Prevention and early intervention for youth mental illness: how should we focus our limited resources? #MQScienceMeeting

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André Tomlin presents a summary of all the evidence we have highlighted over the last 3 years relating to prevention and early intervention for mental illness in young people.

This blog accompanies the #MQScienceMeeting coverage this week, which you can follow on Twitter.

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Third wave psychotherapies for depression and anxiety in older people

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Sarah McDonald is left feeling frustrated by this meta-analysis of mindfulness-based cognitive therapy and acceptance and commitment therapy for depression and anxiety in older people.

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Perinatal mental health difficulties: does the internet have the answer?

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Jane Iles summarises a recent systematic review of digital interventions for perinatal mental health, which highlights a mixed bag of heterogeneous studies in this field.

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Mindfulness-based cognitive therapy may reduce the demand for primary care visits

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Can’t get an appointment with your GP? Don’t stress, mindfulness-based cognitive therapy may help by reducing the demand for primary care visits by distressed patients, according to a new study in the Journal of Psychosomatic Research.

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New meta-analysis supports the use of mindfulness for depression, but not anxiety

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This study confirms that mindfulness based interventions (MBIs) are valid for the treatment of current depressive episodes, and it identifies the need for more studies to investigate the possibility that MBIs might also be of value in treating anxiety disorders.

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Meditation programmes may improve anxiety, depression and pain but better quality research is needed, says systematic review

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There’s little doubt about it – meditation is in vogue. In fairness, it probably always has been. However, clinical and research interest in the effects of meditation programmes on psychological wellbeing has grown considerably in recent years. The development of mindfulness-based interventions has no doubt driven much of this interest. For example, running a PubMed keyword [read the full story…]

#MindfulnessMonday Mindfulness-based stress reduction can alleviate stress and improve quality of life and mental health

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This month in the woodland (and the Twittersphere) we’ve given you #MindfulnessMonday. It’s been our attempt to highlight some of the potential benefits that mindfulness can have on our mental well-being in a variety of different health conditions including breast cancer, depression and anxiety, and psychosis. This last #MindfulnessMonday blog examines the effectiveness of Mindfulness-Based Stress [read the full story…]

#MindfulnessMonday – Mindfulness proves effective in depression and anxiety, but is not superior to traditional CBT

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Last week, Kirsten Lawson blogged about mindfulness-based stress reduction as a treatment for breast cancer.  We have featured a number of blogs on mindfulness in the last couple of years, including a piece about the use of Mindfulness-based cognitive therapy (MBCT). MBCT is recommended by NICE to prevent relapse in people who have already experienced three [read the full story…]

#MindfulnessMonday – Mindfulness-based stress reduction works for patients with breast cancer

Patients with breast cancer commonly have lots on their mind (psychological distress)

Within the woodland October is a month of themes. Many of you will be familiar with #Stoptober, which always helps any elves who sneak round the the back of the woodshed, to give up smoking. You may be less aware of our #MindfulnessMonday activities that will be sprinkled across the month; showcasing the potential benefits that [read the full story…]

Mindfulness shows promise as treatment for health anxiety

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Most of us care about our health (something we elves encourage) but for up to 5% of people, worrying about health has become a significant problem in itself. Severe health anxiety, or hypochondriasis, is said to exist when someone holds a strong fear of having a serious disease, despite all medical assurances to the contrary. [read the full story…]