Clicking into my phone this morning one hour after waking up, in line with my new practice to reduce screen time and protect my headspace as I prepared to launch into the day, I was greeted with multiple posters and salutations from different quarters/people commemorating "INTERNATIONAL MEN'S DAY" 2023. 

Although the thought of men being celebrated felt good at first glance, I could have sworn that it was a prank. International men's day? What is this all about? I whispered to myself. Then I did a little search and only this morning did I realise that, International Men's Day is observed annually on November 19th to focus on men's health, promote gender equality, and celebrate the positive contributions men make to society. It provides an opportunity to address issues such as men's mental health, toxic masculinity, and the challenges faced by men in various areas of life. This year the central theme is "ZERO MALE SUICIDE", as illustrated in one of the official International men's day home page poster below.

If I had my way I would focus on celebrating the positive contributions men make to society all day, everyday, alongside our women-folk. From the relentless hard work to ensure a baseline level of comfort and safety on the nuclear family front, to various amazing contributions in different quarters, including professionally and otherwise, at different levels. It is however pertinent to recognise the fact that, of the approximately 700,000 people who die due to suicide every year, men are more likely to make a large percentage of this sad statistic, with rates quoted to be three times higher compared to women. If you ask for my opinion I'll say it doesn't do the world any good if the reverse was the case, as every single case of suicide is one too many. The theme today however got me reflecting on the various challenges that men could possibly encounter in their journey through life and I stumbled on the below statistics poster that made the rounds 5 years ago.

Although the practice of comparing male to female outcomes (and coming up with indices like the ones noted above) might be an age long phenomenon, I will urge readers to keep an open mind and take a more positive/holistic approach to these and related issues. International men's day should be a day to reflect on how to contribute our quotas both individually, as men living by example, and as a group, to not only appreciate the flavour men should ideally bring to everywhere we find ourselves but to also work on reducing the statistics to zero percent (0 %) for every single challenge. It would have been amazing if we could all possess magic wands 💫 to wave at these issues and make them go away. Unfortunately even against all odds, as the case may be in several regions of the world we live in today, we all have to persistently make concerted efforts to pull our weights and tackle the challenges one day at a time, until we can pat our chests to say that we have made significant progress and beyond. For those who are struggling with any form of anxiety and depression, the major precursor to suicide, please seek professional help as soon as possible and do not leave your family in the dark or put them through a lifetime of emotional pain, as Lori Prichard described in the TEDx Ogden YouTube footage below. 

                              What I learned from my husband's suicide | Lori Prichard | TEDx Ogden

A  Minister for Suicide prevention was appointed in the United Kingdom earlier  this week and the first question that comes to mind is "WHY"?  Was it necessary to separate such a portfolio from the general Health portfolio ran by the current Health Secretary?

According to the Office for National Statistics (ONS), 5821 suicide cases were registered in the UK in 2017; an average rate of 10 deaths for every 100,000 persons in the Kingdom. Though suicide rates are said to be falling in the United Kingdom when expert reviewed statistics are considered from as far back as the 1980's, no fewer than 4500 cases on the average are still reported to be recorded annually and the British Prime Minister supported with her team of Advisers have made this bold statement to say, enough is enough. Before her appointment as Minister for Suicide Prevention, Jacqueline Doyle-Price was a Member of Parliament and was appointed as Junior Minister in the Department of Health on the 14th of June, 2017. Not sure how she plans to reduce the numbers further but this focus will certainly create some undivided attention for Mental Health in the Country and that's a good thing for sure.

Jacqueline Doyle-Price - New UK Minister For Suicide Prevention. 👀: beta.parliarment.uk

Should this all important move be replicated by other countries? On the global front this infographics by the World Health Organisation gives an insight into the magnitude of the problem.


Instead of a "Commissioner of Enjoyment" and what not, would a "Minister for Suicide Prevention" and a National Suicide Prevention Strategy  be recommended for every Country instead? Kindly respond in the comments section below. For more information of the global action towards "Suicide Prevention", refer to the References below.

