Medicine and Health Sciences Commons^™

Depression And Its Associated Factors: Perceived Stress, Social Support, Substance Use And Related Sociodemographic Risk Factors In Medical School Residents In Nairobi, Kenya, Sayed Shah Nur Hussein Shah, Ahmed Laving, Violet Caroline Okech-Helu, Manasi Kumar

Brain and Mind Institute

Abstract: Background: Little data exists regarding depression and its associated factors in medical residents and doctors in Sub-Saharan Africa. Residents are at high risk of developing depression owing to the stressful nature of their medical practice and academic training. Depression in medical residents leads to decreased clinical efficiency, and poor academic performance; it can also lead to substance abuse and suicide. Our primary aim was to measure depression prevalence among medical residents in Kenya’s largest national teaching and referral hospital. Secondary aims were to describe how depression was associated with perceived stress, perceived social support, substance use, and educational environment. …

Neuroactivational And Behavioral Correlates Of Psychosocial Stress-Induced Cocaine Seeking In Rats, Nicole M. Hinds, Ireneusz D. Wojtas, Desta M. Pulley, Stephany J. Mcdonald, Samantha De Guzman, Nicole E. Hubbard, Colin M. Kulick-Soper, Jessica J. Debski, Bianca Patel, Daniel Manvich

Rowan-Virtua Research Day

A prominent feature of cocaine abuse is a high risk of relapse even despite prolonged periods of abstinence. Psychosocial stress is thought to be a major contributor to the onset of cocaine craving and relapse in human substance abusers, yet most preclinical models of stress-induced relapse employ physical stressors (e.g., unpredictable footshock) or pharmacological stressors (e.g., yohimbine to elicit a drug seeking response) and do not rely upon psychosocial stress per se. Importantly, social stressors are well known to activate distinct neural circuits within the brain as compared to other stressors. It is therefore possible that currently available animal models …

Food Insecurity Is Associated With Nonalcoholic Fatty Liver Disease, Cognitive Impairment, And Immune Activation In People Living With Hiv, Javier A. Tamargo

FIU Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Food insecurity (FI) is a socioeconomic condition characterized by inadequate access to enough food and nutrition to sustain health and wellbeing. Food insecurity is a risk factor for chronic and age-related conditions, raising concerns for the aging population of people living with HIV (PLWH), in whom food insecurity is disproportionately prevalent. PLWH are at increased risk of nutrition-related complications and chronic co-morbidities, thus food insecurity may exacerbate adverse health outcomes in this population. This study investigated whether food insecurity was associated with nonalcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD), cognitive impairment, and immune activation among socioeconomically disadvantaged adults living with and without …

Stronger Together: A Case For Partnering Dance/Movement Therapy And Medically Assisted Treatment For A Comprehensive Embodied Approach To The Opioid Crisis, Jayann Chipman

Dance/Movement Therapy Theses

An estimated 2.1 million people in the US are estimated to have opioid use disorder. Medically assisted treatment as an approach utilizes medication, counseling, and group therapy for treatment of opioid use disorder and increases the effectiveness of other therapeutic interventions. It has positive effects on treatment retention, and doubles the probability that an individual will one day achieve abstinence. Medically assisted treatment addresses physical symptoms of withdrawal, but it does not include the embodied experience. Dance/movement therapy addresses the multilevel human experience in an approach to wellness. Dance/movement therapy as a bidirectional modality uses movement and body-mind connectivity to …

An Exploratory Study Of Police Officers: Low Compassion Satisfaction And Compassion Fatigue, Heath Blair Grant, Cathryn F. Lavery, John Decarlo

Publications and Research

Background: Compassion fatigue, or the physical, mental, and emotional state experienced by professionals that assist others in distress, has been well documented in several caring professions such as nurses, firefighters, and emergency medical technicians. Until the current study, it has only rarely been examined in police samples despite their high rates of stress and suicide which is a likely result of a depletion of compassion satisfaction, or the pleasure an officer gets from relating to and helping others.

Aim: This study documents findings from an ongoing study of compassion fatigue amongst a sample of US urban police officers which suggests …

The Moderating Relationship Of Comorbid Psychopathology And Treatment Outcome For Young Adult Offenders In Drug Court, Patrick Mcgonigal, Kathleen A. Moore, Matthew Scott Young

Mental Health Law & Policy Faculty Publications

Title: The moderating relationship of comorbid psychopathology and treatment outcome for young adult offenders in drug court.

