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Biomedical subjects

R G Priest

Publications and source records attributed to R G Priest.

At least 55 records · Page 3Linked to original sources
PubMed1990

An increase in violence on an acute psychiatric ward. A study of associated factors.

The increase in violent incidents on an acute psychiatric ward over a 15-month period was found to be strongly associated with the increase in use of temporary nursing staff (r = 0.63; P = 0.0005). The change in staffing patterns accounted for 39% of the variance in violence. An examination of the characteristics of all patients admitted to the ward revealed that the violent patients were significantly younger, more likely to have been admitted compulsorily and less likely to be depressed than non-violent ones.

Acute Disease↗
PubMed1988

Relaxation and imagery in the treatment of breast cancer.

OBJECTIVE: To see whether stress could be alleviated in patients being treated for early breast cancer. DESIGN: Controlled randomised trial lasting six weeks. SETTING: Outpatient radiotherapy department in a teaching hospital. PATIENTS: One hundred fifty four women with breast cancer stage I or II after first session of six week course of radiotherapy, of whom 15 dropped out before end of study. INTERVENTION: Patients saw one of two researchers once a week for six weeks. Controls were encouraged to talk about themselves; relaxation group was taught concentration on individual muscle groups; relaxation and imagery group was also taught to imagine peaceful scene of own choice to enhance relaxation. Relaxation and relaxation plus imagery groups were given tape recording repeating instructions and told to practise at least 15 minutes a day. END POINT: Improvement of mood and of depression and anxiety on self rating scales. MEASUREMENTS AND MAIN RESULTS: Initial scores for profile of mood states and Leeds general scales for depression and anxiety were the same in all groups. At six weeks total mood disturbance score was significantly less in the intervention groups, women in the combined intervention group being more relaxed than those receiving relaxation training only; mood in the control group was worse. Women aged 55 and over benefited most. There was no difference in Leeds scores among the groups. CONCLUSIONS: Patients with early breast cancer benefit from relaxation training.

Affect↗
PubMed1987

Foetal heart rate and maternal emotional state.

Forty-five pregnant women rated themselves for hostility, depression and anxiety. Maternal and foetal heart rates were recorded while they listened to a tape through headphones. The foetuses of anxious mothers showed pronounced responses to certain taped stimuli but this effect was not found for mothers with high hostility or depression scores.

Anxiety↗
PubMed1986

A comparative trial of depot pipothiazine.

Thirty-nine chronic schizophrenic patients were selected for a 12-month double-blind evaluation of the effectiveness of pipothiazine palmitate (PPT) and flupenthixol decanoate (FPX) in the maintenance management of their illness. Allocation was at random and, in order to allow constant injection intervals, the patients typically received every 2 weeks either 40 mg of flupenthixol decanoate or alternating injections of 100 mg of pipothiazine palmitate and placebo. At monthly intervals the patients were assessed using both a battery of rating scales (which included the Brief Psychiatric Rating Scale (BPRS), the Extrapyramidal Symptoms Rating Scale (EPS] and a general side-effects evaluation. At 3-monthly intervals they were also rated on the Comprehensive Psychiatric Rating Scale (CPRS) and the Zung Depression Scale. Haematological and biochemical tests were performed every 3 months. Both drugs provided good control of psychotic symptoms and side-effects were not troublesome. No substantial difference was detected on the CPRS and the Zung scales. There was a trend in favour of PPT on the BPRS survey, detectable at 6 months and reaching statistical significance by 12 months. We conclude that the PPT regime is at least as effective as the FPX treatment and probably more so. It is possible that even longer periods of control could be obtained with PPT.

Adult↗
PubMed1985

Psychometric ante-natal predictors of post-natal depressed mood.

One hundred and nine women were studied during the course of pregnancy in an attempt to predict which of them would later rate themselves as suffering from depressed mood up to twelve months post-natally. The psychometric measures used comprised the Zung Self-Rating Scale to measure depression, the DSSI/SAD sub-scale to measure anxiety and the Hostility and Direction of Hostility Questionnaire. Post-natal depression observed up to twelve months post-partum was positively associated with first trimester ante-natal scores on all three measures. The HDHQ and the DSSI/SAD measures were good predictors of depression at six weeks post-partum and both correlated significantly at six and nine months post-partum, whereas the Zung measure predicted depression at nine and twelve months as well as at six weeks post-partum. Parity was significantly associated with severe depression at six months post-partum.

Depressive Disorder↗
PubMed1984

Treatment of hypertension in pregnancy by relaxation and biofeedback.

In a study of the effectiveness of systematic relaxation training alone or combined with biofeedback in the treatment of hypertension in pregnancy, 60 women were seen weekly for 6 weeks. 18 were given relaxation therapy alone (group A), 18 relaxation plus biofeedback (group B), and there were 24 controls. Whereas two-thirds of the control group had to be admitted to hospital during their pregnancies, less than a third of each experimental group had to be admitted. The experimental groups also had significantly lower systolic and diastolic blood pressure than the control group. There were no significant differences between groups A and B in hospital admission rates or blood-pressure measurements.

Adolescent↗
PubMed1983

The teaching of psychosomatic medicine and liaison psychiatry at medical schools in the United Kingdom.

A systematic questionnaire survey was carried out of education in psychosomatic medicine and liaison psychiatry by the university departments of psychiatry in the United Kingdom. There was an excellent response rate. Taking first psychosomatic medicine, it is clear that it is rare to have a special course for the students. However the majority provided specific lectures or teaching sessions during the psychiatric attachment, also specific lectures outside this attachment, and the subject was usually brought in during the course of other undergraduate sessions such as topic teaching and clinico-pathological conferences. In liaison psychiatry again it was found that special courses were rarely favoured. However teaching in many places paralleled the methods found for psychosomatic medicine above, and in addition students were usually involved in consultation procedures or linked with medical and surgical firms for this purpose. In some departments research projects were carried out by the students. Possible improvements in teaching these subjects are suggested.

