Iranian Journal of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences
Volume:13 Issue: 4, Dec 2019

This study was conducted to estimate the prevalence of mental disorders in children and adolescents in east Azerbaijan, Tabriz, Iran.

A total of 1036 children and adolescents between the ages of 6 - 18 were selected with cluster sampling in Tabriz city. Measurements of mental disorders were done according to the semi-structured K-SADS scale. Data were gathered by trained clinical psychologists and were analyzed by SPSS V. 16. The prevalence of mental disorders was presented with percent (95% CI) and the significance level was considered as 0.05.

The prevalence of any mental disorder in children and adolescents were 24.9%. The measure in boys and girls were 25.4 and 24.9, respectively. A total of 27.4% of 6 - 9 years old, 23.9% of 10 - 14 year olds, and 23.5% of 15 - 18 year olds had suffered from at least one mental disorder. Themost common disorders, respectively, were enuresis, ADHD, specific phobia, separation anxiety disorder. Panic disorder, social phobia, specific phobia, and agoraphobia occurred more in girls more than boys, while conduct disorder occurred more in boys.

The results of this study showed that one in four children and adolescents had at least one mental disorder. Thus, considering the fact that the beginning of mostmental disorders were not until adolescence years and continuation to adulthood, it is necessary that appropriate interventions were designed and executed. Wemust define cost effective services for early case findings and treatment of mental disorders in the regional health system.

Anxiety, depression, and physical problems are the problems of patients with Alzheimer’s disease (AD). It has been reported that exercises and crocin consumption can improve the anxiety-like behaviors and aerobic power in patients with AD.

The present study aimed to investigate the interactive effect of endurance training and crocin on anxiety-like behaviors and aerobic power of rats with AD.

In this experimental study, 40 male rats with AD (with mean age of eight weeks) were divided into five groups, including (1) control (C), (2) endurance training (ET), (3) endurance training and crocin (ETCR), (4) crocin (CR), and (5) sham (Sh). During eight weeks, the rats in groups 2 and 3 ran on treadmill for three sessions per week and groups 3 and 4 received 25 mg/kg of crocin peritoneally each day. Anxiety-like behaviors were assessed by elevated plus-maze and aerobic power test using rats’ treadmill test.

Endurance training significantly decreased weight and anxiety-like behaviors as well as increased aerobic power (P≤0.05); crocin significantly decreased anxiety-like behaviors and increased aerobic power (P≤0.05); however, the interaction of endurance training and crocin consumption were not significant in the reduction of weight and anxiety-like behaviors and increase of aerobic power (P ≤ 0.05).

It seems that endurance training and crocin consumption distinctly function and from different pathways effective in decreasing anxiety and increasing aerobic power in rats with AD.

Psychiatric nursing graduates face many challenges when entering the work setting. Transition programs can be influential as a potential way to help maintain and improve nursing performance and the quality of health care.

This study explained the nurses’ process of transition in psychiatric wards.

This grounded theory study was conducted with 27 nurses who had the experience of a transition to psychiatric wards of two referral hospitals in Mazandaran province in the north of Iran and a psychiatric referral hospital in Tehran during the years 2016 to 2018. The sampling began purposively and continued theoretically. The data were collected through semi-structured interviews and analyzed using Strauss and Corbin’s approach (2008).

The analysis showed that nurses transitioning to their new roles in psychiatric wards face all-around threats and insecurities as the main problem. Nurses used the strategy of “responsible and resourceful coping” for dealing with these problems.

The findings of the study can help mental nurses prepare for the performance role and promote their quality of health care.

Although improving well-being and psychological health is an important goal in the treatment of inpatient and outpatient populations, there are few measures in this field to assess such an important concept. The Schwartz Outcome Scale-10 (SOS-10) is a brief, cost-effective and user-friendly tool that could be used for this purpose in a wide variety of populations and clinical situations.

In this study, the psychometric properties of the SOS-10 were investigated among the Iranian population.

