Expert consensus on neurodevelopmental outcomes in pregnancy pharmacovigilance studies.

Exposure to certain medications can disrupt processes of fetal development, including brain development, leading to a continuum of neurodevelopmental difficulties. Recognizing the deficiency of neurodevelopmental investigations within pregnancy pharmacovigilance, an international Neurodevelopmental Expert Working Group was convened to achieve consensus regarding the core neurodevelopmental outcomes, optimization of methodological approaches and barriers to conducting pregnancy pharmacovigilance studies with neurodevelopmental outcomes. A modified Delphi study was undertaken based on stakeholder and expert input.

Barriers to academic reintegration in students with severe mental disorders: Thematic analysis.

Background: Education provides a platform to persons to integrate into society for their livelihood. In countries like India, higher education is accorded a significant place in society and is an important pre-requisite for most professional and skilled occupations. However there are a number of illness related and psychosocial barriers to attaining educational goals, especially for persons with Severe Mental Disorders (SMDs').

Senior Vipassana Meditation practitioners exhibit distinct REM sleep organization from that of novice meditators and healthy controls.

The present study is aimed to ascertain whether differences in meditation proficiency alter rapid eye movement sleep (REM sleep) as well as the overall sleep-organization. Whole-night polysomnography was carried out using 32-channel digital EEG system. 20 senior Vipassana meditators, 16 novice Vipassana meditators and 19 non-meditating control subjects participated in the study.

Violence among psychiatric inpatients: a victim's perspective.

OBJECTIVE. Violence in psychiatric wards results in serious consequences and there is need for research to assess it in various settings to enable improvements in safety within psychiatric facilities. This study aimed to assess the inpatient violence from victims' perspective, in settings where family members accompanied patients during inpatient stay and played a significant role in caregiving.

Oxidative damage in muscular dystrophy correlates with the severity of the pathology: role of glutathione metabolism.

Muscular dystrophies (MDs) such as Duchenne muscular dystrophy (DMD), sarcoglycanopathy (Sgpy) and dysferlinopathy (Dysfy) are recessive genetic neuromuscular diseases that display muscle degeneration. Although these MDs have comparable endpoints of muscle pathology, the onset, severity and the course of these diseases are diverse. Different mechanisms downstream of genetic mutations might underlie the disparity in these pathologies.

Glutathione metabolism is modulated by postmortem interval, gender difference and agonal state in postmortem human brains.

The equilibrium between antioxidant function and oxidative stress is implicated in brain pathology. However, human studies on oxidant and antioxidant markers rely on postmortem tissue that might be affected by pre and postmortem factors. To evaluate the effect of these variables, we tested whether antioxidant enzymes [superoxide dismutase (SOD), catalase] glutathione (GSH) and related enzymes [gamma glutamylcysteine ligase (GCL), GSH peroxidase (GPx), GSH reductase (GR), GSH-S-transferase (GST)] and malondialdehyde (MDA, marker of lipid peroxidation) are affected in postmortem human brains (n=50) by increase in postmortem interval (2.