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Biomedical subjects

J Mintz

Publications and source records attributed to J Mintz.

At least 127 records · Page 7Linked to original sources
PubMed1987

Expressed emotion and schizophrenic outcome among Mexican-American families.

This study has demonstrated that among low-income, relatively unacculturated Mexican-American households, a high level of expressed emotion on the part of key relatives significantly increases the risk of relapse for remitted schizophrenics who return home to live with their families after hospital discharge. This cross-cultural replication of earlier research findings in London and southern California suggests that critical, hostile, or emotionally overinvolved attitudes and behaviors may be general major stressors that adversely influence the fragile adaptation of schizophrenic individuals in diverse cultural settings. The finding of a lower prevalence of high levels of expressed emotion among Mexican-American compared to Anglo-American and British households lends support to the hypothesis that intrafamilial behaviors may account for different schizophrenic outcomes in different cultures.

Attitude to Health↗
PubMed1987

Expressed emotion and relapse in first episodes of schizophrenia. A rejoinder to Macmillan et al (1986).

Re-analyses of data presented by Macmillan et al (1986b) challenge their conclusions that high expressed emotion is not prognostically significant for the course of schizophrenia or unrelated to the level of behavioural disturbance prior to admission. Several equally plausible models of causal relationships between EE and duration of untreated illness are presented. We conclude that our re-analyses of the Macmillan data do not warrant premature closure regarding the significance of the EE variable.

Antipsychotic Agents↗
PubMed1987

Communication deviance in adolescence and adulthood: a longitudinal study.

Measures of communication deviance (CD) on the TAT were obtained for a sample of nonpsychotically disturbed adolescents and repeated 15 years later. For both males and females, total amount of CD significantly increased from adolescence to adulthood. The proportion of certain types of CD in an individual's speech was relatively stable across time, but further analysis indicated that the phenomenon was significant only for the females. Low amounts of CD in adulthood were associated with absence of any psychiatric disturbance throughout the 15-year follow-up period.

Acting Out↗
PubMed1986

Fluphenazine plasma levels in patients receiving low and conventional doses of fluphenazine decanoate.

Plasma fluphenazine concentrations (FLU) were measured in 45 patients with schizophrenic disorders who participated in a double-blind comparison of 5 and 25 mg fluphenazine decanoate (FD). The rise in plasma level of FLU 24 h after a "test dose" was significantly correlated with steady state FLU concentration at 12 weeks (for 5 mg patients, r = 0.45, P = 0.04; for 25 mg, r = 0.78, P = 0.005). Patients who had low FLU at baseline required nearly 6 months to reach a steady state when they received 25 mg. Patients who received 5 mg and had low FLU at baseline continued to demonstrate relatively low plasma levels for the entire 1st year. Although the mean FLU at 6 months was lower for patients who relapsed during the subsequent 18 months (0.57 ng/ml for relapsers vs 1.01 ng/ml for nonrelapsers), this difference was not statistically significant. When plasma levels from both dosage groups were combined, FLU at 12 weeks correlated significantly with factor scores for akinesia (r = 0.52, P = 0.002) and BPRS cluster scores for retardation (r = 0.52, P = 0.002). These results indicate that the measurement of fluphenazine plasma levels may be useful in determining when patients treated with FD are receiving drug doses which are likely to cause discomforting side effects.

Adult↗
PubMed1986

Social competence and family environment: 15-year follow-up of disturbed adolescents.

Measures of familial emotional climate and communication deviance, obtained when subjects were adolescents, were used to predict social adjustment 15 years later. The results showed that disturbed family functioning predicted poor quality of later intimate relationships, but did not predict other dimensions of adult social functioning.

Adolescent↗
PubMed1985

Parental affective style and the treatment of schizophrenia. Predicting course of illness and social functioning.

