Published papers

© 2019 Wolters Kluwer Health, Inc. All rights reserved. Objectives Delirium following electroconvulsive therapy (ECT) has been a clinical challenge, which, however, has not been investigated through a systematic literature review. The objective of this study was to systematically synthesize available evidence regarding factors associated with post-ECT delirium. Methods We conducted a systematic literature search for any type of original investigations that reported risk factors of post-ECT delirium, using PubMed. Results The literature search identified 43 relevant articles. One study found an association between catatonic feature and increased risk of postictal delirium. Five studies reported that the presence of cerebrovascular disease, Parkinson disease, or dementia was related to higher incidence of post-ECT delirium. Incidence of post-ECT course delirium was increased with bitemporal stimulation (3 studies). One study showed that ultrabrief pulse ECT reduced reorientation time following seizure compared with brief pulse ECT. High stimulus intensity resulted in more prolonged reorientation time after ECT than lower stimulus intensity (2 studies). Longer seizure length was significantly associated with post-ECT delirium in 1 study. Eight studies that examined postictal delirium in association with medications used, including lithium, did not show any consistent finding in their relationships. Four studies showed decreased incidence of postictal delirium in those receiving dexmedetomidine. Conclusions Limited evidence suggests that catatonic feature, cerebrovascular disease, Parkinson disease, dementia, bitemporal electrode placement, high stimulus intensity, or longer seizure length are associated with an increased risk of post-ECT delirium. Moreover, dexmedetomidine and ultrabrief pulse ECT seem to have preventive effects of post-ECT delirium.

© 2019, The Author(s), under exclusive licence to American College of Neuropsychopharmacology. This systematic review and meta-analysis examined predictors of successful antipsychotic dose reduction in schizophrenia. Prospective clinical trials and randomized controlled trials (RCTs) investigating antipsychotic dose reduction in schizophrenia were selected for systematic review and meta-analysis, respectively. In total, 37 trials were identified. Only 8 studies focused on second-generation antipsychotics (SGAs); no studies investigated long-acting injectable SGAs. Of 24 studies evaluating relapse or symptom changes, 20 (83.3%) met the criteria for successful dose reduction. Factors associated with successful dose reduction were study duration < 1 year, age > 40 years, duration of illness > 10 years, and post-reduction chlorpromazine equivalent (CPZE) dose > 200 mg/day. Clinical deterioration was mostly re-stabilized by increasing the dose to the baseline level (N = 7/8, 87.5%). A meta-analysis of 18 RCTs revealed that relapse rate was significantly higher in the reduction group than the maintenance group (risk ratio [RR] = 1.96; 95% confidence interval [CI], 1.23–3.12), whereas neurocognition was significantly improved (standardized mean difference = 0.69; 95% CI, 0.25–1.12). A subgroup analysis indicated that only a post-reduction CPZE dose ≤ 200 mg/day was associated with an increased risk of relapse (RR = 2.79; 95% CI, 1.29–6.03). Thus, when reducing antipsychotic doses, clinicians should consider the long-term risk of relapse in younger patients with a relatively short illness duration and keep the final doses higher than CPZE 200 mg/day. Further studies, particularly those involving SGAs, are warranted to determine the optimal strategies for successful antipsychotic dose reduction in schizophrenia.

© 2019 The Authors. Psychiatry and Clinical Neurosciences © 2019 Japanese Society of Psychiatry and Neurology Aim: Public speaking seems to be one of the most anxiety-provoking situations for individuals with autism spectrum disorder (ASD). However, there are few evidence-based interventions. We developed Autism-Focused Public Speech Training using Simple Virtual Audiences (APSV), which differs from a general virtual audience in terms of its simple facial expressions and emphasis on the importance of the eyes. The present study aimed to evaluate the feasibility of APSV as an educational method for individuals with ASD. Methods: Fifteen male individuals with ASD were randomly assigned to two groups: one group received APSV (n = 8), and the other group (n = 7) received independent study (IS). From Days 2 to 6, participants in the APSV and IS groups were encouraged to read and answer questions often asked in actual public speaking events. Participants in the APSV study group performed this activity in front of the APSV system, while those in the IS group performed in an empty room. Before and after the intervention (Days 1 and 7), the participants in the two groups had a mock public speaking experience in front of 10 people for approximately 10 min. Results: After the training sessions, the participants’ self-confidence had improved and salivary cortisol levels were significantly decreased in the APSV group as compared to those in the IS group. APSV improved self-confidence and decreased public speaking stress in individuals with ASD. Conclusion: APSV appears to be useful in improving self-confidence and decreasing public speaking stress in individuals with ASD.

