Biomedical subjects

Myrna Weissman

Publications and source records attributed to Myrna Weissman.

9 recordsLinked to original sources

PubMed2006

Group interpersonal psychotherapy for depression in rural Uganda: 6-month outcomes: randomised controlled trial.

BACKGROUND: A randomised controlled trial comparing group interpersonal psychotherapy with treatment as usual among rural Ugandans meeting symptom and functional impairment criteria for DSM-IV major depressive disorder or sub-threshold disorder showed evidence of effectiveness immediately following the intervention. AIMS: To assess the long-term effectiveness of this therapy over a subsequent 6-month period. METHOD: A follow-up study of trial participants was conducted in which the primary outcomes were depression diagnosis, depressive symptoms and functional impairment. RESULTS: At 6 months, participants receiving the group interpersonal psychotherapy had mean depression symptom and functional impairment scores respectively 14.0 points (95% CI 12.2-15.8; P<0.0001) and 5.0 points (95% CI 3.6-6.4; P<0.0001) lower than the control group. Similarly, the rate of major depression among those in the treatment arm (11.7%) was significantly lower than that in the control arm (54.9%) (P<0.0001). CONCLUSIONS: Participation in a 16-week group interpersonal psychotherapy intervention continued to confer a substantial mental health benefit 6 months after conclusion of the formal intervention.

Adult↗

PubMed2005

Maternal depression and the intergenerational transmission of religion.

This study tests the hypothesis that maternal depression (major depressive disorder; MDD) decreases rates of the intergenerational transmission of religiosity from mother to offspring and attenuates the beneficial qualities of religiosity in offspring. Depression was assessed using semistructured clinical interviews; religiosity was assessed based upon the personal importance of religion, frequency of attendance at religious services, and religious denomination. Results suggest that (1) maternal depression attenuates the intergenerational transmission of religion; (2) in the presence of maternal depression, offspring were more likely to have MDD at 10-year follow-up when mother-offspring were concordant on religious importance; and (3) in the absence of maternal depression, offspring were less likely to have MDD at 10-year follow-up when mother-offspring were concordant on attendance. Thus, in the presence of maternal depression, transmission of religious attendance is no longer associated with decreased likelihood of offspring MDD, whereas transmission of religious importance is associated with increased likelihood of offspring depression.

Adult↗

PubMed2004

Interpersonal counselling in general practice.

BACKGROUND: Interpersonal counselling (IPC) derives from interpersonal psycho-therapy (IPT) but is briefer in the number and duration of sessions and is particularly suited to the primary care setting. While depression and other psychological symptoms are not necessarily 'caused' by interpersonal problems, they do occur in a social and interpersonal context. Problem areas commonly associated with the onset of depression are unresolved grief, interpersonal disputes, role transition and interpersonal deficits such as social isolation. OBJECTIVE: This article discusses IPC and how it can be used in the general practice setting. DISCUSSION: The structure of IPC is of a brief treatment of six sessions, each with an explicit focus: assessment, education about the interaction between interpersonal relationships and psychological symptoms, identifying current stress areas and helping the patient deal with these more positively and termination of the IPC relationship. Interpersonal counselling can be utilised general practice to reduce psychological symptoms, restore morale, improve self esteem and the quality of the patient's social adjustment and interpersonal relationships.

Adult↗

PubMed2003

Group interpersonal psychotherapy for depression in rural Uganda: a randomized controlled trial.

CONTEXT: Despite the importance of mental illness in Africa, few controlled intervention trials related to this problem have been published. OBJECTIVES: To test the efficacy of group interpersonal psychotherapy in alleviating depression and dysfunction and to evaluate the feasibility of conducting controlled trials in Africa. DESIGN, SETTING, AND PARTICIPANTS: For this cluster randomized, controlled clinical trial (February-June 2002), 30 villages in the Masaka and Rakai districts of rural Uganda were selected using a random procedure; 15 were then randomly assigned for studying men and 15 for women. In each village, adult men or women believed by themselves and other villagers to have depressionlike illness were interviewed using a locally adapted Hopkins Symptom Checklist and an instrument assessing function. Based on these interviews, lists were created for each village totaling 341 men and women who met Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, Fourth Edition (DSM-IV) criteria for major depression or subsyndromal depression. Interviewers revisited them in order of decreasing symptom severity until they had 8 to 12 persons per village, totaling 284. Of these, 248 agreed to be in the trial and 9 refused; the remainder died or relocated. A total of 108 men and 116 women completed the study and were reinterviewed. INTERVENTION: Eight of the 15 male villages and 7 of the 15 female villages were randomly assigned to the intervention arm and the remainder to the control arm. The intervention villages received group interpersonal psychotherapy for depression as weekly 90-minute sessions for 16 weeks. MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES: Depression and dysfunction severity scores on scales adapted and validated for local use; proportion of persons meeting DSM-IV major depression diagnostic criteria. RESULTS: Mean reduction in depression severity was 17.47 points for intervention groups and 3.55 points for controls (P<.001). Mean reduction in dysfunction was 8.08 and 3.76 points, respectively (P<.001). After intervention, 6.5% and 54.7% of the intervention and control groups, respectively, met the criteria for major depression (P<.001) compared with 86% and 94%, respectively, prior to intervention (P =.04). The odds of postintervention depression among controls was 17.31 (95% confidence interval, 7.63-39.27) compared with the odds among intervention groups. Results from intention-to-treat analyses remained statistically significant. CONCLUSIONS: Group interpersonal psychotherapy was highly efficacious in reducing depression and dysfunction. A clinical trial proved feasible in the local setting. Both findings should encourage similar trials in similar settings in Africa and beyond.

