Wednesday 12 February 2014

Paper on the connection between
childhood harm and mental problems

Via the blog of the Norwegian organization We Shall Overcome and @Sigrun_ 

This is so important that I am posting it in both my blogs. Links to any research that debunks these findings are very welcome, please post them in the comments section.

I do have a question about this point:
▪ Clinical implications include the need to routinely take trauma/neglect/loss histories from all users of mental health services.
How does one "routinely take" trauma histories? I hope they don't ask: "How badly were you neglected on a scale from 1 to 10?"



Full Text
February 2014, Vol. 4, No. 1, Pages 65-79 , DOI 10.2217/npy.13.89
(doi:10.2217/npy.13.89)

John Read*1Roar Fosse2Andrew Moskowitz3 & Bruce Perry4
* Author for correspondence


ABSTRACT
Next section
SUMMARY Evidence that childhood adversities are risk factors for psychosis has accumulated rapidly. Research into the mechanisms underlying these relationships has focused, productively, on psychological processes, including cognition, attachment and dissociation. In 2001, the traumagenic neurodevelopmental model sought to integrate biological and psychological research by highlighting the similarities between the structural and functional abnormalities in the brains of abused children and adults diagnosed with ‘schizophrenia’. No review of relevant literature has subsequently been published. The aim of this paper, therefore, is to summarize the literature on biological mechanisms underlying the relationship between childhood trauma and psychosis published since 2001. A comprehensive search for relevant papers was undertaken via Medline, PubMed and psycINFO. In total, 125 papers were identified, with a range of methodologies, and provided both indirect support for and direct confirmation of the traumagenic neurodevelopmental model. Integrating our growing understanding of the biological sequelae of early adversity with our knowledge of the psychological processes linking early adversity to psychosis is valuable both theoretically and clinically.
Practice points
▪ Multiple studies and reviews have found a causal relationship between childhood trauma/adversity and psychosis.
▪ The 2001 traumagenic neurodevelopmental model of psychosis identified similarities in the brains of traumatized children and adults diagnosed with schizophrenia.
▪ Subsequently, 125 publications have provided indirect support for, or direct confirmation of, the traumagenic neurodevelopmental model.
▪ Many studies have now demonstrated the relationship between psychosis and over-reactivity to stress of the hypothalamic–pituitary–adrenal axis and the dopaminergic system.
▪ Studies of the frontal lobes and hippocampus also support the traumagenic neurodevelopmental model.
▪ Two lines of evidence link prior stress and brain alterations to cognitive deficits in individuals diagnosed with psychotic disorders.
▪ Clinical implications include the need to routinely take trauma/neglect/loss histories from all users of mental health services.
▪ The primary prevention implications are profound.

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