Sports and physical activity are widely recommended, both as guidelines and in clinical practice, because of their broad range of positive effects on health, depression, anxiety, and psychological well-being. While several studies have examined the anti-depressive and anxiolytic effects of physical activity in clinical populations, and fewer studies have focused on the nonclinical populations, ...

INTRODUCTION This study aimed to establish the association between alexithymia and various factors, mainly somatization, and to determine the predictors of alexithymia in depressed patients. METHODS A total of 90 patients with major depressive disorder who met The Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders-Fourth Edition (DSM-IV) diagnostic criteria were administered the Toronto Al...

INTRODUCTION Accurate corneal measurements are crucial in corneal refractive surgery (CRS) to ensure successful outcomes. Soft contact lens (SCL) wear may result in changes to corneal curvature and structure. United States Food and Drug Administration (FDA) pre-operative guidelines recommend that prior to CRS, SCL wearers cease SCL wear for "at least two weeks before examination and treatment" ...

BACKGROUND The symptom checklist SCL-27-plus is a short, multidimensional screening instrument for mental health problems. It contains five scales on current symptoms: depressive, vegetative, agoraphobic, and sociophobic symptoms and pain; a global severity index (GSI-27); a lifetime assessment for depressive symptoms; and a screening question for suicidality. METHOD A reformulated version of...

INTRODUCTION Compared with controls, up to six years after their return, Danish Gulf War veterans have a significantly higher prevalence of self-reported neuropsychological symptoms, potentially as a result of neurotoxic exposure during deployment. We tested the hypotheses that: 1) GW veterans would perform less well than controls using a computerized neuromotor test battery; and that 2) GW vet...

Psychological or behavioral interventions that attenuate the effects of stress may be useful in promoting immunocompetence and delaying HIV disease progression and CD4 count level. Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction (MBSR) is a behavioral intervention that has as its foundation the practice of insight-oriented (or mindfulness) meditation. In this study, we examined the effects of MBSR upon psyc...

The children who experienced their parents' divorce when the divorce rate in Sweden had begun to grow to higher levels than in preceding decades are today adults. The aim of this study was to investigate if adults who had experienced parental divorce 15 years before the time of our study, differed in mental health from those with continuously married parents, taking into account life events oth...