National Elf Service The Mental Elf

Welcome to our first ever #ElfNuggets show!

If you prefer, you can watch this Elf Nuggets episode on the Mental Elf YouTube channel: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x6zZrQ45MbQ

This show will:
- Help mental health practitioners keep up to date with the latest reliable research that they can use in practice
- Each month we will discuss three recent studies that we've blogged about on the Mental Elf, which our panel think we should be using in practice

Our expert panel
- Chair: André Tomlin, Founder, The Mental Elf
- Carrie-Ann Black, Mental Health Nurse from Yorkshire, CAMHS Research and Implementation Nurse Lead in South London. Carrie-Ann's job is all about building research capacity and capability across the mental health nurse workforce
- Emmeline Lagunes-Cordoba, Psychiatrist from Mexico, where she trained in general adult psychiatry and psychotherapy. Emmeline moved to the UK in 2013 to do a PhD in mental health stigma at KCL. She now works in a crisis team in North London
- Becca Read, Clinical Psychologist from Leicestershire. Becca recently completed her clinical psychology doctorate. Now working in the Recovery and Support Team in Richmond

General examples of using evidence in every day mental health practice

Carrie-Ann talks about a paper that was a catalyst for reviewing physical health needs on her CAMHS inpatient unit.
Carney R, Firth J, Pedley R, Law H, Parker S, Lovell K. The clinical and behavioral cardiometabolic risk of children and young people on mental health inpatient units: A systematic review and meta-analysis. Gen Hosp Psychiatry. 2021;70:80-97. doi:10.1016/j.genhosppsych.2021.03.007
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8135692/

Becca talks about a paper that helped her and her early intervention in psychosis team colleagues think through the feelings of disengagement felt by young people in their service and how they could respond:
Davidson L, Roe D, Andres-Hyman R, Ridgway P. Applying stages of change models to recovery from serious mental illness: contributions and limitations. Isr J Psychiatry Relat Sci. 2010;47(3):213-21. PMID: 21149986.
https://doctorsonly.co.il/wp-content/uploads/2011/12/2010_3_7.pdf

Emmeline talks about a meta-analysis that she used when choosing medication to treat a patient:
Taylor, DM, Cornelius, V, Smith, L, Young, AH. Comparative efficacy and acceptability of drug treatments for bipolar depression: a multiple-treatments meta-analysis. Acta-Psych-Scand 2014
https://doi.org/10.1111/acps.12343

The world wide woodland

Emmeline talks about an article in The Guardian about the pandemic and psychosis
https://www.theguardian.com/society/2021/oct/18/psychosis-cases-soar-in-england-as-pandemic-hits-mental-health

Becca talks about a BBC news story on Individual Placement and Support
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-58830648

Carrie Ann talks about a new report from The Wellcome Trust about an international survey on anxiety and depression https://wellcome.org/reports/wellcome-global-monitor-covid-19/2020

Elf Nuggets - science making a difference in mental health

Emmeline talks about antidepressants in young people
https://www.nationalelfservice.net/treatment/antidepressants/antidepressants-youth-depression-anxiety-activeingredientsmh/

Becca talks about autism diagnosis and misdiagnosis
https://www.nationalelfservice.net/learning-disabilities/autistic-spectrum-disorder/undiagnosed-autism/

Carrie-Ann talks about self-harm in young people
https://www.nationalelfservice.net/mental-health/self-harm/self-harm-primary-care/

Ron Kessler, “Pragmatic Precision Psychiatry”
Ronald C. Kessler, Ph.D. is the McNeil Family Professor of Health Care Policy at Harvard Medical School and Director of the World Health Organization World Mental Health (WMH) Survey Initiative.

Jon Roiser, “Towards mechanistic precision psychiatry"
Jonathan Roiser is Professor of Neuroscience and Mental Health and Deputy Director of the UCL Institute of Cognitive Neuroscience.

Precision psychiatry talks by Ron Kessler and Jon Roiser will take place at the forthcoming IoMH Annual Conference, which takes place online on Wednesday 15th September 2021: https://www.ucl.ac.uk/mental-health/iomh-conference/conference-programme

Tickets cost £10 and can be purchased here: https://www.ucl.ac.uk/mental-health/iomh-conference/conference-registration

Towards coproduction: Involvement in the Mental Health Policy Research Unit

Merle Schlief, "Co-production on the PRU Covid interviews project: what we did"

Jackie Hardy, Tamar Jeynes and Mary Birken, "Co-production on the PRU Covid interviews project: reflections - Panel discussion"

The IoMH Annual Conference takes place online on Wednesday 15th September 2021: www.ucl.ac.uk/mental-health/iomh…nference-programme

Tickets cost £10 and can be purchased here: https://www.ucl.ac.uk/mental-health/iomh-conference/conference-registration

Dr Alexandra Pitman is an Associate Professor in Psychiatry in the UCL Division of Psychiatry and an Honorary Consultant Psychiatrist at Camden and Islington NHS Foundation Trust. Her research interests are in the epidemiology of suicide and self-harm, and preventing suicide.

