Keeping you up to date with reliable child health research, policy & guidance
This new Cochrane systematic review finds that motivational interviewing has no effect on reducing alcohol-related problems or risky behaviours such as drunk driving in young people.
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Lisa Burscheidt summarises a recent Cochrane review of psychotherapy for chronic pain in children and adolescents, which concludes that psychological therapies should be considered as a treatment, but better primary studies are needed to help steer pain management decisions.
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In 2012 there was a call from Parliament to research school interventions to reduce body dissatisfaction. Helen Bould reports on an RCT of school-based prevention programme for eating disorders, which highlights the need for more work in this area.
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This study explores the prevalence of psychiatric disorder and comorbidity among a UK sample of young people with experience of homelessness. It finds an extremely high prevalence of mental illness, combined with low levels of mental health service use.
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Matt Field summarises the findings of a recent cluster RCT that uses internet-based prevention (an Australian programme called Climate Schools) to reduce alcohol and cannabis use, truancy, psychological distress and moral disengagement.
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Andrew Shepherd reviews the recent controversial BMJ study that suggests the FDA black box warning about antidepressant use in young people, may have inadvertently caused an increase in suicidal behaviour. He finds it’s not quite that clear cut.
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Fiona Warner-Gale presents the findings of a meta-analytic review of the Incredible Years Parent Training programme, which is found to be effective at modifying disruptive and prosocial child behaviour. This evidence will be of interest to many, including policymakers, planners and practitioners.
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Lisa Burscheidt reports on a recent Cochrane review that looks at the effects of kinship care versus traditional foster care for the safety, permanency and well-being of children removed from the home for maltreatment.
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Bullying is just not good for you. Here on Mental Elf, we’ve already picked some great examples of studies demonstrating this. André blogged about how bullied children are more likely to develop psychosis, and how bullies are at higher risk for teen pregnancy, and not so long ago, I told you how Wolke et al demonstrated that [read the full story…]
How many children develop Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) after a traumatic experience such as an assault, a car crash, war or disaster? William Yule, one of the godfathers of child traumatic stress research, once pointed out that rates reported in separate studies varied from 0 to 100%. So what is on average the rate [read the full story…]
