Professor Geoffrey Tofler Clinical Academic, Medical Director of Preventative Cardiology at RNSH and the Heart Failure Program at NSLHD In Preventative Cardiology, Professor Tofler leads a multidisciplinary team that recently published in the American Heart Journal findings from the first randomised controlled clinical trial to show it is possible to reduce several cardiac risk factors during early bereavement, without adversely affecting the grieving process. The paper, which had been previously awarded the CSANZ Preventive Cardiology Prize, and received national and international attention, was inspired by the increased heart attack and death rate among recently bereaved people, particularly those grieving a spouse or child. In a second program of work on heart failure, the group published findings from its database of 7000 patients on precipitants of heart failure hospitalisation and the risk of rehospitalisations, to address the ongoing challenge of how to minimise heart failure hospitalisations. The International Journal of Cardiology publication showed that three quarters of the patients identified one or more precipitating factors.
Professor Gin Malhi Clinical Academic and Head of Department of Academic Psychiatry The last year has been important with respect to University of Sydney mental health research within the NSLHD. Two major long-term ambitious projects have come to fruition. The first involved identifying changes within the brain that could be used to predict the onset of anxiety and depression. This study examined the brains of adolescent girls using functional MRI between the ages of 12 and 17 years and identified changes within the hippocampus and neural networks related to one’s sense of self. These ground breaking findings have been published in top tier journals including the British Journal of Psychiatry and Psychoneuroendocrinology and provide a clear signal as to where we need to be looking within the brain to better understand the origins of depression. The second set of studies again used neuroimaging to understand the neural basis of suicidal thinking in adults with mood disorders. This research has found that suicide attempts fundamentally alter neuronal connections within the brain, explaining why suicide is more likely in those that have attempted it in the past. It also identified abnormalities within the default mode network of the brain and networks that serve to regulate emotional tone. Again, this research, which has been published in international journals such as Psychological Medicine and Acta Psychiatrica Scandinavica , provides novel and valuable mechanistic insights that we are pursuing further to seek out interventions that can alter these changes and reduce the risk of suicide.
11
Made with FlippingBook - professional solution for displaying marketing and sales documents online