© 2018 The Author(s). Objective: Mindfulness-based cognitive therapy (MBCT) could be a treatment option for anxiety disorders. Although its effectiveness under conditions of low pharmacotherapy rates has been demonstrated, its effectiveness under condition of high pharmacotherapy rate is still unknown. The aim of the study was to evaluate effectiveness of MBCT under the context of high pharmacotherapy rates. Results: A single arm with pre-post comparison design was adopted. Those who had any diagnosis of anxiety disorders, between the ages of 20 and 74, were included. Participants attended 8 weekly 2-hour-long sessions followed by 2 monthly boosters. Evaluation was conducted at baseline, in the middle, at end of the intervention, and at follow-up. The State-Trait Anxiety Inventory (STAI)-state was set as the primary outcome. Pre-post analyses with mixed-effect models repeated measures were conducted. Fourteen patients were involved. The mean age was 45.0, and 71.4% were female. The mean change in the STAI-state at every point showed statistically significant improvement. The STAI-trait also showed improvement at a high significance level from the very early stages. The participants showed significant improvement at least one point in some other secondary outcomes. Trial registration Retrospectively registered at the University Hospital Medical Information Network on 1st August 2013 (ID: UMIN000011347)

© 2019 The Author(s) Background: Pessimistic thinking about the future is one of the cardinal symptoms of major depressive disorder (MDD) and is an important domain of cognitive functioning associated with hopelessness. Neuroimaging studies have shown that the frontopolar cortex (Brodmann area [BA] 10) is involved in thinking about the future and demonstrated that patients with MDD have dysfunctions in BA10. However, the relationship between pessimistic thinking about the future and brain activity is unclear. Hence, we aimed to compare brain activity during future-thinking between patients with MDD and healthy individuals. Methods: We assessed 23 patients with current MDD and 23 healthy individuals. Participants were instructed to imagine the future or to recall the past using the future-thinking paradigm with four distinct temporal conditions (distant future, near future, distant past, and near past) during functional MRI. Resting-state functional MRI was also performed to explore the functional connectivity of BA10. Results: Compared with healthy individuals, patients with MDD had greater negative thinking about the distant future and exhibited increased activation in the medial BA10 when imagining the distant future, following small-volume correction focusing on the frontopolar a priori region of interest (family-wise error correction p < 0.05). Increased positive functional correlation between the right BA10 seed region and the posterior cingulate cortex was also observed. Conclusion: Patients with MDD who show greater pessimistic thinking about the distant future demonstrate increased activation in the frontopolar cortex. These findings are consistent with the hypothesis that frontopolar cortical dysfunction plays a key role in the hopelessness that manifests in patients with MDD.

© 2020 The Authors. Neuropsychopharmacology Reports published by John Wiley & Sons Australia, Ltd on behalf of the Japanese Society of NeuropsychoPharmacology. Aim: Psychopharmacological treatment is indispensable in patients with schizophrenia but data on needs, preferences, and complaints about their medications are limited. Moreover, there has been no study to assess the degree of awareness of their psychiatrists (gap in needs) regarding these issues. Methods: Ninety-seven Japanese patients with schizophrenia (ICD-10) were asked to fill in the questionnaire consisting of multiple-choice questions regarding (a) their needs and complaints about psychopharmacological treatment that they were receiving, and (b) their preference of dosage form, dosing frequency, and timing of dosing. Additionally, their psychiatrists in charge were asked to predict their patients’ response to the above questions. Results: Both the most frequently endorsed need and complaints about the current psychopharmacological treatment were “nothing in particular” (n = 14, 16.7% and n = 17, 20.2%); merely 23.1% and 15.4% of their psychiatrists correctly predicted these responses, respectively. “Once a day” (n = 56, 65.1%), “at bedtime” (n = 53, 61.6%), and “tablet” (n = 51, 59.3%) were the patients’ most favorite dosing frequency, timing, and dosage form, respectively; 59.8% (n = 49), 54.9% (n = 45), and 64.6% (n = 53) of their psychiatrists predicted them. Conclusions: These findings suggest that there is substantial room for improvement on the side of psychiatrists to capture their patients’ needs and complaints about psychopharmacological treatment.

