Behavioral neuropsychiatry最新文献

The purpose of this brief work is to study and make a general survey of the problem of obesity as related in whatever way, to the use of psychotropic drugs. It is a fact learned through clinical experience and knowledge by clinics and researchers working in the field of psychotropic drugs that patients subjected to extended therapy with such drugs show, in a considerable number of cases, an increase in body weight. We consider that this obesity, the pathogenetic cause of which is attributed to the action of psychotropic drugs, constitutes a serious disadvantageous side-effect of those drugs, since a large number of mental patients discontinue their drug therapy for the reasons that it is responsible for the increase in their body weight. It is a known fact discontinuation of the psychotropic drug treatment generally results in a relapse of their mental disorder.

The main endeavor of Forensic Psychiatry is to find out the causes, to investigate the psychodynamics of crime, hence based on them, to try to prevent or to treat them. In this connection, I will not enter into details today about the position of delinquency into psychodynamics, as they have elsewhere been described; I only would emphasize some cases which take place during the state so-called "hystero-epilepsy" of Charcot.

The effects of the psilocybin, a psychomimetic substance, on mental junctioning were investigated in normal volunteers as well as in schizophrenics. The disturbances induced constitute a psychoneurotoxic syndrome--"a state of drunkenness"--of about four hours duration which develops in three distinct phases. The basic mental symptoms of this syndrome consist of disturbances of the apperception, sensory perception and emotion. A moderate impairment of egofunctioning or reality appraisal and an inability to integrate different mental processes are observed. The psychomotor behavior is mainly harmonized to the prevailing emotional state and to the experiences caused by perceptual alterations, in a lesser degree. These changes, according to our observations, are more severe and more "psychotic-like" in schizophrenics rather than in normals. Psychopathological analysis of these changes proves that the whole syndrome cannot be considered as related to the spontaneously triggered functional psychoses or to the organic ones and, therefore, the term "model-psychosis" according to our opinion, is unsatisfactory.

The difference in mean square values of EEG alpha in left and right hemispheres recorded from parietal scalp regions of 5 female and 6 male human Ss was used to trigger 50 msec presentations of words or random dot patterns, and reaction times to correctly detected target stimuli were obtained. In 9 of 11 Ss the effect of left and right triggering was opposite for word and pattern stimuli, although in only 4 Ss were results consistent with a simple interpretation of alpha as an "idling" rhythm. The results support the hypothesis of complementary hempheric specialization and indicate that overt performance depends on the state of functional cerebral asymmetry.

Radioimmunoassays are expected to yield values representing the antigen, i.e., insulin, growth, cortisol, etc. employed in producing the antibody. However, in a recent study of a synthetic ACTH which involved the measurement of cortisol levels (1), we found that above 20gamma%, the radioimmunoassay (RIA) yields cortisol values distinctly above those obtained with the competitive protein binding (CPB) technic. We now suggest a possible explanation for this discrepancy and have calculated a correction factor.

The data herein presented describe, identify, and quantitate interrelationships among blood glucose and serum insulin, growth hormone, cortisol, and glucagon levels of hospitalized insulin-treated diabetic patients. The findings indicate that conventional diet and insulin therapy of diabetes mellitus is almost always accompanied by inappropriate counter-regulation by growth hormone, cortisol, and glucagon. The data are consonant with the hypothesis that a shortage of insulin is only one of the multihormonal defects of diabetes.

Neuropsychological studies on epileptic patients may be expected to reveal specific cognitive dysfunction even in patients with normal general intellectual ability. Difficulties in cognitive processing by visual-spatial and auditory-verbal modes are indicated by this investigation employing the Wisconsin Card Sorting Test and the Token Test, with epileptics of normal intelligence. Impairment in capacity for sustained, focused attention significantly affects performance of epileptic patients on these clinical measures, and others as well which require vigilance and attention and sensory-perceptual discrimination.

There is a suggestion in the previous paper that a way out to convey the overwhelming progress and "heavy" civilization of humanity may be to explore the Space, the Universe, and it, indeeed, results in an excellent job what American and Soviets together are these days endeavoring toward new exploration in Space. Let us see now, is this way out going to give the solution of our problem, hence avoid wars in the world?

The studies in human subjects herein reported provide data on the relative effects of 1-18 ACTH (Organon 2001) and commercial 1-39 ACTH of animal origin on plasma cortisol, serum non-esterified fatty acids, and certain urinary steroids.