Peripartum depression (PPD) is a prevalent mental health disorder in the peripartum period. However, a recent systematic review of clinical guidelines relating to PPD has revealed a significant inconsistency in recommendations.

This study aimed to collect up-to-date evidence on the effectiveness of interventions and provide recommendations for prevention, screening and treating PPD.

A series of umbrella reviews on the effectiveness of PPD prevention, screening and treatment interventions was conducted. A search was performed in five databases from 2010 until 2023. The guidelines were developed according to the GRADE framework and AGREE II Checklist recommendations. Public stakeholder review was included.

One hundred and forty-five systematic reviews were included in the final analysis and used to form the guidelines. Forty-four recommendations were developed, including recommendations for prevention, screening and treatment. Psychological and psychosocial interventions are strongly recommended for preventing PPD in women with no symptoms and women at risk. Screening programmes for depression are strongly recommended during pregnancy and postpartum. Cognitive–behavioural therapy is strongly recommended for PPD treatment for mild to severe depression. Antidepressant medication is strongly recommended for treating severe depression in pregnancy. Electroconvulsive therapy is strongly recommended for therapy-resistant and life-threatening severe depression during pregnancy. Other recommendations are offered to healthcare professionals, stakeholders and researchers in managing PPD in different contexts.

Treatment recommendations should be implemented after carefully considering clinical severity, previous history, risk–benefit for mother and foetus/infant and women’s values and preferences. Implementation of evidence-based clinical practice guidelines within country-specific contexts should be facilitated.

It remains unclear which individuals with subthreshold depression benefit most from psychological intervention, and what long-term effects this has on symptom deterioration, response and remission.

To synthesise psychological intervention benefits in adults with subthreshold depression up to 2 years, and explore participant-level effect-modifiers.

Randomised trials comparing psychological intervention with inactive control were identified via systematic search. Authors were contacted to obtain individual participant data (IPD), analysed using Bayesian one-stage meta-analysis. Treatment–covariate interactions were added to examine moderators. Hierarchical-additive models were used to explore treatment benefits conditional on baseline Patient Health Questionnaire 9 (PHQ-9) values.

IPD of 10 671 individuals (50 studies) could be included. We found significant effects on depressive symptom severity up to 12 months (standardised mean-difference [s.m.d.] = −0.48 to −0.27). Effects could not be ascertained up to 24 months (s.m.d. = −0.18). Similar findings emerged for 50% symptom reduction (relative risk = 1.27–2.79), reliable improvement (relative risk = 1.38–3.17), deterioration (relative risk = 0.67–0.54) and close-to-symptom-free status (relative risk = 1.41–2.80). Among participant-level moderators, only initial depression and anxiety severity were highly credible (P > 0.99). Predicted treatment benefits decreased with lower symptom severity but remained minimally important even for very mild symptoms (s.m.d. = −0.33 for PHQ-9 = 5).

Psychological intervention reduces the symptom burden in individuals with subthreshold depression up to 1 year, and protects against symptom deterioration. Benefits up to 2 years are less certain. We find strong support for intervention in subthreshold depression, particularly with PHQ-9 scores ≥ 10. For very mild symptoms, scalable treatments could be an attractive option.

N-Methyl-D-aspartate (NMDA) receptors are involved in learning and memory. It is known that ventral hippocampus is a crucial structure involved in emotional memory formation mainly for fear and anxiety situations. The aim of this research is to identify the effect of the stimulation of ventral hipocampal NMDA receptors on the reextinction of an aversive emotional memory task. NMDA (0.2 ug/μl; 0.2 μl) or saline (0.9 %; 0.2 μl) was bilateral and locally administered in the ventral hippocampus of male Wistar rats, before the re-instatement trial.

The experimental group consisted of 10 animals and the control group by 9 subjects. The results suggest that the activation of ventral hipocampal NMDA receptors induces an increase in the time needed to re-extinguish the conditioned fear, suggesting a possible potentiating effect on re-installation.

To evaluate the effect of NMDA at the intrahippocampal level, on the reinstatement and re extinction of a conditioned fear response in male Wistar rats.

This study is experimental, where two groups of adult male Wistar rats were used. The bilateral cannulas was implanted, the animals were injected intraperitoneally with a mixture of ketamine (Rotexmédica) and xylacin (Bayer; 75 mg/Kg and 5 mg/Kg), respectively, then the animals were placed in a stereotaxic apparatus (Narishige) and injected with veterinary antibiotic.The (21G) caliber cannulas were bilaterally implanted in HPv at the following coordinates: AP = -5.2 mm relative to Bregma; ML = ± 5 mm in relation to the midline and DV = 5.1 mm in relation to the skull and according to the atlas (Paxinos & Watson, 1985).