© 2018, The Author(s). Alterations in glutamatergic neurotransmission are implicated in the pathophysiology of depression, and the glutamatergic system represents a treatment target for depression. To summarize the nature of glutamatergic alterations in patients with depression, we conducted a meta-analysis of proton magnetic resonance (1H-MRS) spectroscopy studies examining levels of glutamate. We used the search terms: depress* AND (MRS OR “magnetic resonance spectroscopy”). The search was performed with MEDLINE, Embase, and PsycINFO. The inclusion criteria were 1H-MRS studies comparing levels of glutamate + glutamine (Glx), glutamate, or glutamine between patients with depression and healthy controls. Standardized mean differences (SMD) were calculated to assess group differences in the levels of glutamatergic neurometabolites. Forty-nine studies met the eligibility criteria, which included 1180 patients and 1066 healthy controls. There were significant decreases in Glx within the medial frontal cortex (SMD = −0.38; 95% CI, −0.69 to −0.07) in patients with depression compared with controls. Subanalyses revealed that there was a significant decrease in Glx in the medial frontal cortex in medicated patients with depression (SMD = −0.50; 95% CI, −0.80 to −0.20), but not in unmedicated patients (SMD = −0.27; 95% CI, −0.76 to 0.21) compared with controls. Overall, decreased levels of glutamatergic metabolites in the medial frontal cortex are linked with the pathophysiology of depression. These findings are in line with the hypothesis that depression may be associated with abnormal glutamatergic neurotransmission.

© 2018 Society of Biological Psychiatry Background: In terms of antipsychotic treatment response, patients with schizophrenia can be classified into three groups: 1) treatment resistant to both non-clozapine (non-CLZ) antipsychotics and CLZ (ultra-treatment-resistant schizophrenia [URS]), 2) treatment resistant to non-CLZ antipsychotics but CLZ-responsive schizophrenia [non-URS]), and 3) responsive to first-line antipsychotics (non-treatment-resistant schizophrenia). This study aimed to compare glutamatergic neurometabolite levels among these three patient groups and healthy control subjects using proton magnetic resonance spectroscopy. Methods: Glutamate and glutamate+glutamine levels were assessed in the caudate, the dorsal anterior cingulate cortex (dACC), and the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex using 3T proton magnetic resonance spectroscopy (point-resolved spectroscopy, echo time = 35 ms). Glutamatergic neurometabolite levels were compared between the groups. Results: A total of 100 participants were included, consisting of 26 patients with URS, 27 patients with non-URS, 21 patients with non-treatment-resistant schizophrenia, and 26 healthy control subjects. Group differences were detected in ACC glutamate+glutamine levels (F 3,96 = 2.93, p =.038); patients with URS showed higher dACC glutamate+glutamine levels than healthy control subjects (p =.038). There were no group differences in the caudate or dorsolateral prefrontal cortex. Conclusions: Taken together with previous studies that demonstrated higher ACC glutamate levels in patients with treatment-resistant schizophrenia, this study suggests that higher levels of ACC glutamatergic metabolites may be among the shared biological characteristics of treatment resistance to antipsychotics, including CLZ.