Adult↗

PubMed2003

Validity of the mood disorder questionnaire: a general population study.

OBJECTIVE: This study tested the validity in the adult general population of the Mood Disorder Questionnaire, a screening instrument for bipolar I and II disorders. The Mood Disorder Questionnaire has been validated in a psychiatric outpatient study group. METHOD: A total of 711 subjects (stratified by Mood Disorder Questionnaire score) were randomly selected from a group of 85,358 adult respondents in a nationwide epidemiological general population sample that was balanced for key demographic variables. Of these, 695 subjects received a telephone interview involving an abbreviated version of the Structured Clinical Interview for DSM-IV. RESULTS: A sensitivity of 0.281 and a specificity of 0.972 were obtained for the Mood Disorder Questionnaire. CONCLUSIONS: The Mood Disorder Questionnaire is a useful screening instrument for bipolar I and II disorders in the community. The operating characteristics of the Mood Disorder Questionnaire in the general population differ substantially from its characteristics in outpatient psychiatric settings.

Adolescent↗

PubMed2003

Improving the detection of drug abuse, alcohol abuse, and depression in community health centers.

Up to 35 percent of primary care patients suffer from substance abuse or mental disorders, and most of these patients receive care from general medical professionals rather than mental health specialists. Accumulating evidence suggests that primary care physicians often fail to recognize, diagnose, and treat their patients with mental and substance use disorders; only about 5 percent of primary care visits result in a mental or substance use diagnosis. The goals of this project were to evaluate the feasibility of screening for drug abuse, alcohol abuse, and major depression at two federally funded urban Community/Migrant Health Centers (C/MHCs), in Newark, New Jersey, and Bronx, New York, and to examine the effects of a clinical tool designed to guide primary care clinicians in the identification and treatment of substance use and depression, assess provider perceptions of the screening form, and determine the concordance between provider and patient reports of assessment and management.

Adult↗

PubMed2002

Interpersonal psychotherapy delivered over the telephone to recurrent depressives. A pilot study.

Rates of recurrent depression peak among women in their childbearing years, yet a large number of these women are not treated or do not seek maintenance treatment between episodes. Barriers to treatment include time constraints, demands of child care, and finances. A method for improving access to treatment of depression may be delivery of psychotherapy over the telephone. A 12-week pilot controlled clinical trial with random assignment was conducted to test the feasibility and efficacy of Interpersonal Psychotherapy delivered over the telephone (IPT-T) for depression in women (N=15 IPT-T and N=15 no treatment) with a life-time history of recurrent depression and low rates of previous treatment. Patients were interviewed at baseline and at 12 weeks by a blind and independent clinical evaluator to assess their symptom level and social functioning. IPT-T as compared to no treatment was significantly better in lowering symptoms of depression as measured by the Hamilton Rating Scale for Depression (p<.02), improving global functioning (GAS) (p<.02), and improving work and social functioning (p<.03-.05, respectively). These preliminary findings support the feasibility and helpfulness of IPT-T in preventing an increase in depressive symptoms among women with recurrent depression but current mild to moderately levels of depression.

Adult↗

PubMed2002

Adult religiousness and history of childhood depression: eleven-year follow-up study.

This study investigates the association between childhood depression and the protective qualities of adult religiousness. Subjects were 146 (65 female and 81 male) adults with a history of childhood depression and 123 (61 female and 62 male) adults without a history of childhood depression interviewed as part of a long-term follow-up study (mean years of follow-up, 11.2; SD = 1.4). Depression in childhood and adulthood was assessed by blind and independent clinical interviews by using the Schedule for Affective Disorders for School Aged Children and the Schedule for Affective Disorders Life-time Version, respectively. Religiousness was assessed by report on the personal importance of religion, frequency of attendance of religious services, religious denomination, and child-adult concordance of report. Findings showed adult personal importance of religion to be associated with a decreased risk for depression in women without a history of childhood depression but an increased risk for depression in women with a history of childhood depression. Adult Catholicism as compared with Protestantism was associated with a decreased risk for depression in male childhood depressives, but this association was not found in men without childhood depression. The findings potentially suggest a reciprocal-influence process between childhood pathology and the development of religiousness.

Adolescent↗

PubMedDate not supplied

Verbal deficits and disruptive behavior disorders among children of opiate-dependent parents.

In order to explore the association between verbal deficits and disruptive behavior disorders among children of addicted parents, 283 6-17-year-old children and their opiate-dependent parents completed diagnostic interviews and standardized measures of vocabulary. Unexpectedly, racial differences in the scores confounded the exploration of the relationship between cognitive scores and disruptive behavior disorders. An interaction between disruptive behavior disorder and race is explored; among Caucasian youths, low verbal scores are associated with disruptive behavior disorders, but this association was not found among African- and Hispanic-American youths. Further analysis and research are needed to understand the clinical significance of relationships between verbal deficits and disruptive behavior disorders within racially diverse groups.

Adolescent↗