Alex Langford
Suicide risk assessment among psychiatric inpatients: pessimism around predictive power
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Alex Langford appraises a systematic review that looks at high-risk categories for suicide risk assessment among psychiatric inpatients.
[read the full story...]Could psychiatric inpatient admission cause suicide?
Alex Langford considers a recent paper about inpatient suicide, which suggests that being on a psychiatric ward may possibly result in people taking their own life.
[read the full story...]Adding antidepressants to antipsychotics in schizophrenia: do they work, for what, and are they safe?
Alex Langford explores the emerging findings from a recent meta-analysis looking at the efficacy and safety of antidepressants added to antipsychotics for people with schizophrenia and schizophrenia-like psychosis.
[read the full story...]Integrated treatment for first episode psychosis: media hype versus reality
Alex Langford reflects on the media hype surrounding a new RCT of the NAVIGATE intervention; a comprehensive, multidisciplinary, team-based treatment approach for first episode psychosis.
[read the full story...]Antidepressant meta-analyses: big business and bias
Alex Langford reflects on the findings of a recent study that looks at 185 meta-analyses of antidepressants. It finds that industry involvement in research can lead to biased studies that under-report negative aspects of antidepressants for depression.
[read the full story...]Understanding Psychosis and Schizophrenia: a critique by Laws, Langford and Huda
Keith Laws, Alex Langford and Samei Huda provide a critique of the British Psychological Society Division of Clinical Psychology report published today.
[read the full story...]Paliperidone Palmitate is no better than Haloperidol Decanoate at preventing relapse or controlling psychotic symptoms
Alex Langford summarises a relatively large and pragmatic study, which provides firm evidence that the newer antipsychotic, Paliperidone, is no better at preventing relapse or controlling psychotic symptoms than its decades-old comparator, Haloperidol.
[read the full story...]Psychotherapy trials should report the side effects of treatment
If a treatment is powerful enough to have a good effect, then it’s powerful enough to have a bad effect. This is well recognised when it comes to medication, with strict regulations in place to ensure adverse outcomes are monitored and measured. By contrast, psychotherapy has never been as readily associated with the potential to [read the full story…]
Ketamine for severe depression: what can we conclude from a small open label study?
Last week the media reported widely on a study of ketamine for depression (McShane et al, 2014). As usual the headlines made bold assertions, the Telegraph running with “Horse tranquilliser Ketamine could cure severe depression” (Knapton, 2014). But what did the paper authored by an Oxford group and published in the Journal of Psychopharmacology really [read the full story…]
What impact do guidelines actually have on patient outcomes for people with schizophrenia?
Using research findings to improve care in mental health should be easy. Notice an understudied area, do a study on it, write a guideline based on your results and watch mental health professionals modify their practice accordingly. Hooray for science. But in reality, this process is convoluted and murky. Though we’re fairly good at churning out [read the full story…]