© The Author(s) 2019. Background: Glutathione is among the important antioxidants to prevent oxidative stress. However, the relationships between abnormality in the glutathione system and pathophysiology of schizophrenia remain uncertain due to inconsistent findings on glutathione levels and/or glutathione-related enzyme activities in patients with schizophrenia. Methods: A systematic literature search was conducted using Embase, Medline, PsycINFO, and PubMed. Original studies, in which three metabolite levels (glutathione, glutathione disulfide, and total glutathione (glutathione+glutathione disulfide)) and five enzyme activities (glutathione peroxidase, glutathione reductase, glutamate-cysteine ligase, glutathione synthetase, and glutathione S-transferase) were measured with any techniques in both patients with schizophrenia and healthy controls, were included. Standardized mean differences were calculated to determine the group differences in the glutathione levels with a random-effects model. Results: We identified 41, 9, 15, 38, and seven studies which examined glutathione, glutathione disulfide, total glutathione, glutathione peroxidase, and glutathione reductase, respectively. Patients with schizophrenia had lower levels of both glutathione and total glutathione and decreased activity of glutathione peroxidase compared to controls. Glutathione levels were lower in unmedicated patients with schizophrenia than those in controls while glutathione levels did not differ between patients with first-episode psychosis and controls. Conclusions: Our findings suggested that there may be glutathione deficits and abnormalities in the glutathione redox cycle in patients with schizophrenia. However, given the small number of studies examined the entire glutathione system, further studies are needed to elucidate a better understanding of disrupted glutathione function in schizophrenia, which may pave the way for the development of novel therapeutic strategies in this disorder.

© 2020 Elsevier B.V. Background: Growing attention has been paid to the field of gut microbiota for mental disorders over the last decade. However, to our knowledge, no studies have conducted systematic reviews on the association between gut microbiota and major depressive disorder (MDD) in both interventional and non-interventional studies. Methods: We conducted a systematic review and meta-analysis of 16 studies (10 observational [701 participants] and six interventional trials [302 participants]) examining gut microbiota in patients with MDD. The primary outcome measures were differences in the profile of microbiota inthe observational studies, and symptom changes for depression between pre- and post-intervention with probiotics in the interventional trials. Results: In the observational studies, significant reductions in several taxa at the family and genus levels were observed in patients with MDD compared to non-depressed controls. In the interventional studies with probiotics, a significant improvement was found in depressive symptomatology compared to controls (SMD = .-1.62, 95% CI = .-2.73 to -0.51, p< 0.01). Limitations: Lack of consideration of the effects of diet and pharmacotherapy was a possible limitation. Conclusions: Our results indicate that several taxa at the family and genus levels, specifically family Prevotellaceae, genus Coprococcus,and Faecalibacterium, were decreased in MDD compared to non-depressed controls in observational studies, and depressive symptoms were improved compared to controls in interventional studies with probiotics. Due to the limited number of studies, further studies considering diet and pharmacotherapy are needed to explore the relationships between gut microbiota and MDD in humans.

Copyright © American Society for Nutrition 2019. Background: Few studies have assessed associations of non-enzymatic antioxidant capacity (NEAC) in the overall diet with all-cause or specific mortality, and their results have been inconsistent. Objectives: The present study investigated the association between dietary NEAC and all-cause or cause-specific mortality. Methods: The study was a large-scale population-based prospective cohort study in Japan consisting of 42,520 men and 50,207 women aged 44-76 y, who had no history of cancer, stroke, ischemic heart disease, or chronic liver disease. We evaluated FFQ-based dietary NEAC with use of published databases in which the NEACs of individual foods were analyzed by ferric reducing antioxidant power (FRAP) and oxygen radical absorbance capacity (ORAC) assays. Dietary NEAC was calculated by multiplying the estimated NEAC with the consumed amount and summing up those values for all foods, and was categorized in quartiles. We identified death and cause of death with use of residential registry and death certificates. HRs and 95% Cls for death from the second survey, which was conducted from April 1995 to December 2014 were estimated with Cox proportional hazards regression analysis. Results: After 1,498,308 person-years of follow-up, 12,978 total deaths occurred. The multivariable-adjusted HRs (95% Cls) for all-cause mortality for the highest compared with the lowest quartile of FRAP and ORAC were 0.85 (0.80, 0.89) and 0.84 (0.79, 0.89), respectively. Dietary NEACs were inversely associated with mortality from cardiovascular disease (CVD), but not from cancer. The multivariable-adjusted HRs (95% Cls) for CVD for the highest compared with the lowest quartile of FRAP and ORAC were 0.83 (0.75, 0.92) and 0.79 (0.70, 0.89), respectively. Conclusions: Higher dietary NEACs from FRAP and ORAC were associated with lower risk of all-cause mortality and mortality from CVD in Japanese adults.