It was observed that in the first phase of extinction there were no statistically significant differences between the two groups, experimental and control, as in the second phase of extinction. The results obtained for the re-extinction phase 1 and 2 showed that there were significant statistical differences between the groups. This difference was only evident in the first three minutes in the two phases of re-extinction.

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Statistically significant differences were observed between the two groups, in the phases of re-extinction, seeing a longer time of the freezing response in the experimental group, as an effect of the application of NMDA in the ventral hippocampus (HPv), which suggests that this substance has a memory-enhancing effect, and therefore contributes to increasing the permanence of the fear response. It should be noted that this difference was only evident in the first three minutes in the two re-extinction phases. These results may be related to other studies where it has been shown that LTP is dependent on the N-methyl-D-aspartate receptor in the CA1 region in vivo (Zhong, Cherry, Bies, Florence, & Gerges, 2009)

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Early intervention on a first psychotic episode is fundamental for a more favorable prognosis, and it usually combines pharmacological treatment, which mainly affects positive psychotic symptoms, with interventions that can improve the rest of the symptoms and associated problems such as deterioration in social functioning (Harvey & Penn, 2010; Fusar-Poli, McGorry & Kane, 2017). While Mindfulness is gaining more and more prominence in the field of psychotherapy (Chan et al., 2019; Cillesen et al., 2019), social cognition and social functioning are being researched as key targets on which to intervene after a first psychotic episode (Green, Horan & Lee, 2015).

SocialMIND® is a mindfulness-based social cognition training tailor-made to improve social functioning in people who have suffered a first psychotic episode within the last five years. It is currently being compared with a group Psychoeducational Multicomponent Intervention (PMI) in a Randomized Controlled Trial (RCT) (Mediavilla et al., 2019). Both group psychotherapies include 17 sessions delivered over a 9 month period: 8 weekly sessions, 4 biweekly sessions and 5 monthly sessions.

The results of SocialMIND® at 8 weeks showed improvements in social cognition and social functioning, specifically on affective social cognition and self-care (Mediavilla et al., 2021).

To evaluate the efficacy of SocialMIND® in improving social functioning, measured by the Personal and Social Functioning (PSP) scale 16 weeks after starting the intervention, in people who have suffered a first psychotic episode in the last 5 years.

Randomized, controlled pilot trial (use of a psychoeducational multicomponent intervention or PMI as active comparator) of two parallel groups (SocialMIND® and PMI) with a 1:1 ratio using a blind evaluator.

No statistically significant differences were found in the social functioning variable between the two treatment arms. Intragroup differences are observed in other secondary variables studied (social cognition) 16 weeks after starting the interventions.

SocialMIND® has not been shown to be more effective than a PMI in improving social functioning at 16 weeks after starting the intervention in people who have suffered a first psychotic episode in the five years prior to being included in the study.

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Resistant schizophrenia is a schizophrenia subtype characterized by a non-ability to respond to an appropriate antipsychotic treatment in dosage and duration by the patients. These patients show a lower prognostic and symptomatology. The unique drug which has shown efficacy for resistant schizophrenia treatment is clozapine, which is effective in suicide and aggressive behaviour prevention too. Whereas clozapine has numerous and serious adverse effects such as agranulocytosis risk. Because of this, and for guaranteeing an accurate diagnosis of resistant schizophrenia, distinguishing this from pseudo-resistance due to a poor tracing of schizophrenia, clozapine’s plasmatic levels monitoring is recommended in Spain by many clinical practise-guidelines.

This studio has the objective of determining if altered clozapine’s plasmatic levels have predictive potential of therapeutical response and answering what clinical and sociodemographic variables are associated to these anormal plasmatic levels.

In this work, a cross-sectional observational study was carried out in which clinical and sociodemographic data obtained by the Mental Health Unit of the Jerez de la Frontera University Hospital were collected within the research project entitled: "Role of social cognition as a factor psychosocial functioning of the schizophrenic patient” (ECOFUN), of all the participating patients (in total the sample was 141 patients, of which 40 are in treatment with clozapine).

