HealthDay (4/11, Norton) reported that a study published online Feb. 16 in the journal Anxiety, Stress & Coping suggests that “service members who have to deal with trouble at home when they’re deployed may be at increased risk of suicidal thoughts.” After conducting a survey involving “more than 1,000 Iraq and Afghanistan vets, researchers found that about 14 percent said they’d had suicidal thoughts in recent months.” What’s more, “the odds were greater for those who’d dealt with family stress or felt unsupported by family members during their deployment.”

Related Links:

— “Family Stress May Figure in Soldiers’ Suicide Risk,”Amy Norton, HealthDay, April 10, 2015.

NPR (4/12, Martin) reported on its website and on its “Weekend Edition Sunday” program that the National Institute of Mental Health estimates that “16 million Americans had at least one major depressive episode in the past year. Of that number, many struggle with whether and how to talk about their depression in the workplace.”

Related Links:

— “Working Through Depression: Many Stay On The Job, Despite Mental Illness,”Rachel Martin , NPR, April 12, 2015.

HealthDay (4/10, Reinberg) reports that a study published online April 10 in The Lancet Diabetes & Endocrinology suggests that people “who are overweight or obese in middle age may be less likely to develop dementia than their normal and underweight peers.” The study, which included almost two million people, revealed that “overweight and obese people were about 30 percent less likely to develop dementia 15 years later than people of a healthy weight.” In contrast, “underweight people were 34 percent more likely to develop dementia than those whose weight was normal.” Also covering the story are BBC News (4/10, Gallagher), The Guardian (UK) (4/10, Boseley) and the Daily Mail (UK)(4/10, Hope).

Related Links:

— “Could Obesity Help Protect Against Dementia?,”Steven Reinberg, HealthDay, April 10, 2015.

In a nearly 3,700-word story on the front of its New York section, the New York Times (4/12, MB1, Winerip, Schwirtz) reports on the issue of prison inmates who suffer from mental illness, noting some “are more likely than other inmates to be the victims as well as the perpetrators of violence.” Using the story of Rikers Island inmate Michael Megginson as an example, the piece shows how the prison system is unequipped to handle complicated psychiatric problems. It reports that “unlike jail, psychiatric hospitals treated his behavior as a symptom of illness,” though “that option has all but disappeared. For the last four decades, the push in the mental health field has been to close these hospitals.”

Related Links:

— “For Mentally Ill Inmates at Rikers Island, a Cycle of Jail and Hospitals,”Michael Winerip, The New York Times, April 10, 2015.

HealthDay (4/8, Preidt) reports that research published online in European Psychiatry suggests that “hospital patients who are alcoholics have an increased risk of dying in the hospital.” The study indicated that “one in five of the patients with alcoholism died while in the hospital, compared with one in 12 patients in” a “control group.” The investigators also “found that, on average, those with alcoholism were likely to be about eight years younger when they died than people without a drinking problem.”

Related Links:

— “Alcoholics Face Greater Death Risk When Hospitalized,”Robert Preidt, HealthDay, April 07, 2015.