She will be giving a talk on “The impact of peer suicide, suicide attempt, and self-harm on risk of self-harm and suicidal behaviour” at the forthcoming IoMH Annual Conference, which takes place online on Wednesday 15th September 2021: www.ucl.ac.uk/mental-health/iomh…nference-programme

Poster presentations can be submitted here: www.ucl.ac.uk/mental-health/iomh…ster-presentations

Tickets cost £10 and can be purchased here: www.ucl.ac.uk/mental-health/iomh…rence-registration

If you're in crisis and need to talk right now, there are many helplines staffed by trained people ready to listen. They won't judge you, and could help you make sense of what you're feeling.

Samaritans. To talk about anything that is upsetting you, you can contact Samaritans 24 hours a day, 365 days a year. You can call 116 123 (free from any phone), email jo@samaritans.org or visit some branches in person. You can also call the Samaritans Welsh Language Line on 0808 164 0123 (7pm–11pm every day).

SANEline. If you're experiencing a mental health problem or supporting someone else, you can call SANEline on 0300 304 7000 (4.30pm–10.30pm every day).

Campaign Against Living Miserably (CALM). You can call the CALM on 0800 58 58 58 (5pm–midnight every day) if oyou are struggling and need to talk. Or if you prefer not to speak on the phone, you could try the CALM webchat service.

Urgent mental health helplines (England only)

If you live in England, you can call a local NHS urgent mental health helpline for support during a mental health crisis. Anyone can call these helplines, at any time. These helplines offer similar support to a crisis team. The NHS website has more information on urgent mental health helplines, including how to find your local helpline.

Professor Laurence Kirmayer from McGill University is a psychiatrist and expert in transcultural psychiatry.

He will be giving the opening keynote talk at the 21st Australasian Conference on Traumatic Stress, which will take place online on 14-18 September 2021: www.acots.org/

Prof Kirmayer's talk is entitled: "Landscapes of trauma: A social-ecological approach to cultural diversity in mental health research, theory and practice.".

The 2021 ACOTS conference is a collaboration between ASTSS (the Australasian Society for Traumatic Stress Studies) and Phoenix Australia – Centre for Posttraumatic Mental Health.

The 2021 virtual conference will be of interest to a broad range of people interested in trauma, including practitioners, researchers, consumers, service developers and policy makers.

Dr Duleeka Knipe is a Vice Chancellor's Fellow, Bristol Medical School (PHS) at the University of Bristol.

She will be giving a talk in the forthcoming IoMH Annual Conference, which takes place online on Wednesday 15th September 2021: https://www.ucl.ac.uk/mental-health/iomh-conference/conference-programme

Dr Duleeka Knipe's talk is entitled: "Suicide in low and middle-income countries – what do we know?".

Poster presentations can be submitted here: https://www.ucl.ac.uk/mental-health/iomh-conference/iomh-conference-poster-presentations

Tickets cost £10 and can be purchased here: https://www.ucl.ac.uk/mental-health/iomh-conference/conference-registration

If you are interested to read more about means restriction in Sri Lanka you can read the following blogs:
https://theconversation.com/pesticides-and-suicide-prevention-why-research-needs-to-be-put-into-practice-102533
https://unearthed.greenpeace.org/2021/03/24/paraquat-papers-syngenta-toxic-pesticide-gramoxone/


If you're in crisis and need to talk right now, there are many helplines staffed by trained people ready to listen. They won't judge you, and could help you make sense of what you're feeling.

Samaritans. To talk about anything that is upsetting you, you can contact Samaritans 24 hours a day, 365 days a year. You can call 116 123 (free from any phone), email jo@samaritans.org or visit some branches in person. You can also call the Samaritans Welsh Language Line on 0808 164 0123 (7pm–11pm every day).

SANEline. If you're experiencing a mental health problem or supporting someone else, you can call SANEline on 0300 304 7000 (4.30pm–10.30pm every day).

Campaign Against Living Miserably (CALM). You can call the CALM on 0800 58 58 58 (5pm–midnight every day) if oyou are struggling and need to talk. Or if you prefer not to speak on the phone, you could try the CALM webchat service.

Urgent mental health helplines (England only)

If you live in England, you can call a local NHS urgent mental health helpline for support during a mental health crisis. Anyone can call these helplines, at any time. These helplines offer similar support to a crisis team. The NHS website has more information on urgent mental health helplines, including how to find your local helpline.