The participants consisted of 181 non-patients selected from among students of Iran University of Medical Sciences and Tehran University and 97 psychiatric patients recruited from Iran Psychiatric Hospital, Clinic of Tehran Psychiatric Institute, and one private clinic. The instruments used included Schwartz Outcome Scale-10, Inventory of Interpersonal Problems (IIP-32), Ryff’s Psychological Well-Being Questionnaire (PWB-18), Syndrome Checklist (SCL-25), Health Survey- Short Form (SF-12), Satisfaction with Life Scale (SWLS), and Beck’s Hopelessness Scale (BHS).

The findings revealed high internal consistency (Cronbach’s α: 0.913) and high test-retest reliability with intraclass correlation coefficients ranging between 0.910 - 0.971. The SOS-10 showed strong and positive correlations with SWL (r: 0.624, P < 0.001), SF-12 (r: 0.762, P < 0.001), and RWQ-18 (r: 0.656, P < 0.001) and strong negative associations with IIP-32 (r: -0.569, P < 0.001), BHS (r: -0.701, P < 0.001), and SCL-25 (r: -0.653, P < 0.001). According to principal component analysis, results indicated that the scale was unifactorial, and this uni-factor structure explained 56.37% of the variance of the scale and was well-fitted to the original version.

Generally, findings indicated that the Farsi version of SOS-10 has good reliability and validity and may therefore be used as a measure for assessing psychological health and well-being by researchers and clinicians in various settings.

Psychological factors play an important role as predisposing precipitating factors for coronary heart disease (CHD). Coping strategies, type D personality, illness perception (IP), and fatigue are among major psychological factors in myocardial infarction (MI) patients.

The study aimed to investigate relationships between coping strategies, type D personality subscales, illness perception, and fatigue in MI patients.

In this cross-sectional study, we collected the demographic and clinical information of 241 consecutive MI patients (mean age: 54.53±9.76 years) in the first week of hospitalization. After four months, we used questionnaires to collect information on type D personality subscales, coping strategies, illness perception, and fatigue at patients’ houses. To verify relationships between the variables, the collected data were analyzed by structural equation modeling.

The participants with more positive illness perception regarding MI were less likely to be fatigued and/or less probably used emotion coping. Patients who experienced fatigue as a symptom after MI were probably inhibited socially. Social inhibition, negative affectivity, and emotion coping were seen more in women than in men and younger participants used task coping strategy more than older ones.

Improving psychological factors such as illness perception, coping strategies, and type D personality may promote the health condition of patients in the post-MI period although these factors may influence the process of MI prevention.

According to the approaches of emotions in moral judgment, some moral emotions, especially guilt and pride can be considered its primary triggers. It seems that guilt and pride motivate moral judgment, such that the guilt is a moral emotion opposed to pride. Also, the horror stimulates an emotional reaction into the spectator.

To appreciate the introduction of the new emotive moral test, the present study was designed to validate the emotional moral competence index (EMCI), to identify associations between EMCI and moral emotions, including pride and guilt, and the age of university students.

In this study, 177 students were selected, the participants were chosen fulfilling with differentiated education years, from the first to the fourth university grade. Fifty-seven students were assigned to the first group, 33 students to the second, 52 to the third, and 35 to the fourth group. The participants completed the emotive moral test. The effect inter-subjects of the four groups were examined by the multiple analysis of variance statistical method, and the relationships between EMCI and other sub-indexes were evaluated by correlation analysis.

The introduced emotive moral test was a validated instrument of moral judgment. The validation of its EMCI index explicitly showed the inseparable emotive and cognitive relationship through two specific emotions, guilt and pride. Also, guilt was a moral emotion opposed to pride, and pride had a favorable impact on moral judgment. Finally, it indicated that the horror triggered an emotional reaction that inversely related to the spectator’s age.