Background: The drug court system is an alternative to incarceration that provides offenders with non-violent, substance motivated crimes with an opportunity to dismiss their charges and undergo a rigorous substance abuse treatment program. It is unknown whether drug court is effective for young adult clients and the role of co-occurring psychopathology within this context.

Methods: This study evaluated the overall effectiveness of a drug court system applied to young adult offenders ages 18-26, and additionally explored the moderating relationship of psychiatric symptoms on …

A Rural/Urban Comparison Of Privacy And Confidentiality Concerns Associated With Providing Sensitive Location Information In Epidemiologic Research Involving Persons Who Use Drugs, Abby E. Rudolph, April M. Young, Jennifer R. Havens

Epidemiology and Environmental Health Faculty Publications

Background—Analyses that link contextual factors with individual-level data can improve our understanding of the "risk environment"; however, the accuracy of information provided by participants about locations where illegal/stigmatized behaviors occur may be influenced by privacy/confidentiality concerns that may vary by setting and/or data collection approach.

Methods—We recruited thirty-five persons who use drugs from a rural Appalachian town and a Mid-Atlantic city to participate in in-depth interviews. Through thematic analyses, we identified and compared privacy/confidentiality concerns associated with two survey methods that (1) collect self-reported addresses/cross-streets and (2) use an interactive web-based map to find/confirm locations in rural and …

Co-Occurring Substance Use Disorder And Mental Illness In Criminal Offenders, Jayme M. Reisler

Jayme M Reisler

The high rate of comorbid substance use disorder and other mental illness (“dual diagnosis”) poses an enormous obstacle to public policy and sentencing in criminal cases. It is estimated that almost half of all Federal, State, and jail inmates suffer from dual diagnosis – a significantly higher prevalence than in the general population. Yet such inmates lack access to proper and effective treatments for their conditions. Several etiological theories have been put forth to explain the occurrence of dual diagnosis in general. However, virtually no studies have explored possible etiological reasons for the higher prevalence of dual diagnosis specifically in …

Risky Business: How Self-Monitoring And Gender Relate To The Participation In Risky And Unsafe Behaviors In College Students, Katherine Beale

Honors Theses

The aim of this study was to examine the relationship between gender, self-monitoring and risk taking behavior. Studies on gender differences and risky behavior have shown that women perceive certain behaviors as being more risky than men do, and that men are more likely to take risks than women as a result of perceived gender norms. The current study predicts that males who are high self-monitors, and are more susceptible to behave in accordance with the male norm of being a risk taker, will be more likely to partake in risky behaviors than low self-monitor males. Additionally, it is predicted …

Firesetting Behavior And Psychiatric Disorders, Stephanie Stockburger, Hatim A. Omar

Pediatrics Faculty Publications

Firesetting behavior results in serious damage to lives and property every year. Firesetting has been linked to a number of comorbid psychiatric disorders including depression, substance abuse, conduct disorder, antisocial personality disorder, obsessive compulsive disorder, psychotic disorder, schizoid personality disorder, and schizophrenia. Psychiatric disorders differ by gender. In addition, juvenile firesetters have history of a separate set of psychiatric comorbidities. The strong correlation between psychiatric comorbidities and firesetting behavior illustrates the need for fire service and mental health collaboration.

A Clustering Method To Identify Who Benefits Most From The Treatment Group In Clinical Trials, Beom S. Lee, Pranab K. Sen, Nan Park, Roger A. Boothroyd, Roger H. Peters, David A. Chiriboga

Mental Health Law & Policy Faculty Publications

In randomized controlled trials (RCTs), the most compelling need is to determine whether the treatment condition was more effective than control. However, it is generally recognized that not all participants in the treatment group of most clinical trials benefit equally. While subgroup analyses are often used to compare treatment effectiveness across pre-determined subgroups categorized by patient characteristics, methods to empirically identify naturally occurring clusters of persons who benefit most from the treatment group have rarely been implemented. This article provides a modeling framework to accomplish this important task. Utilizing information about individuals from the treatment group who had poor outcomes, …

Early Life Stress, Drug Abuse, Exercise Effects On Bdnf And Sex-Influenced Excercise Differences, Karissa Dold

Honors College Theses

In 2011, the U.S. reported 3 million child maltreatment cases, an uncomfortably high but recurring figure each year. Research shows exposure to early life stress (ELS) increases an individual’s susceptibility to substance abuse, specifically of nicotine, alcohol, and cocaine. Increased susceptibility may result from dysregulation of the HPA axis sustaining activation into adulthood after ELS. Hyperactivation of the HPA axis significantly reduces hippocampal BDNF, a neurotrophin involved in neuronal growth and plasticity. Reduced hippocampal BDNF may be a factor in substance abuse vulnerability. Additionally, research shows exercise protects hippocampal BDNF from stress induced down-regulation. To explore these relationships, this study …