REFERENCES:
* BBC NEWS|World Mental Health Day:PM Appoints Suicide Prevention Minister

* ONS|Suicide In The UK:2017 Registrations

* WHO|Suicide Prevention

This year, the theme for "World Mental Health Day 2018" is "Young People And Mental Health In A Changing World" and the big question is "what about it"?

The world has changed a lot in the last 10 to 20 years, compared to what it used to be and whether our older generation choose to accept the fact or not, more than ever before, people are at greater risk of tilting into the dark side mentally and young people are at the heart of it all. "During our time this and that would be the case and all of these...... would be seen as insanity", the older ones in their late 50's and above would say. Sorry the world is changing and all of whatever...... is no longer seen as insanity yet, new generation young brains have to accept and assimilate these new happenings as normal. War situations in various parts of the world now seem to be normal trend; diminishing economic circumstances in many parts of the third world now seem like normal trend; sexual orientations of all kinds are beginning to emerge and the vulnerable young ones are even getting more confused by the day. How about the incidence of moderate to severe depression and mid-life crisis amongst older youth? Etc.

Such a theme for a focus of discussion was obviously long over due. World Health Organisation (WHO) statistics indicate that mental illnesses can start from as early as 14 years of age but many a time go unnoticed until much later. Suicide has been identified as the leading cause of death amongst "15 to 29 year olds" worldwide and if you have really been in one of them fixated moods, then you will realise that, when support tends to be required the most, there really is no one to talk to. This year, as a Health related Blogging platform we are joining WHO to say,"Hello Youngster -  WE ARE IN IT TOGETHER - IF YOU HAVE NO ONE ELSE TO TALK TO - TALK TO US".

You can always send a message via our "CONTACT FORM" located towards the bottom right hand corner on the home page or any other page of this Blog and be sure to receive an email response in less than 24 to 48 hours. Otherwise you can drop a comment in the comment section of this article and someone will certainly get through to you. We have helped quite a few people and are happy to talk with and support much more people. Young people are the leaders of tomorrow and our minds must be guarded preciously, if we hope to have a sane world tomorrow to come. For more details and information about "World Mental Health Day 2018" click on the References below.

REFERENCES:
* WHO|World Mental Health Day 2018

* World Federation For Mental Health|World Mental Health Day 2018

• Genetic factors: some people have an increased genetic predisposition to mental illnesses 
• Family history: history of mental illness in a relative increases its incidence
• Environmental factors: war, natural disasters, unstable and violent environment
• Social causes such as alcohol use, substance use, stress, etc.                    

We may be overemphasizing happiness.

Researchers have found that alternative enactment techniques -- such as acting -- can improve patients' perspective memory. Academics involved in the study claim the new method is particularly beneficial for people with mild cognitive impairment (which could suggest early stages of Alzheimer's disease) and can provide a cost-effective alternative that can support independent living.

Have you ever been shopping and returned home to find that you have forgotten to buy the very item you went shopping for? Have you known it was going to rain yet left your umbrella at home? Have you gone out and left the television on?

All these instances are examples where prospective memory has failed -- you have not remembered to take the action you had planned. While these examples are comparatively trivial, poor prospective memory can have serious consequences -- forgetting to take medication, or leaving the stove on, for example.

A failing prospective memory can be an early sign of Alzheimer's disease, according to University of Chichester psychologists, and new therapeutic methods are being used to utilise levels of prospective memory as a means to accurately diagnose diseases of cognitive impairment. Such methods can be effective non-invasive alternatives to traditional clinical methods such as the extraction of cerebral spinal fluid.

In research published in the journal "Neuropsychology," a team led by the University of Chichester has studied prospective memory performance of 96 participants including patients with mild cognitive impairment aged 64 to 87 years, healthy older adults aged 62 to 84 years and younger adults aged 18 to 22 years.

The study, which also included members from Radboud University Nijmegen, Sussex Partnership NHS Foundation Trust and the University of Lisbon, looked at prospective memory performance before the introduction of an enhancement technique and compared it with performance after the enhancement technique. The technique used was encoded enactment, where subjects were encouraged to act through the activity they must remember to do.

