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If you are a psychiatrist who tends to look on the bright side, you may find the results of a new physician survey to be relatively good. Psychiatrists report the lowest level of professional burnout and the lowest level of burnout severity across various specialties. But just how good is relatively good?

In a new study, researchers found an absolute risk of 4.42% of valproate use during pregnancy with autism spectrum disorder and an absolute risk of 2.50% for childhood autism.

Traumatic brain injury, criminal responsibility, traumatic stress, and autism spectrum/neurodevelopmental disorders slideshow

The intense level of international interest in DSM-5 is a great surprise. Although DSM has become a research standard around the world, it is rarely used by clinicians outside the US and therefore poses a much lesser threat to their patients. So why all the prominent media coverage in countries outside of the US?

With ECT‚ the response rate for treatment-refractory patients is sobering‚ and the treatment is not without risks and adverse effects.

The ethical aim of psychiatry is the relief of suffering and incapacity.

The Sandy Hook Promise . . “To do everything in our power to be remembered--not as the town filled with grief and victims; but as the place where real change began.”

Discussing the Neuropsychiatric Outcomes After Heart Surgery study, testing the vascular hypothesis of post-coronary artery bypass graft depression.

Psychiatrists vary in their eagerness to share therapeutic decisions with patients: some believe that adherence is paramount and paternalism is often necessary to prevent loss of insight with consequent impaired judgment and functional decline. These authors argue in favor of a radically more collaborative style.

Money should not be wasted on futile preventive programs to detect mental health problems that don't yet exist. Instead, resources should be invested where there is desperate need-to properly treat and decently house psychiatric patients who are now shamefully neglected.

Plaintiffs in this lawsuit claim that CPT coding policy has resulted in decreased reimbursement for psychiatrists, who will now receive 20% less for evaluation and management services than what Anthem pays other physicians.

All types of antidepressants have been found to be effective for major depression with comorbid substance dependence.

I envision the day when psychiatry and psychology re-embrace the mind, along with the brain and behavior.

Lamotrigine is an important option in bipolar disorders. However, many clinicians also use it in patients with a (unipolar) depressive disorder who have not responded adequately to conventional antidepressants.

How frequently do you find yourself prescribing antibiotics for inpatients with schizophrenia and related psychotic disorders during hospitalization?

All psychiatry, anywhere in the world, is American psychiatry. This is both good and bad.

This smartphone-friendly version of the HAM-D (Hamilton Depression Rating Scale) measures levels of depression and probes the severity of symptoms, such as mood, guilt, suicidal thoughts, sleep, and anxiety.

This iPhone and Android-friendly Bipolar Spectrum Diagnostic Scale (BSDS) is found most helpful in detecting not only severe cases of bipolar disorder but also patients who fall into the “softer” end of the bipolar spectrum.

This article explains and demonstrates the importance of psychiatric advance directives and the benefits and obstacles involved in implementing them.

Family involvement is often misunderstood as being a hindrance to individuation, when in fact family-oriented interventions can improve patient functioning, agency, and autonomy.

This book draws together the entire spectrum of the relevant psychosocial dimensions and data necessary to adequately assist in the evaluation and treatment of patients who may be candidates for bariatric surgery.

American psychiatrists might be able to sympathize in the wake of recent mass tragedies leading to new, hastily conceived laws that directly impinge on psychiatric practice, confidentiality, and duty to protect third parties.

Periprocedural advancements, including liberalization of concomitant and pre-treatment medications, add to the comfort and tolerability of ECT.

On December 18, 2012, French psychiatrist Daniele Canarelli, age 58, received a 1-year suspended prison sentence by the Criminal Court of Marseille after one of her patients killed someone.