Copyright © 2019 Kumazaki, Muramatsu, Yoshikawa, Matsumoto, Miyao, Ishiguro, Mimura, Minabe and Kikuchi. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) and the copyright owner(s) are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms. The preliminary efficacy of interview training using an android robot whose appearance and movements resemble those of an actual human for treating social and communication difficulties in individuals with autism spectrum disorders (ASD) has been demonstrated. Patient preferences regarding the appearance of robots are crucial for incentivizing them to undergo robot-assisted therapy. However, very little is known about how the realistic nature of an android robot is related to incentivizing individuals with ASD in an interview setting. In this study, individuals with ASD underwent an interview with a human interviewer and an android robot. Twenty-three individuals with ASD (age, 17-25 years) participated in this study. After the interview, the participants were evaluated in terms of their motivation to practice an interview with an android robot and their impression of the nature of the android robot in terms of humanness. As expected, subjects exhibited higher motivation to undergo interview training with an android robot than with a human interviewer. Higher motivation to undergo an interview with the android robot was negatively correlated with the participants' impressions of the extent to which the android robot exhibited humanness. This study brings us one step closer to understanding how such an android robot should be designed and implemented to provide sufficiently realistic interview training that can be of therapeutic value.

© 2019, Springer-Verlag GmbH Germany, part of Springer Nature. Liquorice [main ingredient, glycyrrhizin (GL)] is widely used as a food sweetener and herbal medicine. Occasionally, liquorice consumption causes pseudoaldosteronism as a side effect which causes oedema, hypokalaemia, and hypertension due to hyperactivity of mineral corticoid receptor. We aimed to detect GL metabolites in human blood and urine samples and to determine the pathological relationship between GL metabolites and pseudoaldosteronism. For this multi-centre, retrospective, cross-sectional study, we recruited patients who had visited Center for Kampo Medicine in Keio University Hospital, Department of Japanese Oriental (Kampo) Medicine in Chiba University Hospital, Clinic of Japanese Oriental (Kampo) Medicine in Kanazawa University Hospital, and Department of Oriental Medicine in Kameda Medical Center from November 2011 to July 2018. We collected laboratory data including concentration of serum potassium, plasma activity of renin and aldosterone, and residual blood and/or urine samples of participants who had experienced symptoms/signs of pseudoaldosteronism in the form of increase in blood pressure and occurrence or aggregation of oedema while taking liquorice-containing herbal preparations, and measured GL metabolites using a highly selective liquid chromatography tandem mass spectrometer system. We registered 97 participants (mean age 60 ± 15 years; male:female 14:83). 18β-glycyrrhetinic acid (GA) was detected in 67 serum samples (median 122 nM, range 5 nM–1.8 µM) and 18β-glycyrrhetyl-3-O-sulfate (compound 3) in 68 samples (median 239 nM, range 2 nM–4.2 µM). 3-Monoglucuronyl 18β-glycyrrhetinic acid, 22α-hydroxy-18β-glycyrrhetyl-3-O-sulfate-30-glucuronide, 22α-hydroxy-18β-glycyrrhetyl-3-O-sulfate, and GL itself were not or rarely detected. We could not find any correlation between blood pressure or peripheral oedema and serum concentration of GL metabolites. Sulfotransferase 2A1 catalysed the metabolic reaction of GA to compound 3, a major GL metabolite in human blood. High serum concentration of compound 3 was related to lower renin, aldosterone, and potassium levels, suggesting a pathological relationship between compound 3 and liquorice-induced pseudoaldosteronism. This is the first study to identify the association between a novel metabolite, compound 3, and the incidence of pseudoaldosteronism, highlighting it as a promising biomarker.