The findings indicated that both pride and guilt activate moral judgment. The EMCI was introduced, and its theoretical and empirical validity was shown. The EMCI explicitly demonstrates the inseparable emotive and cognitive relationship through two specific opposed emotions, guilt versus pride. Finally, pride has a favorable impact on moral judgment and the horror triggers an emotional reaction proportional to the habituation

Investment in improving the quality of education can pave the way for sustained development. There are several studies, which have shown that personality features are important factors in predicting academic performance such as intelligence and cognitive ability. Mental disorders are one of the most severe complications of personality disorders, which influence academic performance, as well as students’ quality of life. Therefore, early diagnosis and treatment of personality disorders can help prevent students’ academic failure.

This study can provide a better understanding of the prevalence of personality features and disorders among students. This may be of great value for providing mental health care for the students who demonstrate certain traits. Furthermore, this may be helpful for education policymakers to provide guidelines and update their student health monitoring process for the universities.

This cross-sectional study was conducted in 2015 at Tehran University of Medical Sciences, School of Medicine. We have used convenience sampling. A total of 107 questionnaires were administered to the students, and overall 96 valid questionnaires were collected from the participants. The association between personality features and academic performance in medical students was evaluated through Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory (MMPI-2), which assesses personality features and psychopathology. Thus, the 370-item MMPI-2, as well as the academic performance questionnaire (including national university entrance exam rank, grade point average (GPA) of the first five terms, National Basic Science Exam Grade), was given to the students.

The results were statistically analyzed using Spearman’s correlation and Independent sample t-test. Among the Clinical scales, the highest scores belonged to the following scales: Hypomania (%24), depression (%23), hysteria (%20.8), masculinityfemininity (%17.8), hypochondriasis (%17.7), and social introversion (%13.5), respectively. Concerning the relationship between each of these scale scores and academic performance, the scores of clinical scales of hypomania, hysteria, masculinity-femininity, hypochondriasis, and paranoia, had a significant relationship (all of the P values were < 0.05) with academic performance. Moreover, the scores of validity scales of Infrequency and Lie had significant negative correlations (P values < 0.05) with academic performance.

The scores of Hypomania, Hysteria, Masculinity-Femininity, Hypochondriasis, and Paranoia scales correlated with students’ academic performance.

Emotional Intelligence (EI) is a kind of social intelligence and the main aspect of social maturity that improves the psychological health of adolescents. Based on the theory of Petrides, EI is made up of a distinctive series of traits and emotional selfperceptions related to the personality dimensions named trait emotional intelligence. Trait Emotional Intelligence QuestionnaireAdolescent Short Form (TEIQue-ASF) is one of the few instruments for evaluating trait EI in adolescents.

This study aimed to examine the psychometric properties of TEIQue-ASF in Iranian adolescents.

In this cross-sectional study, the sample consisted of 550 high school students who were selected through randomized cluster sampling from four high schools in Tehran. In addition to the TEIQue-ASF scale, we used the Schutte Emotional Intelligence Scale (SEIS) and the Junior Eysenck Personality Questionnaire (JEPQ) in this study. All analyses were carried out by IBM SPSS-22.0.

The results revealed high internal consistency (Cronbach’s α: 0.86, P < 0.001) and subscales of the TEIQue-ASF were significantly correlated with the subscales of SEIS (P < 0.05), psychoticism, neuroticism, and extraversion (P < 0.05). Factor analysis also verified the original four-factor structure (well-being, self-control, emotionality, and sociability).

The Farsi version of TEIQue-ASF is a reliable and valid scale to assess the trait emotional intelligence of Iranian adolescents and may, therefore, be a considerable measure for assessing trait emotional intelligence in educational and clinical contexts among adolescents.

The growing elderly population will bring serious problems to society. Depression is one of the major disorders of old age that can be affected by various factors such as gender, age, education, and place of residence, among others. However, most of these variables are not fully controllable and they can interact with each other. Therefore, it is often difficult to find relationships between these variables using regression models that have restrictive assumptions. In this study, the Artificial Neural Network (ANN) models were used to overcome this dilemma. We determined the effect of variables of age, marital status, number of family members, income, employment status, homebound status, gender, place of residence (city or village), the number of chronic non-communicable diseases, and ethnicity on depression in the elderly. Data were analyzed using SPSS22 software for 1,477 people aged 60 - 92 years. The best ANN model had 33 neurons in the hidden layer and a sigmoid transfer function in both hidden and output layers. The preferred ANN model had a minimum sensitivity of 60% to determine the level of depression in the elderly. This model introduced ethnicity, the number of households, and the number of chronic diseases, age, and income as the most effective variables in predicting depression.

