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Biomedical subjects

D Ames

Publications and source records attributed to D Ames.

At least 91 records · Page 5Linked to original sources
PubMed1988

Psychiatric illness in elderly residents of Part III homes in one London Borough: prognosis and review.

The psychiatric morbidity among 390 (89%) residents of the 12 Part III homes managed by the London Borough of Camden has been assessed using a standard interview, for comparison with data obtained from residents in a previous survey. Fewer residents were now assessed as having no evidence of dementia or depression, the proportion with some degree of dementia having risen in the 3.6-years follow-up period. Of the original residents, 64% were no longer present by the time of the second survey; the great majority were likely to have died. Residents who had previously been assessed as severely demented or depressed were over-represented in this group. Of the residents who remained, only 17% of those previously depressed had recovered. This evidence suggests that Part III homes are continuing to amass a large number of residents suffering from dementia and depression. The need for adequate psychogeriatric services to Part III homes remains pressing.

Aged↗
PubMed1987

Impoverished written responses and negative features of schizophrenia.

Repetition in the written language of schizophrenics and its possible relationships to other aspects of schizophrenic disorders are not well understood. We investigated repetitiousness in written utterances, finding schizophrenic subjects to be more repetitive than affective controls and normal controls. Over-all, written repetitiousness was more strongly correlated with psychopathologic features than oral repetitiousness. As in previous work, thought-disordered schizophrenic subjects produced the most repetitive responses. Poverty of content and illogical thinking were correlated with scores for written repetition. Measures of other negative features, disturbed mental functioning and motor behavior were also associated with repetitiousness in both written and oral modes. That these negative features are linked (namely, linguistic repetitiousness, negative formal thought disorder, voluntary motor abnormalities, and deficient mental functioning) is consistent with Crow's concept of a defect syndrome (Type 2) in schizophrenia.

Humans↗
PubMed1985

Deficient motor synchrony in schizophrenic disorders: clinical correlates.

A laboratory measure of synchronization was used to assess the differential ability of schizophrenics, affectives, and normal controls to take advantage of stimulus predictability. It was hypothesized that (1) schizophrenics will perform on this task in a way that distinguishes them from other groups, (2) clinically observed motor anomalies will be associated with deficient motor synchrony, and (3) deficient motor synchrony will be associated with more severe clinical ratings of thought disorder. Twenty-one schizophrenic, 8 affective, and 16 normal controls were studied. The results were consistent with the hypotheses; schizophrenic subjects had distinctive performance patterns, especially at 40 bpm, which was associated with both motor and thinking disturbance. The authors discuss additional analyses that suggest that deficient motor synchrony is associated with negative symptoms, certain ward behaviors, and not with demographic variables, and that among unmedicated schizophrenic subjects, the performance patterns are worse.

Adult↗
PubMed1984

The type--token ratio in schizophrenic disorders: clinical and research value.

Prior research has indicated that the type-token ratio (TTR), a measure of repetition in language, correlates with clinical judgements of thought disorder when spoken language was examined, and differentiates statistically thought-disordered from non-thought-disordered schizophrenics and psychiatric and normal controls. We replicated this finding and examined the clinical sensitivity and specificity of the TTR measure in the diagnosis and in the assessment of thought disorder. The current clinical value of the TTR is limited, but further investigations of the nature of repetition in schizophrenic language are warranted.

Adult↗
PubMed1984

A study of the dexamethasone suppression test in hospitalized depressed patients.

90 patients with a primary depressive illness, admitted consecutively to one psychiatric ward were studied. All patients had the dexamethasone suppression test (DST) done before initial treatment. First treatment response was correlated with the DST results. The non-suppressors, as a group, improved with treatment better than the suppressors. However, unlike in previous studies, no relationship was found between non-suppression and poor response to antidepressant medication.

Adjustment Disorders↗
PubMed1984

Neurologic features and psychopathology in schizophrenic disorders.

