Dear colleagues,
It is my great pleasure to welcome you to the first issue of 2013.
In our first article San et al. assessed the risk factors for relapse in patients with schizophrenia. It emerged that the number of previous hospitalizations and the number of different types of antipsychotics were significantly associated with relapse while the absence of cannabis consumption improved treatment outcome.
Ota and colleagues addressed the question of whether the Japanese version of the National Adult Reading Test (JART) and the Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale- Revised (WAIS-R) are useful and valid tools for distinguishing between pervasive developmental disorder (PDD) and schizophrenia. Their findings confirmed the discriminative validity of JART and WAIS-R.
Guo et al. investigated the relationship between obesity and health-related quality of life (HRQoL) in Chinese patients with schizophrenia. They concluded that obesity is associated with decreased HRQoL. For improving HRQoL preventative measures such as weight management have to be considered in order to avoid weight gain in schizophrenic patients.
Jindal and colleagues examined the efficacy of aripiprazole versus olanzapine in short-term treatment of schizophrenia. Their results suggest that ariprazole is equally efficacious as olanzapine, however ariprazole exhibited a more benign side effect profile with regard to weight gain, blood sugar and lipid levels as compared to olanzapine.
Jamilian et al. explored the serum levels of vitamin D, calcium, phosphorus and parathyroid hormone in Iranian patients with major depression and schizophrenia as compared to healthy controls. It emerged that no significant differences in the serum levels of vitamin D between schizophrenic and depressed patients could be found. Vitamin D affected the brain independent of the hormonal pathways, which regulate the serum levels of calcium.
Bares and colleagues assessed the efficacy of antidepressant monotherapy versus combination therapy in treatment resistant depressive patients. Both treatment modalities produced a reduction of depressive symptomatology in acute treatment of patients with treatment resistant depression.
Ghaleiha et al. sought to evaluate the effect of terazosin on sweating after sertraline intake in patients with major depression. They concluded that terazosin seemed be effective in decreasing sweating severity in patients receiving sertraline.
Kontoangelos and colleagues investigated the relationship between diabetes mellitus type 2, obsessive compulsive disorder (OCD) and depressive symptomatology in diabetic patients. Their findings suggest that diabetes mellitus type 2 may be associated with OCD and depressive symptomatology.
Bandelow et al. compared the frequency of traumatic life events during childhood in depressed patients of the melancholic subtype and healthy controls. It emerged that the depressed patients had significantly more severe traumatic events than the control subjects. However, melancholic depression seemed to be less associated with traumatic events than other psychiatric disorders.
In the last three articles Sansone and colleagues report the findings on traumatic events such as bullying in childhood and their implications on compulsive buying, employment and criminal outcomes in adulthood. Their findings indicate that there is a relationship between childhood trauma, compulsive buying behavior, reduced employment viability and criminal behavior in adulthood.
Yours sincerely,