Mental Health | featured news

By the time his Greyhound bus hissed to a stop on Richards Boulevard in Sacramento on the morning of Feb. 12, James Flavy Coy Brown was in a mild panic. It was 6:30 a.m., 15 hours and 11 stops after a taxi had scooped him up in front of Rawson-Neal Psychiatric Hospital in Las Vegas, where he had spent the previous 72 hours, and deposited him at a bus station.

It can be hard to admit to feelings of loneliness, but one in 10 Britons is lonely. It's not just an issue for the elderly - loneliness is rising among the young. So are we all destined to be lonely?

Many postpartum women have violent thoughts involving their infants, but we don't talk about this side effect of motherhood, Shanon Cook says.

Researchers find a majority of children with ADHD have continued symptoms, or symptoms of another psychiatric disorder, in adulthood. Childhood attention deficit hyperactivity disorder frequently persists into adulthood, bringing heightened risks of additional psychiatric issues and nearly five times the risk of suicide, according to a 20-year study that followed children diagnosed with the disorder.

The biggest study yet into genetics and mental health has come up with a stunning result: The five most common mental illnesses -- autism, attention deficit disorder, bipolar disease, schizophrenia and major depression -- all have a common genetic root.

A report in Nature Neuroscience suggests that natural physical changes interfere with quality slumber, blunting the ability to remember new information for the long term.

It has the makings of a science fiction movie: Zap someone's brain with mild jolts of electricity to try to stave off the creeping memory loss of Alzheimer's disease....

As if being stressed weren't bad enough, thinking you're stressed might also cause serious problems.

Beta blockers, a venerable class of blood pressure drugs that has fallen from favor in recent years, may help protect the aging brain against changes linked to Alzheimer's disease and other forms of dementia that rob memory and mental function, new research indicates.

Self-described neurotics who also have high levels of conscientiousness (organized, plan ahead, and are extremely self-controlled) experience lower levels of a disease-fighting biomarker, according to research.