Evidence of neurologic disturbance is widely reported in schizophrenic disorders. Few studies have attempted to determine the specificity of these abnormalities to schizophrenic disorders or their relationship to particular psychopathologic features. We assessed neurologic and psychopathologic features in a sample of 53 schizophrenic, 21 affective, and 20 normal subjects. The results indicate that neurologic (motor and sensory) disturbances occur with the highest frequency (92%) and severity in schizophrenic subjects. Affective subjects showed a high frequency (52%) but less severe abnormalities and normal controls had a frequency (5%) comparable to prior reports. Schizophrenic phenomenologic subtypes were not associated with distinguishable patterns of neurologic abnormality. Schizophrenic subjects and affective subjects tend to produce more right sensory errors although few of the latter produced errors. Neurologic abnormalities are highly correlated with evidence of disturbed thinking and cognitive performance. A noteworthy association between disturbed thinking and neurologic motor abnormality was detected in schizophrenic disorders. Anomalous laterality preferences also occur more frequently among schizophrenics and are associated with greater frequency of neurologic disturbance, formal thought disorder, and impaired cognitive performance than among schizophrenics with right laterality preferences.

Adult↗
PubMed1983

The limits of general hospital care: a continuing role for state hospitals.

An examination of the characteristics of patients transferred to a state hospital after their treatment in a rural community general hospital had failed provides some data for defining the state hospital's role in relation to such patients. Of 2,128 discharges from the general hospital in a three-year period, 33, or 1.6 percent, were referred to the state hospital. The patients could be divided into four subgroups: violent patients, unresponsive patients with severely disorganized mental states, dependent patients treated successfully but referred because of a lack of community residential facilities, and deteriorating alcoholic recidivists who had proved to be unresponsive to treatment. At follow-up, the most improvements had occurred among the unresponsive subgroup. The author believes that, among those subgroups, state hospitals are most useful for violent patients, for deteriorating recidivist alcoholics, and, depending on further research, possibly for unresponsive patients.

Adult↗
PubMed1979

A second retreat?

Explore the source record for details and available documents.

Community Mental Health Centers↗
PubMed1976

Effects of dietary citrinin and aflatoxin on leg problems of broilers growtn on wire floors.

Dietary levels of citrinin of 62.5, 125 and 500 mug./g. diet or aflatoxin at a dietary level of 2.5 mug./g. of diet fed from 1-21 days of age did not inccrease the incidence of leg problems compared to control groups receiving no dietary nycotoxins. These data indicate that dietary contamination with these toxins does not account for the incidence of occasionally observed leg probelms in younger broiler chicks.

Aflatoxins↗
PubMedDate not supplied

A controlled study of a specific MAO A reversible inhibitor (R011-1163) and amitriptyline in depressive illness.

A double blind comparative study of amitriptyline and a new reversible MAO A inhibitor R011-1163 was conducted in 25 depressed inpatients over 4 weeks. Response to treatment was assessed with the Hamilton depression rating scale, the Carroll depression self rating scale and the Visual analogue scale. Both drugs produced significant changes in depressive symptomatology (P less than 0.01, MANOVA) and there were no statistically significant differences between drugs (P greater than 0.05 MANOVA). Side effects were of mild to moderate severity with dry mouth the most commonly reported side effect of amitriptyline and vague, generalised headache in patients, treated with R011-1163.

Adjustment Disorders↗
PubMedDate not supplied

Semantic priming in thought disordered schizophrenic patients.

Groups of thought disordered (TD) and non-thought disordered (NTD) schizophrenic patients, unipolar affective patients and normal controls performed a lexical decision task involving the recognition of words immediately preceded (primed) by either an associated or an unrelated word. Significant increments in recognition speed in the associated prime condition were found in all groups, with significantly greater gain by TD schizophrenics than by others. These findings are consistent with network models of associational activation and lend support to an attentional deficit hypothesis for schizophrenic language functioning.

Adult↗