All age groups reported improvement in prospective memory, but it was particularly marked in those older subjects with mild cognitive impairment, that is, potentially in the early stages of Alzheimer's disease. The study suggests that encouraging people in this category to adopt enactment as a means to enhance prospective memory could result in them leading independent, autonomous lives for longer

Leading the study was Dr Antonina Pereira from the University of Chichester. She said: "Poor prospective memory can range from the vaguely annoying to life threatening, depending on the circumstances. We wanted to confirm two things -- that prospective memory deteriorates with age and that enactment techniques might support those with a poor prospective memory."

She added: "We did indeed find that prospective memory erodes as we get older, and our early findings in this little researched area would suggest that enactment techniques are effective in improving prospective memory. We were heartened to see that there was improvement in our group with mild cognitive impairment. Enactment techniques offer the potential for a cost-effective and widely applicable method that can support independent living. This contributes to an individual's health, well-being and social relationships while reducing the burden of care."

Antonina's tip for overcoming poor prospective memory

"The next time you would like to remember to pick up a pint of milk from the store on your way home, do not wait until you have got home to realise you have forgotten to do it. Instead, recreate the action you would like to remember, pretending that you are actually doing it, in as much vivid detail as possible. This might feel awkward to begin with, but it has been identified as an optimal technique to enhance prospective memory. It can have very long lasting effects and work even for people with cognitive impairment. Acting is the key."

Story Source:

Materials provided by University of Chichester. Note: Content may be edited for style and length.

Ballet couples on contemporary music. How does much affect mood and performance?

It doesn't matter if it's Bach, the Beatles, Brad Paisley or Bruno Mars. Your favorite music likely triggers a similar type of activity in your brain as other people's favorites do in theirs.

That's one of the things Jonathan Burdette, M.D., has found in researching music's effects on the brain.

"Music is primal. It affects all of us, but in very personal, unique ways," said Burdette, a neuroradiologist at Wake Forest Baptist Medical Center. "Your interaction with music is different than mine, but it's still powerful.

"Your brain has a reaction when you like or don't like something, including music. We've been able to take some baby steps into seeing that, and 'dislike' looks different than 'like' and much different than 'favorite.'"

To study how music preferences might affect functional brain connectivity -- the interactions among separate areas of the brain -- Burdette and his fellow investigators used functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI), which depicts brain activity by detecting changes in blood flow. Scans were made of 21 people while they listened to music they said they most liked and disliked from among five genres (classical, country, rap, rock and Chinese opera) and to a song or piece of music they had previously named as their personal favorite.

Those fMRI scans showed a consistent pattern: The listeners' preferences, not the type of music they were listening to, had the greatest impact on brain connectivity -- especially on a brain circuit known to be involved in internally focused thought, empathy and self-awareness. This circuit, called the default mode network, was poorly connected when the participants were listening to the music they disliked, better connected when listening to the music they liked and the most connected when listening to their favorites.

The researchers also found that listening to favorite songs altered the connectivity between auditory brain areas and a region responsible for memory and social emotion consolidation.

"Given that music preferences are uniquely individualized phenomena and that music can vary in acoustic complexity and the presence or absence of lyrics, the consistency of our results was unexpected," the researchers wrote in the journal Nature Scientific Reports (Aug. 28, 2014). "These findings may explain why comparable emotional and mental states can be experienced by people listening to music that differs as widely as Beethoven and Eminem."

Not surprising to Burdette was the extent of the connectivity seen in the participants' brains when they were listening to their favorite tunes.

"There are probably some features in music that make you feel a certain way, but it's your experience with it that is even more important," said Burdette, who also is professor of radiology and vice chairman of research at Wake Forest School of Medicine. "Your associations with certain music involve many different parts of the brain, and they're very strong.

"In some cases, you might not even like the particular song, but you like the memories or feelings that you associate with it."

In other research projects, Burdette and colleagues at the School of Medicine and the University of North Carolina-Greensboro have found that trained music conductors are likely to be better at combining and using auditory and visual clues than people without musical training; that activity in brain areas associated with vision decreases during tasks that involve listening; and that different levels of complexity in music can have different effects on functional brain connectivity.

