Mental Health Archive

Articles

Can medication help us combat Alzheimer’s disease?

Aducanumab is a newly approved drug for Alzheimer’s disease with the potential to reduce amyloid-beta plaque buildup in the brain. There are other medications being studied to see if they can reduce amyloid-beta, such as a monoclonal antibody that targets amyloid-beta before it forms plaques, and a monoclonal antibody that takes aim at plaque that has already formed. Other experimental approaches try to prevent tau tangles in brain cells, reduce brain inflammation, or reduce the amount of amyloid-beta that is produced.

Easily distracted? Try meditation

Attention control is an essential for time management and productivity, but to stay focused on a task, you need to be able to keep distractions from derailing your progress. Mindfulness meditation can calm a wandering mind, and can be used to train your brain to increase attention, focus, and concentration.

How can I help my partner with dementia who resists help?

Caring for someone can be stressful, and this can be even more challenging if a loved one is not ready to accept help. Caregivers who find themselves in this situation should take steps to enlist others' help to ease their burden and should take time for themselves to reduce their stress levels and protect their mental health.

Grieving: A natural process to help heal

At some point, almost everyone experiences the passing of a loved one whether it’s family, a friend, a spouse, or a beloved pet. Grieving is a natural process that is essential to healing. The best way to deal with grief is to look for ways to make the mourning and healing process less challenging. These include acknowledging grief, embracing the lost loved one’s community, and speaking with others who have gone through grieving.

Gender-affirming surgery brings benefits

Gender-affirming surgery brings psychological benefits for people who undergo these procedures.

Supporting a bullied middle schooler

When children reach middle school, bullying can become more personal as classmates play a bigger role in their lives. Learning to deal with unpleasant emotions is an important part of adolescent development, and parents can help children in this situation by validating their child's feelings and working with them on antibullying techniques.

Exercise can add to your sense of purpose — and vice versa

Researchers found that being active increases one’s sense of purpose in life, and that the opposite was also true—having a strong purpose in life makes it more likely a person will stay active.

The benefits of volunteering, without leaving home

Volunteering has many benefits, enabling people to gain a sense of purpose, connect with others, and get a break from their own problems. Those benefits are associated with better health, including greater levels of physical activity, better sleep quality, a healthier diet, reduced rates of cardiovascular disease, and even longevity. A person may be able to reap many of those benefits by volunteering from home, such as doing work for a nonprofit group via computer or phone.

Postpartum anxiety is invisible, but common and treatable

It's not unusual for women to feel down or depressed after giving birth, but if the feelings persist or become debilitating, it's cause for concern. Many of the symptoms overlap between postpartum depression and postpartum anxiety, but some women do not respond as well to some treatments for depression, so it's important to establish the correct diagnosis.

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