Psychological factors, such as depression and anxiety are among the risk factors in coronary heart disease (CHD). Therefore, we need the necessary interventions in this field to quickly diagnose these disorders.

The aim of this study was to determine the psychometric properties of Patient Health questionnaires-4 (PHQ-4) as a screening tool for depression and anxiety in CHD patients in Iran.

In this study, 279 CHD patients completed PHQ-4, Patient Health questionnaires-9 (PHQ-9), generalized anxiety disorder-7 (GAD-7) scale, and Beck depression inventory version-II (BDI-II). Semi-structured clinical interviews (SCID) based on DSM-5 were also used to diagnose depression and anxiety.

Cronbach’s alpha for PHQ-2, GAD-2, and PHQ-4 were reported to be 0.79, 0.75, and 0.78 respectively. The correlations of the PHQ-4 questionnaire with the BDI-II, GAD-7, GAD-2, PHQ-9, and PHQ-2 were found to be 0.72, 0.63, 0.85, 0.79, and 0.88 respectively. The results of fitting one-factor and two-factor models showed that the two-factor model has a more suitable fit. The optimal cut-off point of PHQ-4 ≥ 7 to measure depression and anxiety concurrently (sensitivity = 0.86, specificity = 0.90, and the area under the curve was 0.93 (CI = 0.90 - 0.96).

The PHQ-4 questionnaire is an appropriate tool for diagnosis of and screening for depression and anxiety in the population of CHD patients.

Anxiety is considered as a chronic stress complication. The role of N-methyl-D-aspartate (NMDA) glutamate receptors located in basolateral amygdala (BLA) in stress-induced anxiety is hypothesized.

It is unknown how NMDA glutamate receptors located in BLA affect maintenance of chronic stress-induced anxiety. This study investigated the role of these receptors in maintaining anxiety induced by electric foot shock in male Wistar rats.

Animals were subjected to stress based on the following protocol: Seven days after bilateral cannulation in BLA, they experienced seven sessions of stress (one session/day). Before each stress session, the animals received different doses of memantine (1, 2.5, and 5 mg/kg) peripherally, or (0.1, 1 and 5 µg/kg) in BLA. Six days after stress termination, the animals were tested for maintenance of anxiety using an open field paradigm. Moreover, the animals’ brains were removed for further assessment of brain-derived neurotrophic factor (BDNF) levels in the hippocampus.

The stressed animals showed anxiety six days after stress termination. Moreover, chronic peripheral and central memantine injection by itself showed both anxiolytic and anxiogenic properties six days after drug administration termination in the non-stressed animals. Memantine preadministration, both peripherally and centrally, reduced the stress-induced maintenance of anxiety in the stressed animals. The BDNF assessment revealed that stress and memantine did not change hippocampal BDNF level six days after drug or stress termination.

Inhibition of NMDA receptors in BLA can inhibit maintenance of stress-induced anxiety, which is not related to hippocampal BDNF level. In addition, chronic memantine injection induces anxiety

The objective of this case report was to highlight one of the uncommon subtypes of tardive dyskinesia (TD) as tardive blepharospasm secondary to olanzapine.

We reported a rare case of young-onset schizophrenia in an adolescent patient, who was treated with olanzapine, but subsequently developed tardive blepharospasm. Clinical resolution of the blepharospasm after olanzapine was stopped and switched to quetiapine.

Tardive blepharospasm can be a regarded as a presentation of tardive dyskinesia. Complete recovery of the symptoms can be achieved by stopping the offending drug early and switching to a serotonin-dopamine receptor antagonist.