0000000000986337

AUTHOR

Domenico Berardi

EPA-1417 – Migration history and first episode psychosis: Results from EUGEI project- Italy

The excess of psychosis among migrants and ethnic minorities is a well defined phenomenon in North Europe, while it should be still demonstrated in south Europe. Because of the variation in prevalence and distribution of risk factors in different national contexts, similar studies in different countries are needed to test the hypotheses and to ensure the generalizability of the findings. Moreover, available studies have been mostly focused on risk factors of psychosis during the post migration phase (such as ethnic fragmentation, unemployment, etc) and among well established ethnic minorities (second and further generations of migrants). In Italy, first generation migrants are still the lar…

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The EUropean Network of National Schizophrenia Networks Studying Gene-Environment Interactions (EU-GEI)

Funder: FP7 Ideas: European Research Council; doi: http://dx.doi.org/10.13039/100011199; Grant(s): HEALTH-F2-2010-241909

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Transdiagnostic dimensions of psychopathology at first episode psychosis: findings from the multinational EU-GEI study.

Background\ud The value of the nosological distinction between non-affective and affective psychosis has frequently been challenged. We aimed to investigate the transdiagnostic dimensional structure and associated characteristics of psychopathology at First Episode Psychosis (FEP). Regardless of diagnostic categories, we expected that positive symptoms occurred more frequently in ethnic minority groups and in more densely populated environments, and that negative symptoms were associated with indices of neurodevelopmental impairment.\ud \ud Method\ud This study included 2182 FEP individuals recruited across six countries, as part of the EUropean network of national schizophrenia networks st…

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Synergistic effects of childhood adversity and polygenic risk in first-episode psychosis

The European Network of National Schizophrenia Networks Studying Gene-Environment Interactions (EU-GEI) Project is funded by grant agreement HEALTH-F2-2010-241909 (Project EU-GEI) from the European Community’s Seventh Framework Programme.

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Migration history and risk of psychosis: results from the multinational EU-GEI study.

The European Network of National Schizophrenia Networks Studying Gene-Environment Interactions (EU-GEI) Project was funded by grant agreement Health-F2-2010-241909 (Project EU-GEI) from the European Community’s Seventh Framework programme.

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Perceived major experiences of discrimination, ethnic group, and risk of psychosis in a six-country case-control study

AbstractBackgroundPerceived discrimination is associated with worse mental health. Few studies have assessed whether perceived discrimination (i) is associated with the risk of psychotic disorders and (ii) contributes to an increased risk among minority ethnic groups relative to the ethnic majority.MethodsWe used data from the European Network of National Schizophrenia Networks Studying Gene-Environment Interactions Work Package 2, a population-based case−control study of incident psychotic disorders in 17 catchment sites across six countries. We calculated odds ratios (OR) and 95% confidence intervals (95% CI) for the associations between perceived discrimination and psychosis using mixed-…

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Duration of untreated psychosis in first-episode psychosis is not associated with common genetic variants for major psychiatric conditions: results from the multi-center EU-GEI Study

The EU-GEI Project is funded by the European Community’s Seventh Framework Programme under grant agreement No. HEALTH-F2-2010–241909 (Project EU-GEI).

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Childhood Maltreatment, Educational Attainment, and IQ: Findings From a Multicentric Case-control Study of First-episode Psychosis (EU-GEI).

[Background and hypothesis] Evidence suggests that childhood maltreatment (ie, childhood abuse and childhood neglect) affects educational attainment and cognition. However, the association between childhood maltreatment and Intelligence Quotient (IQ) seems stronger among controls compared to people with psychosis. We hypothesised that: the association between childhood maltreatment and poor cognition would be stronger among community controls than among people with first-episode of psychosis (FEP); compared to abuse, neglect would show stronger associations with educational attainment and cognition; the association between childhood maltreatment and IQ would be partially accounted for by ot…

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Jumping To Conclusions, General Intelligence, And Psychosis Liability: Findings From The Multi-Centre EU-GEI Case-Control Study