"I find this type of work fascinating, because I think music is so important," Burdette said. "If science can help get more people to recognize what music does to and for us, great."

Music is just a small part of Burdette's research activities -- his most recently published study, for example, showed that brain volume could be an accurate predictor of success in weight-loss attempts by the elderly -- but it has long been a big of part his life.

Burdette grew up playing viola, piano and guitar. He has been singing since childhood and continues to do so, including in the chorus in productions staged by the Piedmont Opera, of which he has been a board member for more than 10 years. He's also done some conducting. His wife, Shona Simpson, plays piano. Their three teenage daughters -- Fiona, Ellie and Jessie -- perform professionally as the Dan River Girls. His brother, Kevin, is a singer who has appeared as a soloist with the Metropolitan Opera, Los Angeles Philharmonic and other top-tier opera companies and symphony orchestras.

"Music is my avocation," the physician in the family said. "Radiology is my vocation."

Burdette additionally has deep interest, if not direct involvement, in music's clinical applications.

"Music isn't going to cure anything, but it definitely can play a therapeutic role," he said.

In countries such as Germany, Burdette noted, music therapy is commonly an integral part of the rehabilitation process for people who have had strokes, brain surgery or traumatic brain injuries.

"If you're trying to restore neuroplasticity in the brain, to re-establish some of the connections that were there before the injury, music can be a big help, and I'd like to see it used more widely in this country," he said.

Burdette also is a proponent of programs that help people with Alzheimer's, dementia and other cognitive and physical problems re-connect with the world through music. One such program is Music & Memory, which employs iPods with customized playlists featuring songs popular when the participating individual was under 30 years old.

"You can actually see the power of music," Burdette said. "People who were just sitting there, not engaged in anything, light up when they start hearing music from when they were 25.

"It's fantastic. What else can do that? I can't think of anything other than music."

Travel can be stressful, exasperating, and yes, downright enraging. In the past week or so, three planes have been diverted thanks to passenger scuffles—one caused by a woman who demanded her Delta flight land after a passenger's reclining seat struck her head, and another the result of the Knee Defender, a plastic bracket one man used to prevent the seat in front of him from reclining. Yes, "recliner rage" is now a thing.

A conflict with a fellow passenger doesn't have to lead to a total travel meltdown. To keep your calm while getting out of town for work or play, try these top tips from Gail Saltz, MD, Health‘s contributing psychology editor and author of Anatomy of a Secret Life.

Don't be a control freak

When you're on the road, you’re often at the mercy of external factors—the weather, that guy who stole the last parking space. “When something goes wrong, people tend to look for solutions, thinking if they do X, they will solve Y. Unfortunately, that’s not always the case during vacations, when much less is under your control,” says Saltz. Her suggestion? Acknowledge that you can’t control everything. “You can’t do anything about the airline losing your luggage or you missing your plane, but you can channel your thoughts into the enjoyable aspects of your trip,” she says. Yes, snafus suck, but accepting that you’ve done all you can do (and thinking about your planned kayak adventure) can be a therapeutic fix.

Be a mindful traveler

Even the most meticulously planned trip can cause some apprehension, discomfort, and stress. “The more stress you feel, the more your adrenal glands produce cortisol, and once you’re down the cascade of fight-or-flight reactions, it’s hard to turn back,” says Saltz, who recently led a Health Twitter chat on stress. If you feel flushed, angry, and irritated—some of the common signs of anxiety—stop what you’re doing, take a moment to acknowledge the stressful trigger, and focus on something calm in the present, like your child’s green eyes or a passing cloud. Being mindful of the here-and-now will help slow your spiraling anxiety about "what ifs?".

Let it go

When things don't go our way, we often cope with the stress by playing the blame game. “People tend to direct their anger at the pilot, the driver, the guy reclining in his seat and smashing your knees, but pointing to one person won’t fix your problems,” notes Saltz. Instead, she says, acknowledge that the system isn’t working and accept that things go wrong. Your luggage got lost? Pick up a t-shirt and focus on the vacation you’re having, rather than the dress you could have been wearing. In other words, don’t let one incident ruin the great memories you’ll have for years to come.