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Summary: Several stress‐related mental disorders are characterised by disturbed sleep, but objective sleep biomarkers are not routinely examined in psychiatric patients. We examined the use of wearable‐based sleep biomarkers in a psychiatric sample with headband electroencephalography (EEG) including pulse photoplethysmography (PPG), with an additional focus on microstructural elements as especially the shift from low to high frequencies appears relevant for several stress‐related mental disorders. We analysed 371 nights of sufficient quality from 83 healthy participants and those with a confirmed stress‐related mental disorder (anxiety‐affective spectrum). The median value of macrostructural, microstructural (spectral slope fitting), and heart rate variables was calculated across nights and analysed at the individual level (N = 83). The headbands were accepted well by patients and the data quality was sufficient for most nights. The macrostructural analyses revealed trends for significance regarding sleep continuity but not sleep depth variables. The spectral analyses yielded no between‐group differences except for a group × age interaction, with the normal age‐related decline in the low versus high frequency power ratio flattening in the patient group. The PPG analyses showed that the mean heart rate was higher in the patient group in pre‐sleep epochs, a difference that reduced during sleep and dissipated at wakefulness. Wearable devices that record EEG and/or PPG could be used over multiple nights to assess sleep fragmentation, spectral balance, and sympathetic drive throughout the sleep–wake cycle in patients with stress‐related mental disorders and healthy controls, although macrostructural and spectral markers did not differ between the two groups. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Nightmare disorder is a prevalent parasomnia characterized by vivid and highly unpleasant dream experiences during night time sleep. The neural background of disturbed dreaming was proposed to be associated with impaired prefrontal and fronto-limbic functioning during REM sleep. We hypothesized that the impaired prefrontal and fronto-limbic functioning in subjects with frequent nightmares would be reflected at the behavioral level during waking tasks as well. 35-35 Subjects with frequent nightmares and matched controls participated in "Study 1", involving an Emotional Go/NoGo, an Emotional Stroop task, and a Verbal Fluency task. Nightmare subjects exhibited longer reaction times in the Emotional Go/NoGo and Emotional Stroop tasks. Moreover, they committed more perseveration errors and showed less fluent word generation in the Verbal Fluency task. Nightmare subjects showed an overall slowing irrespective of the valence of the stimuli. While the effects of sleep quality and waking anxiety were associated to these deficits in some cases, these factors could not solely explain the difference between the two groups. In "Study 2", 17 subjects with frequent nightmares and 18 controls were compared by a Color-word and an Emotional, block design Stroop task in order to avoid the slow effects of emotional interference potentially caused by previous items. Nightmare subjects were characterized by an overall slowing in the Emotional Stroop task, irrespective of the valence of the stimuli. In the Color-word Stroop task, nightmare subjects were not significantly slower in comparison with controls. Our results suggest that individuals with frequent nightmares are impaired in executive tasks involving the suppression of task-irrelevant semantic representations. (Contains 2 figures and 1 table.)

Aims: The main target of our research was to measure the changes in psychological symptoms (anxiety, depression, craving) of patients receiving buprenorphine-naloxone substitution treatment for six months, and the evaluation of the changes using the clients' dependency parameters (ASI)., Methods: The level of dependency was investigated using the Addicton Severity Index (ASI). The psychiatric symptoms related to Axis I and II disorders were examined using the Structured Clinical Interview for DSM-IV, SCID I and SCID II. The degree of craving was measured using the Heroin Craving Questionnaire, the assessment of the symptoms of depression using BDI and HAM-D, recorded by the medical attendant of the patient. To survey the extent of anxiety, we used STAI-S, and HAM-A. All patients receiving Suboxone therapy in Hungary between November 2007 and April 2008 were included in the study (n=80). During this time, Suboxone therapy was available in 6 locations., Results: We found significant improvement in almost all observed fields of behavioural and symptomatic dimensions during the first month. The only exception was the dimension of subsistence/livelihood of ASI, the changes were only at the tendency level. During the next five months of therapy, there was no further sign of improvement or decline in the observed fields, the only exception was again the subsistence/livelihood dimension of the ASI., Conclusions: Our results indicate that buprenorphine/naloxone treatment is a promising possibility for patients in need of opiate-substitution treatment.

Aim: Psychometric properties of the Hungarian version of the original and the short form of the Positive and Negative Affect Schedule (PANAS) were investigated in the present study., Methods: Participants were undergraduate university students (N=1163) and patients visiting their General Practitioners (GPs) for various somatic complaints (N=466)., Results: According to the confirmatory factor analysis, both versions showed adequate fit to the theoretical one-and-one (positive and negative affect) factor model. Internal consistency coefficients (Cronbach-alpha values) were above .8 for the original positive and negative scales, .73 and .79 for the short positive scale, and .65 and .67 for the short negative scale in the student and the patient groups, respectively. The correlations between the original 10-item subscales and their 5-item counterparts were above .9 in both groups., Conclusion: The short PANAS scale represents a good and practical alternative for the original version, with lower but still acceptable internal consistency values.