AbstractBackgroundThe “jumping to conclusions” (JTC) bias is associated with both psychosis and general cognition but their relationship is unclear. In this study, we set out to clarify the relationship between the JTC bias, IQ, psychosis and polygenic liability to schizophrenia and IQ.Methods817 FEP patients and 1294 population-based controls completed assessments of general intelligence (IQ), and JTC (assessed by the number of beads drawn on the probabilistic reasoning “beads” task) and provided blood or saliva samples from which we extracted DNA and computed polygenic risk scores for IQ and schizophrenia.ResultsThe estimated proportion of the total effect of case/control differences on J…

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Treated Incidence of Psychotic Disorders in the Multinational EU-GEI Study

Importance: Psychotic disorders contribute significantly to the global disease burden, yet the latest international incidence study of psychotic disorders was conducted in the 1980s. Objectives: To estimate the incidence of psychotic disorders using comparable methods across 17 catchment areas in 6 countries and to examine the variance between catchment areas by putative environmental risk factors. Design, Setting, and Participants: An international multisite incidence study (the European Network of National Schizophrenia Networks Studying Gene-Environment Interactions) was conducted from May 1, 2010, to April 1, 2015, among 2774 individuals from England (2 catchment areas), France (3 catch…

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The EUropean Network of National Schizophrenia Networks Studying Gene-Environment Interactions (EU-GEI): Incidence and First-Episode Case-Control Programme. Soc Psychiatry Psychiatr Epidemiol

Purpose: The EUropean Network of National Schizophrenia Networks Studying Gene-Environment Interactions (EU-GEI) study contains an unparalleled wealth of comprehensive data that allows for testing hypotheses about (1) variations in incidence within and between countries, including by urbanicity and minority ethnic groups; and (2) the role of multiple environmental and genetic risk factors, and their interactions, in the development of psychotic disorders. Methods: Between 2010 and 2015, we identified 2774 incident cases of psychotic disorders during 12.9 million person-years at risk, across 17 sites in 6 countries (UK, The Netherlands, France, Spain, Italy, and Brazil). Of the 2774 incident…

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The independent and combined influence of schizophrenia polygenic risk score and heavy cannabis use on risk for psychotic disorder: A case-control analysis from the EUGEI study.

Background: Some recent studies have challenged the direction of causality for the association between cannabis use and psychotic disorder, suggesting that cannabis use initiation is explained by common genetic variants associated with risk of schizophrenia. We used data from the European Union Gene-Environment Interaction consortium (EUGEI) case-control study to test for the independent and combined effect of heavy cannabis use, and of Schizophrenia Polygenic risk score (SZ PRS), on risk for psychotic disorder. Methods: Genome-wide data were obtained from 492 first episode psychosis patients (FEPp) and from 787 controls of European Ancestry, and used to generate SZ PRS from the summary res…

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Jumping to conclusions, general intelligence, and psychosis liability: Findings from the multi-centre EU-GEI case-control study

This study was funded by the Medical Research Council, the European Community’s Seventh Framework Program grant [agreement HEALTH-F2-2009-241909 (Project EU-GEI)], São Paulo Research Foundation (grant 2012/0417-0), the National Institute for Health Research (NIHR) Biomedical Research Centre (BRC) at South London and Maudsley NHS Foundation Trust and King’s College London, the NIHR BRC at University College London and the Wellcome Trust (grant 101272/Z/12/Z).

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Social disadvantage, linguistic distance, ethnic minority status and first-episode psychosis: Results from the EU-GEI case-control study

The European Network of National Schizophrenia Networks Studying Gene-Environment Interactions (EU-GEI) Project was funded by grant agreement Health-F2-2010-241909 (Project EU-GEI) from the European Community’s Seventh Framework programme. The Brazilian study was funded by grant 2012-0417-0 from the São Paulo Research Foundation. Dr Jongsma is funded by the Economic and Social Research Council (grant ES/S011714/1). Dr Kirkbride is funded by the Wellcome Trust and Royal Society (Grant 101272/Z/13/Z). Dr Jongsma and Professor Jones are funded by the National Institute of Health Research Collaboration of Leadership in Applied Health Research and Care East of England. Professor Rutten is funded…

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Early Parental Death and Risk of Psychosis in Offspring: A Six-Country Case-Control Study

