Symposium on Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analysis in Mental Health

Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analysis plays a pivotal role in mental health research. In this symposium we will discuss the basic of Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analysis commonly used in mental health research. We would try to answer all the below mentioned questions through examples in the symposium. 1.What is Systematic Reviews? 2.What is Meta-Analysis? 3.Why Meta-Analysis is important in mental health research? 4.What are the landmark studies in Mental Health Research using Meta- Analysis? 5.What are the software packages used for Meta-Analysis? Mental Health Research, Meta-Analysis. Titles of presentation: 1.Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analysis in Mental Health Research: An overview : Prof. Basudeb Das; 2.Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analysis in Mental Health Research: Some Landmark Studies: Dr. Avinash Sharma; 3.Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analysis: Statistical issues & Software packages: Hariom Pachori. Details of speakers: 1.Prof. Basudeb Das, Director & Director Professor of Psychiatry, Central Institute of Psychiatry, Kanke, Ranchi-834006. 2.Hariom Pachori, Statistician, Central Institute of Psychiatry, Kanke, Ranchi-834006. 3.Dr. Avinash Sharma, Associate Professor of Psychiatry, Central Institute of Psychiatry, Kanke, Ranchi-834006. Identifying and capitalizing nonacademic skills in the management of Specific Learning Disorder Specific learning disorders (SLD)is one of the most common psychiatric disorder that led to scholastic backwardness in children. Studies reported decreased activities in left temporal and parietal cortex, increased activities in right frontal and temporal regions and reduced hemispherical asymmetry in dyslexic children. Reduced abilities in scholastic skills are postulated to be due to hemispherical asymmetry. Studies reported that the left side of brain is the area of academic skills such as critical thinking, reasoning, language, and numerical ability. The functions of the right side of brain are more related to creativity, imagination, emotional recognition. Though the two hemispheres of the brain work together to perform its functions, and the dichotomy is not established, clinically we observe that, in children with SLD, the non-academic skills attributed in the right side of brain is better functioning. In our Child and Adolescent Clinic, we routinely screen for the non- academic skills and use them for the individually tailored management of the children which we found to be useful. Most of the studies conducted on the interventions of SLD focussed on improving the academic skills. After widely searching the literature, we could not find any research focusing on developing the right brain skills of SLD children and using those skills in the management of SLD. Identifying the non-academic right brain skills and using them will help in rehabilitation, future career and educating the parents. Overview- Dr. Varghese P. Punnoose Identification of non-academic skills- Dr. Parvathy RS Usefulness of identification of non-academic skills in the psychoeducation- Dr. Bettina Sara Mathew Importance of non-academic skills in the management plan- Dr. Ganga G Kaimal Left – Right brain dichotomy- myths and facts - Dr Sneha Susan Varghese