Curriculum↗
PubMed1983

Effects on psychological performance of the benzodiazepine, loprazolam, alone and with alcohol.

The effects of a new 1,4 benzodiazepine hypnotic, loprazolam (1.0 mg) and alcohol (0.7 g/kg body weight) were investigated over a 15 h period in eight healthy male medical students, in a placebo controlled balanced design. Loprazolam when given alone impaired performance on a manual dexterity task, on a test of mental arithmetic, on a tracking task and it impaired memory as judged by the name and address memory test. Given alone, alcohol impaired performance on the simple reaction time task and on the tracking task. Performance on the memory test and choice reaction time test actually improved. No evidence was found suggesting a potentiation of effect when loprazolam and alcohol were given together. However, (a) on the manual dexterity task the alcohol, having no effect on its own, alleviated the loprazolam-induced impairment. (b) In the tracking task both alcohol and loprazolam impaired performance when given alone but not when given together. (c) The memory test was impaired by loprazolam, improved by alcohol and the effect of the combination is the expected sum of the two effects. Similarly for the arithmetic task the effect of the combination of the alcohol and loprazolam effects is the expected sum of the independent effects. The bulk of the evidence on the interaction suggests that alcohol mitigates the effects of loprazolam. In no sense could the drug be said to be having a sobering influence.

Anti-Anxiety Agents↗
PubMed1983

Propranolol in schizophrenia: a double blind, placebo controlled trial of propranolol as an adjunct to neuroleptic medication.

A double blind, placebo controlled trial was carried out to examine the contribution of propranolol as an adjunct to neuroleptic medication in the treatment of chronic schizophrenic patients whose florid symptoms had not remitted with neuroleptic medication alone. Propranolol was shown to have a more beneficial effect than placebo, but the results were much less dramatic than those which have been described in previous studies. Recent work has shown that there may be a pharmacokinetic interaction between propranolol and neuroleptics, and this should be considered as one possible explanation of our findings.

Adult↗
PubMed1982

Psychophysiological ante-natal predictors of post-natal depressed mood.

Forty-seven women were studied during the course of pregnancy in an attempt to predict which of them would later rate themselves as suffering from depressed mood post-natally. Psychometric and physiology measures were used in the three trimesters of pregnancy and six weeks after birth. The psychometric measures used ante-natally and post-natally comprised the Hostility and Direction of Hostility Questionnaire, and Locus of Control Scale, the DSSI/SAD sub-scale to measure anxiety, and the Zung Self-Rating Scale to measure depression. Psychophysiological measures used water heart-rate and blood pressure. Post-natal ratings of depression were associated with a high ante-natal score on overall hostility. Women with high anxiety and hostility ratings had a more pronounced response to the sound of a baby crying than to noise of similar frequency and intensity. This more pronounced heart response was also related to later post-natal depression ratings. However, by far the most useful predictive measure was the Hostility and Direction of Hostility Questionnaire: its predictive power in the first trimester of pregnancy was almost as good as in the third trimester.

Anxiety↗
PubMed1982

Does lofepramine have fewer side effects than amitriptyline? Results of a comparative trial.

A double blind trial was carried out comparing the tricyclic antidepressant lofepramine with amitriptyline in the treatment of patients suffering from moderate to markedly severe depression. No difference was demonstrated between the two drugs in terms of their antidepressant effect, but patients treated with lofepramine suffered from significantly less side effects than patients treated with amitriptyline. Both groups of patients had a high drop out rate but this was less marked in the groups of patients treated with lofepramine.

Adolescent↗
PubMed1981

The St. Mary's Hospital sleep questionnaire: a study of reliability.

A systematic sleep questionnaire has been devised for assessing the previous night's sleep of a subject. It has been designed for repeated use. It is completed by the subject and is framed with the needs of the hospital patient in mind. In the present study it was given to 93 subjects in four different groups: 16 surgical inpatients, 21 medical inpatients, 32 psychiatric inpatients (in a general hospital unit), and 24 normal volunteers. Test retest reliability correlations have been derived using a nonparametric correlation coefficient (Kendall's tau). Each of the items achieved statistically significant reliability (p less than 0.0001) in all four groups, with the value for tau on the total sample varying from 0.70 to 0.96. The St. Mary's (or SMH) Sleep Questionnaire is put forward as an instrument that is a systematic inquiry into the subject's experience of sleep and that is composed of items of demonstrable reliability.

Adolescent↗
PubMed1981

the effects of termination of pregnancy: a follow-up study of psychiatric referrals.

A series of 57 women presenting in the first years of the implementation of the Abortion Act for a psychiatric opinion on termination of pregnancy (TP) were carefully examined. The average scores on psychometric tests were well into the pathological range. Of the 25 recommended for TP 24 were single, 20 had been separated from one or both parents and 6 had a psychiatric history. On those women available for follow-up the mean psychometric scores improved early (1-17 months after consultation) and eventually fell to the normal range (3-6 years after consultation). A particular feature of the study wa an in-depth follow-up fo the subsample of 10 women. This was especially illuminating on the meaning that the pregnancy had for the patient. Ambivalent feelings towards the pregnancy were recalled. Some had used the pregnancy to hold on to the father. Many were still acting out problems with the family of origin. Their relationships with the medical profession were often unsatisfactory. The study increases our (still patchy) understanding of this population and confirms the need for counselling at the time that the woman first presents, both to avoid adverse psychiatric sequelae and to use the abortion as a critical experience to improve overall adjustment.

Abortion, Induced↗