The sample of patients has a mean age of 44 years and medium-high educational levels. The vast majority are men and do not currently consume substances of abuse, and when this consumption occurs, tobacco and alcohol are the most consumed substances. Their total scores on the PANSS and Markova Barrios scales are generally very disparate, but with average values of 55 and 16. It has been obtained as results that there is no significant statistical correlation between the plasma levels of clozapine and the values of the PANSS scale and its subscales in the patients. On the other hand, patients treated with clozapine would present clinical and sociodemographic characteristics practically identical to those of patients treated with other antipsychotics, especially their values on the PANSS scale. In addition, plasma levels of clozapine are correlated, although not significantly, with an improvement in the positive symptomatology of schizophrenia.

As a conclusion, unusually higher values of clozapine are correlated significantly with lower values in positive symptomatology in schizophrenia, but plasmatic levels are not correlated significantly with values of PANSS scale.

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Berscheid (1999), taken from Lacunza & Contini (2016), indicated that social relations were the foundation of the human condition. From positive psychology, Park et al. (2013) point out good relationships as a factor that contributes to a good psychological life, since they provide emotional and instrumental support in times of stress and challenge, indicating, in turn, normal evolutionary development and the avoidance of psychopathological problems.

To establish the relationship between positive relationships and the presence of stressors in adolescents.

A cross-sectional, descriptive-correlational study was carried out in 109 (N= 109) adolescents. The SISCO Inventory was used to study academic stress as well as the Ryff Psychological Well-Being Scale.

A negative magnitude correlation was found between positive relationships and stressors. ( Table 1).

As a secondary result, 60.6% of the evaluated adolescents presented life purpos as the factor with the highest score in the psychological well-being variable. This points to authors such as Erikson (1988, p. 96), who define adolescence as a space characterized by feelings of creativity, productivity, new ideas, and a period of cognitive and social maturation, which leads to a definitive commitment to life itself. (Graph 1).

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Positive relationships in adolescents decrease the presence of stimuli considered stressors.

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Psychotic disorders have a huge impact on social functioning, which is the ability to stablish and maintain social activities such as interpersonal relationships and self-care activities of daily living. Research data support that the early intervention in people who have experienced a first episode of psychosis (FEP) -based on a multidisciplinary treatment including both psychopharmacological and psychosocial treatments-, has a relevant role in a favorable evolution. AGES-Mind study is based on manualized psychotherapeutic interventions for people with first-psychosis episodes.

To describe the use of rehabilitation resources and social functioning in a group of people with FEP who were included in a psychotherapeutic group program versus a control group, at 12 and 24 months since the beginning of the intervention.

Longitudinal, analytical, observational, retrospective study on a cohort of 46 patients with first-episode psychosis within the last 5 years. 23 patients received group psychotherapy in the context of the AGES-Mind study and they were compared with 23 control patients who did not receive a group intervention (treatment as usual). Controls were matched by age, gender and time elapsed since the first episode of psychosis with those exposed to the intervention. Sociodemographic data, social functioning (self-care, social activities, social relationships, and behavior) and use of rehabilitation resources outcome variables were assessed.

Significant differences were found regarding participation in social activities in the intervention group versus control group at 24 months. No significant differences were found in other dimensions of social functioning or in the use of rehabilitation resources.

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Further studies with larger sample sizes are needed in order to determine if the participation in group therapy leads to an improvement in social functioning and use of rehabilitation resources for people who have experienced a first episode of psychosis.

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Although some studies have reported that case management (CM), when is compared with standard care, reduces the loss of contact with health services, the debate continues about its superiority over other treatment models.

To assess treatment adherence and reasons for treatment discontinuation, and the impact of the type of APs administration on it, for a group of patients with schizophrenia treated in a CMP or receiving standard treatment in mental health units (MHUs).

An observational, longitudinal study (ten-year follow-up) was conducted on 688 patients with severe schizophrenia (CGI-S ≥ 5). All the causes of the end of treatment were recorded, together with the AP medication prescribed and kind of regimes.

43.6% of the patients had discontinued treatment in MHUs and only 12.1% on the CMP (p < 0.0001). 27.6% of patients in MHUs were on long-acting injectables (LAIs), and 57.6 on the CMP (p < 0.001). Treatment discontinuation was closely linked to be on OAPs medication in both cases (p < 0.001).Table 1.Treatment discontinuation, hospital admissions and suicide attempts [N(%)]

Our findings show how specific strategies as programs with an integrated treatment and case-managed approach, increase adherence. Moreover, treating with LAI APs clearly contributes to the achievement of these results. The widespread implementation of comprehensive community programs with case management, and the use of LAI-APs, should be an effective choice for people with schizophrenia and clinical severity and impairment, and at high risk of treatment discontinuation.