© 2018 Elsevier B.V. Objective: The impact of subjective vs. objective illness severity on subjective cognitive impairment in patients with depression has not been addressed. Methods: This study is a post-hoc analysis of our cross-sectional study in Japanese outpatients with depressive disorder (ICD-10) (Ozawa et al., 2017). The participants received assessments with the Japanese version of the Perceived Deficits Questionnaire (J-PDQ), Quick Inventory of Depressive Symptomatology (QIDS), and Montgomery–Asberg Depression Rating Scale (MADRS). First, multiple regression analysis was conducted to examine the effects of demographic and clinical characteristics, including illness severity and medications (e.g., antidepressants and benzodiazepines), on the PDQ total score. Next, we categorized the participants into 4 groups based on the presence/absence of subjective and objective symptom remission (i.e., QIDS total score of ≤5 and MADRS total score of ≤9, respectively), and compared the differences in PDQ total scores between the QIDS- and MADRS-remitted group and the QIDS-non-remitted but MADRS-remitted group. Results: 102 participants were included (45 men; mean ± SD age, 50.5 ± 14.7 years). Higher QIDS and MADRS total scores were significantly associated with a greater PDQ total score (both p's < 0.001), while other factors did not exhibit any associations. The QIDS-non-remitted but MADRS-remitted group showed a significantly higher PDQ total score than that of the QIDS- and MADRS-remitted group (median 10.0 [8.0–12.0] vs. 3.0 [range: 2.0–4.0], p < 0.001). Conclusions: These findings suggest that objective remission in the absence of subjective remission may not be adequate to improve subjective cognitive functioning.

© 2018 The British Psychological Society Although neuroimaging studies have provided evidence for an association between moral emotions and the orbitofrontal cortex, studies on patients with focal lesions using experimental probes of moral emotions are scarce. Here, we addressed this topic by presenting a moral emotion judgement task to patients with focal brain damage. Four judgement tasks in a simple pairwise choice paradigm were given to 72 patients with cerebrovascular disease. These tasks consisted of a perceptual line judgement task as a control task; the objects’ preference task as a basic preference judgement task; and two types of moral emotion judgement task, an anger task and a guilt task. A multiple linear regression analysis was performed on each set of task performance scores to take into account potential confounders. Performance on the guilt emotion judgement task negatively correlated with the orbitofrontal cortex damage, but not with the other variables. Results for the other judgement tasks did not reach statistical significance. The close association between orbitofrontal cortex damage and a decrease in guilt emotion judgement consistency might suggest that the orbitofrontal cortex plays a key role in the sense of guilt, a hallmark of morality.

© 2019 Ishii et al. (Figure Presented) Bipolar disorder (BP) and schizophrenia (SCZ) are major psychiatric disorders, but the molecular mechanisms underlying the complicated pathologies of these disorders remain unclear. It is difficult to establish adequate in vitro models for pathological analysis because of the heterogeneity of these disorders. In the present study, to recapitulate the pathologies of these disorders in vitro, we established in vitro models by differentiating mature neurons from human induced pluripotent stem cells (hiPSCs) derived from BP and SCZ patient with contributive copy number variations, as follows: two BP patients with PCDH15 deletion and one SCZ patient with RELN deletion. Glutamatergic neurons and GABAergic neurons were induced from hiPSCs under optimized conditions. Both types of induced neurons from both hiPSCs exhibited similar phenotypes of MAP2 (microtubule-associated protein 2)-positive dendrite shortening and decreasing synapse numbers. Additionally, we analyzed isogenic PCDH15-or RELN-deleted cells. The dendrite and synapse phenotypes of isogenic neurons were partially similar to those of patient-derived neurons. These results suggest that the observed phenotypes are general phenotypes of psychiatric disorders, and our in vitro models using hiPSC-based technology may be suitable for analysis of the pathologies of psychiatric disorders.

© 2020, The Author(s). Early diagnosis of dementia including Alzheimer’s disease (AD) is an urgent medical and welfare issue. However, to date, no simple biometrics have been available. We reported that blood DNA methylation levels of the COASY gene, which encodes coenzyme A synthase, were increased in individuals with AD and amnestic mild cognitive impairment (aMCI). The present study sought to replicate these findings with larger numbers of samples. Another objective was to clarify whether COASY methylation is associated with neurodegeneration through a comparison of AD, AD with cardiovascular disease (CVD), and vascular dementia (VaD). We measured blood COASY methylation levels in normal controls (NCs) (n = 200), and individuals with aMCI (n = 22), AD (n = 151), and VaD (n = 21). Compared with NCs, they were significantly higher in individuals with aMCI and AD. Further, they were significantly higher in AD patients without cardiovascular diseases compared to AD patients with them. These findings suggest that COASY methylation levels may be related to neurodegeneration in AD.

