relieved by the administration of glucose. The most common organic cause of hypoglycemia is functioning islet-cell tumor. By far the most prevalent type of hypoglycemia is idiopathic (function), a condition whose pathophysiology is not understood and which has given rise to a popular lay "mythology."

Adenoma, Islet Cell↗
PubMed1977

Screening for alcoholism among college students.

When the Michigan Alcoholism Screening Test (MAST) was administered to 245 students on two midwestern college campuses, 29% of the students on the small, private college campus and 19% on the large state university campus scored more than 4 points, indicating possible alcoholism. The authors hope that this study will stimulate further research on alcoholism among college students.

Adolescent↗