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Risk of functional impairment and progression to chronic illness in people with a first episode of psychosis (FEP) has motivated early intervention programs, showing promising results. Defining the characteristics of people with FEP at local level enables the clinicians to adjust interventional models to the reality of the population. The area 5 of Madrid (Spain) is referred to La Paz University Hospital and it serves a catchment area of roughly 527,000 people.

We aim to identify sociodemographic and clinical characteristics of patients in the area 5 of Madrid (Spain) who meet the criteria of FEP.

A descriptive retrospective study including 179 people (age range 18-40 years) who were attended in mental health services of La Paz University Hospital (area 5 of Madrid, Spain), between January 2019 and May 2020, having suffered a psychotic episode in the last five years.

The average age of people with FEP was 29.32 years, with a higher proportion of men (62%). The mean duration of untreated psychosis (DUP) was 3.64 months and 47% of patients consume cannabis. We found disparities in DUP among the different districts in the area and we also observed differences depending on the district for inclusion in rehabilitation programs or psychotherapy. The following averages were obtained for the aggregate sample: 1.01 hospitalization/year, 1.42 emergency room visits/year, 1.81 years of illness and a mean dosage equivalent to olanzapine 6.75 mg/day. The incidence of psychosis in our area has been 7.01 cases per 100000 inhabitants/year.

The incidence of psychosis has been as expected according to data recorded at previous studies in Spain. The results obtained in our sample have included a lower DUP and a higher use of cannabis than those described in the literature. We have also found differences when observing the inclusion of patients in different treatments (psychotherapy, rehabilitation), which may be related to the differences in the DUP by districts. Further exploration in this field is needed to draw causal conclusions.

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Cerebral emboli are generated by every step of standard carotid angioplasty and stenting. Primary carotid stenting (PCS) is a technique in which the use of balloon angioplasty (BA) is minimized to decrease the embolic load. The primary aim of this study is to establish the number of emboli generated by each step of primary stenting and determine the relationship to new diffusion (DWI) lesions on subsequent magnetic resonance imaging (MRI).

Eighty-five patients with severe, symptomatic carotid stenosis were prospectively recruited and underwent carotid stenting. Intraoperative transcranial Doppler was performed in 77 patients. The number and size of microemboli for each of seven procedural steps were recorded. Correlation was made with the number and location of new DWI lesions.

PCS was performed in 73 patients. BA was required in 12 patients. The mean number of microemboli was 114, and most microemboli were generated by stent deployment, followed by BA. Balloon techniques generated significantly more emboli than primary stenting (p = 0.017). There was a significant relationship between total microemboli and new DWI lesions (p = 0.009), and between new DWI lesions in multiple territories and the severity of pretreatment stenosis (p = 0.002).

During PCS, more emboli are generated by stent deployment than during any other stage of the procedure. When BA is necessary, more malignant emboli are generated but total emboli are unchanged and there is no difference in new diffusion lesions on MRI. PCS is safe and is not inferior to historical controls for the generation of new DWI lesions.

The response to antipsychotic treatment in patients with schizophrenia varies from 14 to 34% in first episodes, and from 45 to 61% in more chronic patients. Nevertheless, the concept of treatment resistant schizophrenia (TRS) is still a matter of great controversy. Recently, an international group of experts has developed the TRRIP criteria to define treatment resistant schizophrenia (TRS), including an ultra-resistance category for clozapine resistant patients. Up till now, there is a scarcity of epidemiological data of TRS with TRRIP criteria.

This study attempts to identify the population diagnosed of schizophrenia that fulfils the minima TRRIP criteria for TRS in our mental health catchment area.

A descriptive and retrospective study has been developed on the patients diagnosed of schizophrenia (ICD.10, F.20) in the catchment area of the Mental Health Service at Jerez Hospital between 2018 and 2019. TRRIP criteria were applied for two independent researchers and, in case of disagreement, consensus was reached by using the LEAD procedure.

The total number of ICD-10 schizophrenic patients identified was 590, from a population of 456.752 in 2019. A group of these, 206 patients (35%) qualified as TRS according to the minima TRRIP criteria, 50% were positive subtype and the rest the negative one. 46.8% were treated with clozapine.

Consensus criteria of TRS minimise the heterogeneity of epidemiological data in literature. Our data suggest a prevalence rate of TRS lower than that of similar studies. Accordingly, a comprehensive understanding of this population would undoubtedly contribute to improve preventive and therapeutic strategies.

No significant relationships.