New legal highs warning

A warning about new "legal highs"has been issued by Wales Drug and Alcohol Helpline. With mephedrone recently banned as a Class B drug, clubbers are looking for alternatives and 400 have been identified on the Internet

Read the full article

Alcohol dependency increases prescriptions

Statistics released from the NHS Information Centre show that there was a 12% increase last year in prescriptions handed out to deal with alcohol dependency in England. The figures cited compared the prescribing of two particular drugs in 2009 with that in 2008. However, experts caution that it may be a matter of increased willingless of patients to face their addiction rather than an increase in alcoholism itself.

Read the full article
Read the report

Loneliness and the social networking generation

A survey commissioned by the Mental Health Foundation surprisingly found that in this day of instant messaging and social networking it is the young and not the older generation who are more prone to loneliness. The charities report The Lonely Society cited changes in society and family life as being the key reasons for feelings of isolation.

Read the full article

Creativity and mental health

Scientists have linked creativity to schizophrenia by studying the receptors in the brain.The study from the Karolinska Institutet found that dopomine levels in creative people are similar to the levels found in in the brains of schizophrenics.

Read the full article

The recesssion and workplace stress

The charity MIND commissioned a survey of 2,050 workers to assess the effects of the recession on mental health. It found that fears about job security, longer hours or a cut in hours had resulted in 1 in 11 British workers consulting their GP due to stress, anxiety or depression


Read the full BBC article
Read the MIND press release

Mental health and "green exercise"

A study in the Environmental Science and Technology journal concludes that all it takes is five minutes of exercise in an outdoor setting such as a park, wood or garden to help maintain mental well being. The different exercises taken into consideration ranged from gardening to horse riding.

Read the full article