Biomedical subjects

C B Thomas

Publications and source records attributed to C B Thomas.

At least 109 records · Page 6Linked to original sources

PubMed1976

Precursors of premature disease and death. The predictive potential of habits and family attitudes.

The youthful habits and family attitudes of medical students who later developed or died from one of five disease states were different from those of healthy classmate controls to begin with. In medical school, the total disorder group had significantly more nervous tension, anxiety, and anger under stress, had more insomnia, smoked more cigarettes, and took alcoholic drinks more frequently. Individual disorder group means were significantly different from each other. The mental illness group showed the most nervous tension, depression, and anger under stress and the malignant tumor group the least. The malignant tumor group resembled the healthy control group in these respects. The suicide, mental illness, and malignant tumor groups had low mean scores for closeness to parents, while the hypertension and coronary occlusion group means were slightly higher than the control group mean. Thus psychologic differences in youth have predictive potential in regard to premature disease and death.

Adult↗

PubMed1976

What becomes of medical students: the dark side.

In the cohort of 1337 former Johns Hopkins medical students from the classes of 1948 through 1964, there were 1248 graduates and 89 nongraduates. In follow-up studies of this cohort, 49 subjects, 3.1% of the graduates and 11.2% of the nongraduates, have been found to have died prematurely. Incipient mental illness and emotional disturbance appear to have contributed substantially to academic failure, poor performance during and after medical school, and premature death. These findings underscore the need for learning to identify and help medical students who are especially vulnerable to stress. Such insights would contribute to the prevention of premature disease and death, not only from mental illness but from other disorders.

Accidents↗

PubMed1975

Human figure drawings in a prospective study of six disorders: hypertension, coronary heart disease, malignant tumor, suicide, mental illness, and emotional disturbance.

To test the hypothesis that human figures drawn by young adults are potential predictors of future disease states, drawings of 204 former medical students were examined 13 to 23 years later. During the interval, the 102 subjects in the experimental group developed one of six specified disorders, while the 102 subjects in the control groups remained in good health. Drawings were classified in eight categories based primarily on the stance of the figure. Categories of drawings found to be distinctive for the various groups are: healthy control groups: the neutral or uncommitted attitude; hypertension/coronary group: the inviting or input-demanding attitude; malignant tumor group: the attitude of ambivalence or conflict; suicide/mental illness group: the self-related or withdrawal attitude; emotional disturbance group: incomplete figures, bizarre figures, action scenes. Thus the evidence suggests that the stance of the figure drawing reflects the subject's attitude toward the outside world. When the category profiles of groups are compared, the following differences are found at levels of statistical significance: the total experimental group is different from the total control group; the somatic subset, "Body Takes the Rap" is different from the psychological subset, "Psyche Takes the Rap"; and the hypertension/coronary group, malignant tumor group, and emotional disturbance group are different from their specific control groups. It is concluded that human figure drawings by this population have predictive potential for certain future disease states, and that there are psychological precursors of somatic disease.

Coronary Disease↗

PubMed1975

Youthful hypercholesteremia: its associated characteristics and role in premature myocardial infarction.

Hypercholesteremic medical students were different from their normocholesteremic classmates in a variety of ways. When students are grouped by cholesterol level in medical school, gradients across the means of biological, physiological, physical, and psychological characteristics are found. The hypercholesteremic students were older, shorter, and heavier, with younger mothers, less depression, less anxiety and less overall nervous tension under stress. Compared with their normocholesteremic classmates, youthful hypercholesteremics were more than 30 times as susceptible to episodes of acute myocardial infarction occurring 13 to 21 years after the high cholesterol levels were measured. Ten male medical students who subsequently sustained a myocardial infarction, most of whom were known to have had hypercholesteremia in youth, were significantly different at the outset from their 103 hypercholesteremic classmates who have not had such an episode. On the average, the precoronary individuals in medical school were shorter in stature, were older, had more overall nervous tension under stress, were more tired on awakening and had lower academic standing. The combination of hypercholesteremia and a personality profile denoting sensitivity and vulnerability to stress best characterizes this group of ten subjects who sustained a myocardial infarction at an early age. These findings suggest that it may be possible to differentiate young hypercholesteremics who are highly susceptible to myocardial infarction from their hypercholesteremic peers with relatively low susceptibility on the basis of personality profile.

Adult↗

PubMed1974