Evidence for early parental death as a risk factor for psychosis in offspring is inconclusive. We analyzed data from a six-country, case-control study to examine the associations of early parental death, type of death (maternal, paternal, both), and child’s age at death with psychosis, both overall and by ethnic group. In fully adjusted multivariable mixed-effects logistic regression models, experiencing early parental death was associated with 1.54-fold greater odds of psychosis (95% confidence interval (CI): 1.23, 1.92). Experiencing maternal death had 2.27-fold greater odds (95% CI: 1.18, 4.37), paternal death had 1.14-fold greater odds (95% CI: 0.79, 1.64), and both deaths had 4.4…

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Facial Emotion Recognition in Psychosis and Associations With Polygenic Risk for Schizophrenia

The EU-GEI Project was funded by the European Community’s Seventh Framework Programme under grant agreement No. HEALTH-F2-2010-241909 (Project EU-GEI). The Brazilian study was funded by the Säo Paulo Research Foundation under grant number 2012/0417-0.

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First-episode psychosis and migration in Italy (PEP-Ita migration): A study in the Italian mental health services

Abstract Background It has been frequently reported a higher incidence of psychotic disorders in immigrants than in native populations. There is, however, a lack of knowledge about risk factors which may explain this phenomenon. A better understanding of the causes of psychosis among first-generation migrants is highly needed, particularly in Italy, a country with a recent massive migration. Methods/Design The “Italian study on first-episode psychosis and migration (PEP-Ita)” is a prospective observational study over a two-year period (1 January 2012–31 December 2013) which will be carried out in 11 Italian mental health centres. All participating centres will collect data about all new cas…

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The incidence of psychotic disorders among migrants and minority ethnic groups in Europe: findings from the multinational EU-GEI study

AbstractBackgroundIn Europe, the incidence of psychotic disorder is high in certain migrant and minority ethnic groups (hence: ‘minorities’). However, it is unknown how the incidence pattern for these groups varies within this continent. Our objective was to compare, across sites in France, Italy, Spain, the UK and the Netherlands, the incidence rates for minorities and the incidence rate ratios (IRRs, minorities v. the local reference population).MethodsThe European Network of National Schizophrenia Networks Studying Gene–Environment Interactions (EU-GEI) study was conducted between 2010 and 2015. We analyzed data on incident cases of non-organic psychosis (International Classification of …

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The contribution of cannabis use to variation in the incidence of psychotic disorder across Europe (EU-GEI): a multicentre case-control study.

Background: Cannabis use is associated with increased risk of later psychotic disorder but whether it affects incidence of the disorder remains unclear. We aimed to identify patterns of cannabis use with the strongest effect on odds of psychotic disorder across Europe and explore whether differences in such patterns contribute to variations in the incidence rates of psychotic disorder. Methods: We included patients aged 18–64 years who presented to psychiatric services in 11 sites across Europe and Brazil with first-episode psychosis and recruited controls representative of the local populations. We applied adjusted logistic regression models to the data to estimate which patterns of canna…

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Identifying gene-environment interactions in schizophrenia: contemporary challenges for integrated, large-scale investigations

European Community Recent years have seen considerable progress in epidemiological and molecular genetic research into environmental and genetic factors in schizophrenia, but methodological uncertainties remain with regard to validating environmental exposures, and the population risk conferred by individual molecular genetic variants is small. There are now also a limited number of studies that have investigated molecular genetic candidate gene-environment interactions (G x E), however, so far, thorough replication of findings is rare and G x E research still faces several conceptual and methodological challenges. in this article, we aim to review these recent developments and illustrate h…

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The continuity of effect of schizophrenia polygenic risk score and patterns of cannabis use on transdiagnostic symptom dimensions at first-episode psychosis: findings from the EU-GEI study

The work was supported by Guarantors of Brain post-doctoral clinical fellowship to DQ; Clinician Scientist Medical Research Council fellowship (project reference MR/M008436/1) to MDF; Heisenberg professorship from the German Research Founda- tion (grant no. 389624707) to UR; the National Institute for Health Research (NIHR) Maudsley Biomedical Research Centre at South London and Maudsley NHS Foundation Trust and King’s College London. The views expressed are those of the author(s) and not necessarily those of the NHS, the NIHR or the Department of Health and Social Care. The EU-GEI Project is funded by the European Community’s Seventh Framework Programme under grant agreement No. HEALTH-F2-…

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