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Biomedical subjects

L H Levy

Publications and source records attributed to L H Levy.

18 recordsLinked to original sources
PubMed1993

Effects of membership in bereavement support groups on adaptation to conjugal bereavement.

Examined the contribution of membership in bereavement support groups (BSGs) to bereavement adaptation in a sample of 127 widows and widowers, 37 of whom participated in BSGs, during the first 18 months of their bereavement. Both BSG members and nonmembers exhibited significant declines in depression, anger, anxiety, subjective stress, and psychotropic medication usage over the 18-month course. Multiple regression analyses revealed that neither group membership nor level of group involvement was associated with significantly greater declines in these variables, after demographic variables, initial levels of distress, and levels of perceived social support were accounted for. In further exploratory analyses, however, the number of BSG meetings attended accounted for significant amounts of variance in levels of anger and psychotropic medication usage and interacted with perceived social support in accounting for variance in subjective stress. The extent to which these findings call into question common assumptions regarding the efficacy of BSGs and implications for future research are discussed.

Adaptation, Psychological↗
PubMed1992

Bereavement support groups: who joins; who does not; and why.

Compared widowed spouses who joined (n = 40) bereavement support groups (BSGs) during the first 13 months of bereavement with those who declined to join (n = 96). Controlling for gender, age, and socioeconomic status, no differences were found for perceived levels of social support, but joiners, compared with nonjoiners, reported experiencing more stressful events and scored significantly higher on measures of depression, anger, anxiety, and subjective stress. Nonjoiners and, to a lesser extent, joiners viewed those attending groups as less self-sufficient (e.g., need help, lonely), suggesting a mildly stigmatizing image of BSGs. A dialectical model is proposed in which BSG utilization rates are seen as the product of an avoidance-avoidance conflict involving the choice between suffering emotional distress on one's own or the perceived stigma of joining a BSG. Implications for future research on participation in self-help and mutual support groups are discussed.

Adult↗
PubMed1991

Anticipatory grief: its measurement and proposed reconceptualization.

Factor analysis of an Anticipatory Grief Inventory composed of thoughts, feelings, and behaviors believed to be associated with anticipatory grief, completed by 159 male and female spouses of deceased cancer patients within three months of their loss yielded three interpretable factors: Conjugal Coping, Anticipatory Grief, and Cognitive Coping. Only Anticipatory Grief correlated significantly with measures of depression and subjective stress (rs = .36-.35), but did so positively, suggesting that, rather than serving an adaptive function, Anticipatory Grief may be a risk factor for poor early bereavement adjustment. Thus, recommendations concerning its facilitation in spouses of patients in the terminal stages of illness should be reconsidered.

Adaptation, Psychological↗
PubMed1980

Self-help groups: the members' perspectives.

The emergence of self-help groups as an important source of help-giving for persons with psychological problems has occurred without a systematic attempt to tap an important source of information about this phenomenon: the members themselves. Eighty members of nine self-help groups were surveyed. The results of this study suggest that self-help groups serve a different population than do professional therapists, that the help-giving processes are mainly supportive in nature, and that an optimistic attitude toward increased collaboration between professional care-givers and self-help groups is justified. Questions for further research are discussed.

Behavior Therapy↗
PubMed1978

Self-help groups viewed by mental health professionals: a survey and comments.

This paper presents a summary of a national survey of the utilization and evaluation of self-help groups by outpatient mental health facilities making and receiving referrals from self-help groups. Evaluations of self-help groups' effectiveness tended to be favorable, and respondents generally believed that they could play an important role in a mental health delivery system. Only 30.7%, however, believed that the probability was high that their agencies would be interested in exploring how their activities might be integrated with those of self-help groups.

Attitude of Health Personnel↗
PubMedDate not supplied

Kveim-test in patients suspected of sarcoidosis and in leprosy patients in a geographical area not yea investigated.

The Kveim-test was studied in a geographical area (São Paulo, Brazil) not yet investigated, and leprosy patients were also tested. One hundred and forty seven patients from a general hospital who had had the possibility of sarcoidosis, as a differential diagnosis, were tested with Kveim suspension. Another group of 13 patients with clinical and histological diagnosis of leprosy (10 with tuberculoid leprosy lepromin-positive and 3 with indetermined leprosy) was also tested with Kveim suspension. Sixteen Kveim-tests (10 per cent) with sarcoid granulomatous reaction revealed histologically were considered positive. Three patients with sarcoidosis for more than 3 years gave negative Kveim-test. Four patients with positive Kveim-test had respectively lymphosarcoma, Crohn's disease, lung fibrosis and concurrent tuberculosis infection. Nine positive Kveim-tests (5.6 per cent) were coincident with sarcoidosis. Thirteen leprosy patients (ten tuberculoid) gave negative Kveim-test.

Adolescent↗
PubMedDate not supplied

[Lyme disease: cutaneous involvement and treatment of the initial phases].

Lyme disease is a tick-transmitted infectious disease caused by Borrelia burgdorferi. The clinical spectrum includes manifestations in the skin, heart, joints and nervous system. In Brazil no case has been reported with laboratorial confirmation. We report a suspect case with clinical and laboratorial findings in a young woman who developed cutaneous manifestations. She recovered after tetracycline treatment. The usual manifestations and the treatment of early stage of the illness are discussed.

Adult↗