Substance Abuse And Insecure Attachment Styles: A Relational Study, Yasmin Borhani

LUX: A Journal of Transdisciplinary Writing and Research from Claremont Graduate University

The attachment styles an individual forms while they are growing up can impact the type of relationships they form as adults. Research has shown insecure attachment styles can be correlated to substance abuse, emotional distress, and interpersonal problems. More specifically, this study focuses on the correlation between insecure attachment styles and substance abuse. Nineteen participants (nine male, ten female) between the ages of 18 to 32 were selected. Participants were given a 20-question survey that measured substance abuse and attachment styles. A t-test was conducted to compare the differences between participants who abuse substances and participants who do not abuse …

Research Brief: "Impact Of The Seeking Safety Program On Clinical Outcomes Among Homeless Female Veterans With Psychiatric Disorders", Institute For Veterans And Military Families At Syracuse University

Institute for Veterans and Military Families

This brief is about the effect of the Seeking Safety program's services on improvement in PTSD, psychiatric symptoms, and social support among homeless female veterans. In policy and practice, clinicians should be trained on how to use the program to better serve homeless female veterans, and policymakers should push for clinician training for those who work with homeless veterans. Suggestions for future research include applying this study and the Seeking Safety program to non-VA healthcare systems, assessing substance use within the program, and assessing the long-term effects of the Seeking Safety program.

Examining The Effects Of Exercise On Stressed Individuals Alcohol Expectancies, Maria Magavern

Honors Theses

The current study examined the effect of exercise habits on alcohol expectancies and drinking behaviors. Previous research has suggested that under times of stress, individuals, especially without alternative effective coping mechanisms, often turn to alcohol (Cooper, Russell, Skinner, Frone, & Mudar, 1992). Exercise and alcohol produce many of the same psychological effects and both serve as stress reducers (Brown, Read, Marcus, Jakicic, Strong, Oakley, Ramsey, Kahler, Stuart, Dubreuil, & Gordon, 2010). The Discounting Principal reveals a tendency to discount all other causes when there is support that a given cause is already known to be responsible for a given event …

U.S. Cultural Involvement And Its Association With Co-Occurring Substance Abuse And Sexual Risk Behaviors Among Youth In The Dominican Republic, Elián P. Cabrera-Nguyen, Juan B. Peña

Elián P. Cabrera-Nguyen

We examined the relationship of US cultural involvement with substance abuse and sexual risk behavior profiles from our nationally representative sample of public high school students in the Dominican Republic. Using a novel methodological approach to control for selection bias, we examined explanations for the so-called Latino or Hispanic immigrant paradox. A latent class regression analysis with manifest and latent covariates found that US cultural involvement indicators were independent and robust predictors of increased risk of co-ocurring substance abuse and sexual risk behaviors. Implications for prevention efforts targeting risk behaviors among Latino/a adolescents in the US and abroad are considered.

Trajectories Of Ptsd And Substance Use Disorders In A Longitudinal Study Of Personality Disorders, Meghan E. Mcdevitt-Murphy, Gilbert R. Parra, M. Tracie Shea, Shirley Yen, Carlos M. Grilo, Charles A. Sanislow, Thomas H. Mcglashan, John G. Gunderson, Andrew E. Skodol, John C. Markowitz

Charles A. Sanislow, Ph.D.

Beliefs And Behaviors Regarding Substance Use And Hiv Risk Among Men Who Have Sex With Men (Msm) In A Mid-Sized U.S. Community, David A. Patterson Silver Wolf (Adelv Unegv Waya) Phd, Martin Hall Mssw, Seana Golder Phd

Brown School Faculty Publications

This paper explores the beliefs and behaviors surrounding substance use and HIV risk among a convenience sample of 98 MSM in a mid-size community located in the central U.S. Several interesting patterns were identified in the descriptive analyses. Multivariate analysis identified two variables, belief that recreational drug use made sexual experiences better and reports that most MSM friends drank alcohol or took recreational drugs that were significant predictors of engagement in substance using behavior. Models accounted for 24% of the variance in drinking behavior and 15% of the variance in drug using behavior. Suggestions for HIV/AIDS prevention and intervention and …