In a recent issue of Psychotherapy and Psychosomatics a group of German investigators headed by Eva Brakemeier has performed a pilot study to test a new approach for chronic depression.

This study demonstrates that the inpatient cognitive behavioral analysis system of psychotherapy (CBASP) program can be considered as a promising and feasible treatment option that produces a good outcome for chronically depressed patients with high comorbidity in the short and long term. Future randomized controlled studies should examine whether this intensive CBASP program is more effective than standard psychiatric interventions or CBASP outpatient treatment.

Cognitive behavioral analysis system of psychotherapy (CBASP) was initially developed as an outpatient treatment for chronic depression. It integrates cognitive-emotional, behavioral, interpersonal, and psychodynamic theories and strategies by addressing directly the specific psychopathology of chronic depression. Given the high degree of suicidality, comorbidity, and therapy resistance in chronic depression, however, many of these patients require inpatient treatment.

In this study, the investigators report on a first specialized program for chronic depression adapting CBASP to an inpatient setting and evaluate the feasibility and short- as well as long-term outcome of it. The new CBASP group therapy focuses on a modified approach for conducting situation analysis and on Kiesler’s circle training with the extensive use of role playing and shaping. The entire treatment team was trained in CBASP; regular workshops and weekly supervisions for both the team and the individual therapists were conducted. Specific CBASP elements were implemented in other accompanying treatments such as nurse encounters, physiotherapy, music therapy, and occupational group therapy. A patient support group was established to avoid relapse after discharge. Patients received optimized pharmacotherapy in addition to the CBASP program in compliance with current national and international guidelines for depression treatment. [continue reading…]

In the late 1990s, Jane Anderson was working as a landscape architect. That meant she didn’t work much in the winter, and she struggled with seasonal affective disorder in the dreary Minnesota winter months. She decided to try meditation and noticed a change within a month. “My experience was a sense of calmness, of better ability to regulate my emotions,” she says. Her experience inspired a new study which will be published in an upcoming issue of Psychological Science, a journal of the Association for Psychological Science, which finds changes in brain activity after only five weeks of meditation training.

Previous studies have found that Buddhist monks, who have spent tens of thousands of hours of meditating, have different patterns of brain activity. But Anderson, who did this research as an undergraduate student together with a team of University of Wisconsin-Stout faculty and students, wanted to know if they could see a change in brain activity after a shorter period.

At the beginning of the study, each participant had an EEG, a measurement of the brain’s electrical activity. They were told: “Relax with your eyes closed, and focus on the flow of your breath at the tip of your nose; if a random thought arises, acknowledge the thought and then simply let it go by gently bringing your attention back to the flow of your breath.”

Then 11 people were invited to take part in meditation training, while the other 10 were told they would be trained later. The 11 were offered two half-hour sessions a week, and encouraged to practice as much as they could between sessions, but there wasn’t any particular requirement for how much they should practice.

After five weeks, the researchers did an EEG on each person again. Each person had done, on average, about seven hours of training and practice. But even with that little meditation practice, their brain activity was different from the 10 people who hadn’t had training yet. People who had done the meditation training showed a greater proportion of activity in the left frontal region of the brain in response to subsequent attempts to meditate. Other research has found that this pattern of brain activity is associated with positive moods. [continue reading…]

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Long-term exposure to air pollution can lead to physical changes in the brain, as well as learning and memory problems and even depression, new research in mice suggests.

While other studies have shown the damaging effects of polluted air on the heart and lungs, this is one of the first long-term studies to show the negative impact on the brain, said Laura Fonken, lead author of the study and a doctoral student in neuroscience at Ohio State University.

“The results suggest prolonged exposure to polluted air can have visible, negative effects on the brain, which can lead to a variety of health problems,” Fonken said.

“This could have important and troubling implications for people who live and work in polluted urban areas around the world.”

The study appears online this week in the journal Molecular Psychiatry.

For this study, Fonken and colleagues in Ohio State’s Department of Neuroscience collaborated with researchers in the university’s Davis Heart and Lung Research Institute.

In previous studies in mice, the Davis research group – including Qinghua Sun, associate professor of environmental health sciences, and Sanjay Rajagopalan, professor of cardiovascular medicine — found that fine air particulate matter causes widespread inflammation in the body, and can be linked to high blood pressure, diabetes and obesity. This new study aimed to extend their research on air pollution to the brain. [continue reading…]