Most individuals at some point of their life experience events that are stressful. While some people seem to crumble to the deleterious effects of stress, others sail through adverse situations. Chronic or acute stress is associated with a wide range of psychosocial disorders. So what are the factors and the possible neurobiological mechanisms associated with resilience? Read more →

Eight out of every ten Americans have searched for medical information online. Three-quarters of these searchers do not scrutinize the quality, validity, or date of the information. With the overabundance of healthcare information available on the World Wide Web, people looking for quality medical information could easily be led astray. The unnecessary escalation of health concerns — newly-termed “cyberchondria” — is the focus of a study conducted by Microsoft, and it could have serious implications for many patients. Read more →

The human brain undergoes rapid development from late gestation to early childhood. The brain structures that are developing or undergoing age-related changes are more vulnerable to the effects of stress. Trauma at different time points in an individual’s life might be associated with different outcomes, depending on the brain structure that was affected at the time of exposure to adversity. Read more →

Emotional or mood problems are more frequent in people with disabilities (of any severity or duration) than in the general population. Rates range from about 20% to 50%, depending on the study and the population – from spinal cord injury to multiple sclerosis to stroke. It is important to understand the rates and types of mood disorders because the functional deficits associated with disability (I’m using disability to refer to any sort of loss of function, even if it is only temporary) can manifest similarly to mood disorder symptoms. For example, what might look like anhedonia could simply be inability to do much, or at least the reticence to be active because of pain or functional loss. Read more →

Most couples promise to love each other in sickness and in health when reciting marriage vows. Now, simply saying those words may lead to better health. Numerous studies have extolled the benefits of marriage on overall morbidity and mortality, but a recent study reports that mental health may, in fact, be preserved, in married people.

More than 25 million people worldwide suffer from dementia, with Alzheimer’s disease accounting for most of the cases. With an aging population, the number of dementia cases is expected to exceed 80 million by 2040. Read more →

Medical mysteries pop up every now and then that are either misdiagnosed or dismissed as either a psychosomatic or a psychological disorder. Chronic fatigue syndrome (CFS) is one of these mysteries and identification of a cause, or even whether the disease actually exists, continues to elude scientists. My previous post focused upon my own personal experience with CFS; in this post I would like to turn the focus to a brief history of CFS and an exploration of current medical studies. Read more →