The family practitioner plays an important role in the detection and treatment of mental disorders. It is said that over half of all persons affected with mental illness are initially seen and treated by the non-psychiatrist in the outpatient setting rather than in the specialty mental health clinic. Objective: This paper aims to evaluate perceived level of confidence and competence of the primary care practitioner in the recognition, diagnosis, and management of mental disorders. Methods: A survey of family physicians and general practitioners using a thirteen (13)-point questionnaire during an annual convention of the Philippine Academy of Family Physicians (PAFP) was conducted. The questionnaire included items that attempted to quantify: exposure to psychiatry during residency and current medical practice; proportion of mental illness cases among total patient load; signs and symptoms that would be associated with mental illness; familiarity with standardized criteria for diagnosing mental illness i.e. schizophrenia and depression; familiarity with therapeutic medications; and perceived level of confidence in treating psychiatric cases. Results and Conclusion: The study implies that the family physician, although aware of the general signs and symptoms indicative of mental illness, is still hesitant in formulating a definitive diagnosis. Possible reasons for this attitude may be inadequate training in psychiatry as well as unfamiliarity and perceived difficulty with the DSM-IV.
Human ; Male ; Female ; MENTAL DISORDERS ; DIAGNOSTIC AND STATISTICAL MANUAL OF MENTAL DISORDERS ; PHYSICIANS, FAMILY

Background and Objective: The prevalence of aspirin resistance amongst patients with cardiovascular disease and in the healthy population has been reported to range from 5% to 45%. Lately, rapid platelet function analyzer (RPFA) a point-of-care determination of platelet aggregability has been introduced for rapid determination of aspirin resistant patients. The purpose of this paper is to report the prevalence of aspirin resistance among patients with recurrent non cardioembolic ischemic stroke as detected by RPFA (Ultegra®). Methods: Seventy-seven patients with mean age of 61.2 + 10.4 (range 33-87 years) who developed recurrent non-cardioembolic ischemic stroke were consecutively included in the study. Fifty-seven (74%) were males. Aspirin resistance was determined using the RPFA (Ultegra®) machine. Patients with an aspirin reaction unit (ARU) value above 550 were identified as aspirin resistant. Results: Following this method, the prevalence of aspirin resistance was determined to be 10.4% (95% CI: 1% to17%). Comparison of baseline characteristics between aspirin resistant and aspirin responsive patients did not show any significant difference. Conclusion: The prevalence of aspirin resistance in this study was 10.4% amongst patients with recurrent non-cardioembolic ischemic stroke. The study has shown the feasibility of utilizing RPFA (Ultegra®) machine in detecting aspirin resistance.

INTRODUCTION: Peripheral arterial disease (PAD) had been shown to have a higher likelihood of developing cardiovascular events as well as cerebrovascular accidents particularly acute ischemic stroke. However, there are limited data on the association between ankle brachial index (ABI) values and the severity of ischemic stroke. This study aimed to determine the correlation of ABI values and the severity of acute ischemic stroke in Southern Philippines Medical Center. METHODS: A prospective cross-sectional study with 112 patients diagnosed with acute ischemic stroke from June to October 2017. The ABI ratio of the subjects were obtained and correlated with the severity of stroke using National Institutes of Health Stroke Scale (NIHSS). Data analyses utilized chi-square test for categorical variables while ANOVA test for continuous variables. Spearman rho was used to determine the association between ABI and NIHSS. RESULTS: Majority of patients with acute ischemic stroke had PAD with ABI ratio of ≤ 0.9 (51.8%). Using t-test, the NIHSS was significantly higher among patients with PAD having a mean score of 12.43 ± 5.29 compared to patients with normal ABI ratio having a mean score of 5.13 ± 4.09 (p= < 0.001). Furthermore, using Spearman’s rho statistics, ABI ratio was negatively correlated with NIHSS score (p < 0.001). CONCLUSION: Our results confirmed that there is a correlation between low ABI value and the severity of acute ischemic stroke. Routine ABI screening may help physicians intensify treatment strategies for those high-risk patients to prevent future events.
Ankle Brachial Index ; Peripheral Arterial Disease ; Stroke