In a randomized controlled study, the affective style (AS) of parents of schizophrenics in clinic-based individual treatment groups and home-based family treatment groups was compared prior to treatment and again three months after treatment had begun. Affective style is an index reflecting the quality of the family emotional climate, measured from face-to-face discussion. Pretherapy and posttherapy measures of negative AS were significantly predictive of relapse within the nine-month treatment period for patients in individual treatment. In addition, for both treatment groups, a negative AS pattern at the posttherapy reassessment was significantly associated with decreased patient social functioning, reduced ability of the family to absorb the family intervention, and lower capacity of the family to cope with everyday family stresses. The results suggest that AS is an important intrafamilial attribute, with implications for treatment strategy and planning.

Adolescent↗
PubMed1985

Alcohol increases cigarette smoking: a laboratory demonstration.

Most people would agree that a relationship exists between drinking alcohol and smoking cigarettes, but there is very little empirical evidence demonstrating a direct causal association. Study of the relationship has been hampered by the lack of a simple laboratory methodology. This article describes an efficient experimental paradigm. Fourteen male narcotic addicts in methadone maintenance treatment volunteered to come to the laboratory for two smoking sessions, during which each subject was given either an alcoholic drink or orange juice, followed by three cigarettes at 20-minute intervals. Drinking alcohol significantly increased the amount and rate of smoking. However, not all subjects reacted to alcohol with increased smoking, and we were unable to account for those individual differences. Our finding supports the theory that a direct causal mechanism linking smoking and drinking exists. That link probably has clinical significance, because there is evidence that ex-smokers are at particularly high risk when they drink alcohol.

Adult↗
PubMed1985

Orthostatic effect of imipramine and doxepin in depressed geriatric outpatients.

Blood pressure measurements were collected from 36 depressed geriatric outpatients (ages 55 to 81 years) enrolled in a double-blind, placebo-controlled study of the efficacy of doxepin and imipramine. Mean systolic postural changes were 25.9 mm Hg for imipramine, significantly higher than the 10.5 mm Hg for doxepin, and 12.4 mm Hg for placebo. The orthostatic drop in the imipramine group was only weakly related to dose and did not correlate with amount of pretreatment orthostatic hypotension or with duration of treatment. The increased orthostatic hypotension occurred early in treatment and at low doses of imipramine. Accordingly, caution is advised in the use of imipramine for the elderly.

Age Factors↗
PubMed1985

Psychotic patients' understanding of informed consent.

Courts have found psychiatric patients to have the qualified right to refuse treatment. Particularly problematic is whether newly admitted psychiatric patients can comprehend information and give informed consent. The authors examined the ability of voluntary and involuntary psychotic patients to understand information about antipsychotic medication, related this assessment to psychopathology, and evaluated factors involved in hypothetical acceptance or refusal of treatment. Although most patients stated they had understood informed consent material, objective ratings did not support this. Impaired understanding was significantly associated with thought disturbance but did not affect hypothetical acceptance or refusal of antipsychotics. Legal status was not a significant factor.

Adult↗
PubMed1985

Subjective memory complaints in geriatric depression.

Improvement in depressive symptoms was significantly related to a decrease in subjective memory complaints in 29 elderly depressed outpatients. Patients with substantial improvement in their depression showed similar reductions in memory complaints regardless of whether they received tricyclic antidepressants or group psychotherapy.

Age Factors↗
PubMed1984

Costs and benefits of two doses of fluphenazine.

The relative costs and benefits of low- and conventional-dose neuroleptic maintenance therapy were evaluated in a double-blind comparison of 5 and 25 mg of fluphenazine decanoate administered every two weeks. Subjects were 50 patients fulfilling DSM-III criteria for schizophrenic disorder who had been successfully maintained with 25 mg or less of fluphenazine decanoate. A one-year survival analysis disclosed that there were no statistically significant differences between the two doses insofar as preventing relapse. Patients receiving the higher dose appeared to feel more uncomfortable, as indicated by higher scores on subscales of the Hopkins Symptom Checklist-90. In addition, patients receiving the higher dose had higher side-effect scores. These findings suggest that a substantial proportion of patients who are presently maintained with 25 mg or less of fluphenazine decanoate every two weeks will do just as well with as little as 5 mg.

Adult↗