Latest Centre for Addiction and Mental Health Stories

In the first North American study to examine population rates of Emergency Department (ED) use for adults with intellectual and developmental disabilities (IDD), researchers from the Institute for Clinical Evaluative Sciences (ICES) and the Centre for Addiction and Mental Health (CAMH) found 55 per cent of adults with IDD and mental illness visited the ED at least once in a 2 year period and 15.6 per cent visited at least 5 times."A lot of attention has been paid to emergency department...

A new study from the Centre for Addiction and Mental Health (CAMH) has found evidence suggesting that a variation of a specific gene may play a role in late-onset Alzheimer's, the disease which accounts for over 90% of Alzheimer's cases. This innovative study has combined genetics and brain imaging to determine who may be at risk for developing late-onset Alzheimer's disease long before symptoms appear.The gene, which is called brain-derived neurotrophic factor (BDNF), is crucial to...

TORONTO, Feb. 8 /PRNewswire/ - A new study from the Centre for Addiction and Mental Health (CAMH) has found evidence suggesting that a variation of a specific gene may play a role in late-onset Alzheimer's, the disease which accounts for over 90% of Alzheimer's cases. This innovative study has combined genetics and brain imaging to determine who may be at risk for developing late-onset Alzheimer's disease long before symptoms appear. The gene, which is called brain-derived...

A workplace's key employees may be at the greatest risk of experiencing high levels of work stress, according to a new study by the Centre for Addiction and Mental Health (CAMH).In a survey of 2,737 workers, 18 per cent reported that their job was "highly stressful."The odds of having high stress were greater if workers were managers or professionals, if they thought their poor job performance could negatively affect others, or if they worked long or variable hours. The study was...

TORONTO, Dec. 7 /PRNewswire/ - A new study from the Centre for Addiction and Mental Health (CAMH) has found that mindfulness-based cognitive therapy -- using meditation -- provides equivalent protection against depressive relapse as traditional antidepressant medication.  The study published in the current issue of the Archives of General Psychiatry compared the effectiveness of pharmacotherapy with mindfulness-based cognitive therapy (MBCT) by studying people who were initially...

Neuroscientists at the Centre for Addiction and Mental Health (CAMH) have developed a protein peptide that may be a novel type of highly targeted treatment for depression with a low side-effect profile. Depression affects one in ten Canadians at some time in their lives and is a leading cause of disability worldwide.The study published in this month's Nature Medicine found that coupling between two dopamine receptors was significantly elevated in the brains of people who had been diagnosed...

New curriculum to address gambling issues released for National Addictions Awareness WeekA new study from the Centre for Addiction and Mental Health (CAMH) has found that 29,000 Ontario students from grades 7-12 report behaviours indicating that they are gambling problematically. The study also found that more than two-thirds of these students reported problems with substance use and/or alcohol use, and 25% reported a suicide attempt in the past year.The Ontario Youth Gambling Report looked...

A new study from The Centre for Addiction and Mental Health (CAMH) found that contraband tobacco accounts for 43% of all cigarettes consumed by Ontario high school daily smokers in grades 9 to 12.The study, published in the current edition of Tobacco Control, looked at the smoking habits of Ontario students and found that of high school daily smokers, 50% smoked at least one contraband cigarette per day over the last year. Contraband cigarettes are manufactured on and smuggled from US and...

Toronto's Centre for Addiction and Mental Health (CAMH) has been selected as one of seven adult field trial sites in North America and the only site in Canada to test proposed diagnostic criteria for the American Psychiatric Association's (APA) fifth edition of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM). Used by health professionals around the world, DSM is the manual that provides descriptions, symptoms and other criteria for diagnosing mental disorders. CAMH is...

New research from the Centre for Addiction and Mental Health (CAMH) and The Hospital for Sick Children (SickKids), both in Toronto, Canada provides further clues as to why Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) affects four times more males than females. The scientists discovered that males who carry specific alterations of DNA on the sole X-chromosome they carry are at high risk of developing ASD. The research is published in the September 15 issue of Science Translational Medicine.ASD is a...