Time matters for mental health: a systematic review of quantitative studies on time perspective in psychiatric populations.

PURPOSE OF REVIEW: The ability to perform mental time travels and to develop representations of the past, the present, and the future is one of the distinctive capacities of the human mind. Despite its pronounced consequences for motivation, cognition, affect, and subjective well being, time perspective (TP) has been outside mainstream psychiatry and clinical psychology. We highlight the role of psychological-temporal phenomena in various disorders and summarize the current research on TP and psychopathology. RECENT FINDINGS: Our review ultimately comprised 21 articles, including 18 unique datasets. It revealed that persons with different psychiatric diagnoses (attention defict hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), alcohol dependence, anxiety disorders, depression, bipolar disorder, personality disorders, posttraumatic stress disorder, schizophrenia) display different temporal profiles than control groups. We also found marked associations between temporal features and psychiatric symptom severity. The effects of specific TPs vary across different psychiatric diagnoses and to some extent between various age groups, with a consistent, widespread, and nonspecific effect of past-negative and less balanced, inflexible TP profile. SUMMARY: Based on the review, TP biases are crucial factors in symptom development, while adaptive temporal profiles can serve as protective features against mental disorders. Understanding cognitive-temporal processes can enhance comprehension of psychopathological conditions and facilitate the development of temporality-focused clinical interventions.

Towards the understanding of the core of general personality disorder factor: g-PD and its relation to hostile attributions.

There is a general consensus that personality disorders (PDs) share a general factor (g-PD) overlapping with the general factor of psychopathology (p-factor). The general psychopathology factor is related to many social dysfunctions, but its nature still remains to some extent ambiguous. We posit that hostile attributions may be explanatory for the factor common for all PDs, i.e., interpersonal problems and difficulty in building long-lasting and satisfying relationships of all kinds. Thus, the main objective of the current project was to expand the existing knowledge about underlying factors of g-PD with regard to hostile attributions. We performed a cross-sectional study on a representative, community sample of Poles (N = 1031). Our hypotheses were primarily confirmed as hostile attributions predicted p-factor. However, the relation was positive only for hostile attributions related to ambiguous situations involving relational harm and physical harm done by female authorities and negative in case of hostile attributions in situations involving physical harm done by peers. Additionally, paranoia-like thoughts strongly related to hostile attributions and independently predicted g-PD. The results contribute to the current discussion on the nature of the g-PD, confirm that hostile attributions and paranoia are a crucial aspect of personality pathology, and indicate the importance of working on these cognitions in the course of therapeutic work.

Ultrasound-guided, long-axis, in-plane, infraclavicular axillary vein cannulation: A 6-year experience.

BACKGROUND: Despite its potential advantages, ultrasound-guided cannulation of the axillary vein in the infraclavicular area is still rarely used as an alternative to other techniques. There are few large series demonstrating the safety and feasibility of this approach. METHODS: Retrospective analysis of data on patients undergoing ultrasound-guided, long-axis, in-plane infraclavicular axillary vein cannulation for the incidence of complications and the failure rate from two secondary-care hospitals. RESULTS: The analysis included 710 successful attempts of axillary vein long-axis, in-plane, US-guided cannulation, and 24 (3.3%) failed attempts. We recorded a 96.7% success rate with an overall incidence of complications of 13%, mainly malposition (8.1%). There was one case of pneumothorax (0.14%), five cases of arterial puncture (0.7%), and two cases of brachial plexus injury. CONCLUSIONS: The US-guided axillary central venous cannulation (CVC) access technique can be undertaken successfully in patients, even in challenging circumstances. Taken together with existing work on the utility and safety of this technique, we suggest that it should be adopted more widely in clinical practice.

The Surgical Apgar Score predicts outcomes of emergency abdominal surgeries both in fit and frail older patients.

The Surgical Apgar Score (SAS) is a simple and rapid scoring system predicting postoperative mortality and morbidity. However, it remains unknown whether it might be useful in fit and frail older patients undergoing abdominal emergency surgery. METHODS: Consecutive patients ≥65 years, needing emergency abdominal surgery were enrolled in this prospective study. Additionally to the SAS, the G8 screening score was used to determine the frailty status. The logistic regression analysis was conducted investigating the association between the scores and 30-day postoperative outcomes. RESULTS: The study sample comprised 315 older patients (165 female, 150 male) with a median age of 77 (range 65-100) years old. The prevalence of frailty was 60.3%. The most frequent surgical indications were acute cholecystitis, followed by ileus, complicated diverticulitis, ulcer perforation, complication of gastric cancer and other causes. The decreasing SAS was significantly associated with the increasing likelihood of both 30-day postoperative major complications (p < 0.01) and death (p < 0.01) both in fit and frail older patients. Multivariate analyses have identified the G8, frailty screening test, and the SAS score as independent factors that predict postoperative adverse events. The model combining both scores increased the discriminatory ability for 30-day postoperative major morbidity and mortality. CONCLUSION: The SAS confirmed to be a simple and powerful predictor of 30-day postoperative morbidity and mortality both in fit and frail older patients undergoing emergency abdominal surgery. The department allocation algorithm based of the combination of the G8 and the SAS may be considered as an option to improve the outcomes of older patients undergoing abdominal emergency surgery.

Sensitive and Rapid Voltammetric Determination of Phenothiazine and Azaphenothiazine Derivatives in Pharmaceuticals Using a Boron-doped Diamond Electrode.

Novel, sensitive and rapid electrochemical methods for the determination of phenothiazine and azaphenothiazine derivatives were developed. A boron-doped diamond (BDD) electrode was used for electrochemical oxidation of levomepromazine, promazine and prothipendyl. The electrooxidation of these substances demonstrated reversible peaks of oxidation at the potential range 0.55 - 0.75 V vs. SCE. Examining the influence of scan rate allowed is to demonstrate that the currents registered typical of the diffusion-controlled process. Determinations of the studied analytes were carried out by means of a square wave voltammetry (SWV) method and a differential pulse voltammetry (DPV) method. Linear ranges of determination with the use of the BDD electrode and the SWV method were obtained in the ranges: from 4 × 10(-7) to 1.38 × 10(-4) mol L(-1) for levomepromazine, from 4 × 10(-7) to 1.17 × 10(-5) mol L(-1) for promazine and from 4.95 × 10(-7) to 4.54 × 10(-5) mol L(-1) for prothipendyl. The influence of interferences on the voltammetric signal of the studied analytes was also checked. The proposed procedures were used for quantitative determination of the studied compounds in pharmaceutical preparations. The measurements showed high accuracy. The recovery values obtained ranged from 98.52 to 99.57%. The developed procedures were compared with pharmacopoeial reference methods.

Efficient oxidizing agents for determination of 2,10-disubstituted phenothiazines.

2,10-Disubstituted phenothiazines are the best drugs in psychiatry. Several methods for their analysis have been reported in the literature. The official methods are based on non-aqueous titration or spectrophotometry. Various oxidizing agents have been used for the spectrophotometric determination of 2,10-disubstituted phenothiazines, e.g. Ce(SO4)2, NH4VO3, K2S208, KIO4, KIO3, KBrO3, FeCl3, NaNO2, H2O2, chloramine T, p-benzoquinone, N-bromosuccinimide. Oxidation reactions of phenothiazines were also used for their determination by flow-injection methods.