© 2020 Japan Geriatrics Society Aim: To investigate the influence of replacing sedentary time with physical activity on cognitive function using an isotemporal substitution model in a population of community-dwelling oldest old. Methods: This cross-sectional study included residents of the Arakawa ward, Tokyo, who were part of a prospective cohort from the Arakawa 85+ study. We measured physical activity in 136 participants using a triaxial actigraph. Cognitive function was measured using the Addenbrooke's Cognitive Examination-III and participants were divided into a “cognitive decline group” (Addenbrooke's Cognitive Examination-III ≤88) and “cognitive maintain group” (Addenbrooke's Cognitive Examination-III ≥89). Physical activity was divided into three categories: sedentary behavior (≤1.5 metabolic equivalents), light physical activity (>1.5 to <3.0 metabolic equivalents), and moderate-to-vigorous physical activity (≥3 metabolic equivalents). Using an isotemporal substitution approach, we applied multiple logistic regression analysis to demonstrate the association between cognitive function and replacing 30 min/day of sedentary behavior with an equal period of light physical activity. Covariates included age, education and the Center for Epidemiologic Studies Depression Scale. Results: Our findings showed that in men, replacing 30 min of sedentary behavior per day with light physical activity was associated with a 1.47-fold increase in the odds of maintaining cognitive function. An association between physical activity and cognitive function was not observed in female participants. Conclusions: Our results indicate that substituting sedentary behavior with light physical activity could be helpful in maintaining cognitive function in community-dwelling oldest old men. These results highlight the importance of behavioral changes to promote cognition. Geriatr Gerontol Int 2020; 20: 773–778.

© 2018 Elsevier B.V. Introduction: In recent years, the early detection and treatment of the first episode of schizophrenia (FES) has attracted worldwide attention. In Japan, psychiatric care has changed to an open and accessible framework over the past decade. Therefore, the duration of untreated psychosis (DUP) is thought to have been shortened. The purposes of this study were to investigate whether recent DUP periods are shorter than they were 10 years ago and whether the DUP at present differs among psychiatric facilities. We investigated the recent DUP at a psychiatric hospital and its satellite clinic. Material and methods: We examined the differences in DUP, age, sex, referral pathway, living companions, social participation, and schooling history among 3 groups of FES patients: (i) a psychiatric hospital during 1999–2001 and (ii) during 2009–2011, and (iii) a psychiatric clinic during 2009–2011. Results: The average DUP was 14.3 (SD = 17.5) months for the psychiatric hospital during 1999–2001, 16.0 (SD = 18.7) months for the psychiatric hospital during 2009–2011, and 24.4 (SD = 30.0) months for the psychiatric clinic during 2009–2011. No significant differences were found in the DUP for each facility and during this decade. Also, the differences in the DUP could not be attributed to factors such as living companions or social participation. Discussion: Increases in the numbers of patients and psychiatric clinics have not led to the early detection of FES. To shorten the DUP in the future, closer cooperation among the medical field, the educational field, and the health and welfare will be needed.

© The Author(s) 2019. Job interviews are significant barriers for individuals with autism spectrum disorder because these individuals lack good nonverbal communication skills. We developed a job interview training program using an android robot. The job interview training program using an android robot consists the following three stages: (1) tele-operating an android robot and conversing with others through the android robot, (2) a face-to-face mock job interview with the android robot, and (3) feedback based on the mock job interview and nonverbal communication exercises using the android robot. The participants were randomly assigned to the following two groups: one group received a combined intervention with “interview guidance by teachers and job interview training program using an android robot” (n = 13), and the other group received an intervention with interview guidance by teachers alone (n = 16). Before and after the intervention, the participants in both groups underwent a mock job interview with a human interviewer, who provided outcome measurements of nonverbal communication, self-confidence, and salivary cortisol. After the training sessions, the participants who received the combined interview guidance by teachers and the job interview training program using an android robot intervention displayed improved nonverbal communication skills and self-confidence and had significantly lower levels of salivary cortisol than the participants who only received interview guidance by teachers. The job interview training program using an android robot improved various measures of job interview skills in individuals with autism spectrum disorder.