Colleagues at UCSF shared this list of resources for people in a crisis in the Bay Area. We share this here in the hope that it can be helpful. Please let us know if there are corrections or updates… Alameda National Suicide Prevention Lifeline: Call 1-800-273-TALK Substance Use Treatment & Referral Helpline: 1-844-682-7215 Crisis Support Services Suicide Prevention: (800) 309-2131 …
Exercise and Mental Health – A Therapist’s Guide
This is a great resource from Psychology Tools, with a huge amount of information about the use of exercise in treatment of mental illness, and a long bibliography of articles describing evidence related to the use of exercise, impact of physical exercise on mental health, ways of encouraging clients to exercise, and biological, psychological and social mechanisms by which exercise …
Bipolar Workbook from Gateway Psychiatric
Gateway Psychiatric Services is excited to announce the release of our latest book: The Bipolar Disorder Workbook from Callisto Media. Designed to educate and motivate people who have questions, particularly about Bipolar II and cyclothymia, the workbook walks users through a series of structured exercises, beginning with a basic checklist intended to identify symptoms that may warrant further investigation. The …
Biofeedback at Gateway Psychiatric
Biofeedback is a stress management technique that uses devices that give you information about your body’s physiologic response to stress. The idea is to provide you with information that would ordinarily be outside of your conscious awareness, such as your body temperature, blood pressure, or heart rate. Generally, there are three stages of biofeedback: Developing increased awareness of the body …
Antidepressant Diet Cookbook
Two recent studies suggest that the Mediterranean diet may be an antidepressant diet as well as the diet that reduces heart disease, inflammation, and the risk of dementia. In the SMILES trial 65 patients with depression were randomized to a Mediterranean diet based intervention (a diet support group) or a social support group. The group excluded people who were treatment …
Foundations of Wellbeing
In the beginning of this year we sent out an invitation to our patient’s to sign up for the Foundations of Wellbeing program developed by neuroscientist Rick Hanson and were very pleased by the response. Since then we’ve been hearing from those who signed up that the program has had a significant effect on their mental health. A representative comment …
Nutrition and Diet Update
Nutrition and Diet Update We recently updated the overall guidelines in our healthy diet page to incorporate information from the largest study today looking at diet and its effect on overall mortality. It’s worth summarizing both the strengths and weaknesses of this study which was published in two articles in the Lancet. It is the largest study to date. Nearly 140,000 …
Pill Minder and Information Source
David Pogue recently reviewed 47 apps that can serve as a pill minder and information source and selected one that clearly outshone the others. But first, why is this important? This is some information from his article in Yahoo Finance… An estimated 187 million Americans (58%) are on at least one prescription drug. (Source: Network for Excellence in Health Innovation …
Online Recovery Resources
Accessing Online Recovery Resources from Afar Recently I had a patient relocate to Spain who had been in recovery from alcohol for one year. She was very concerned about leaving her recovery community and was surprised to learn that she could continue to access support online from afar. Initially she was skeptical about accessing support online. However, after trying out …
UCSF Bipolar Education Group Starts Again
Dr. Descartes Li, an expert in Bipolar Disorder at UCSF runs an excellent 8 session program for people with bipolar who are interested in learning more. Here is the latest information about the group which starts at the end of February. The UCSF bipolar psychoeducational group starts on February 27, 2017. It runs for 8 sessions, Mondays 12pm to 115pm. …