Shedding light on epilepsy in 22q11.2 Deletion Syndrome

Posted on 30 August 2017 by Christopher Eaton

Imagine being the parent of a child with a rare genetic disorder that affects heart, mind and brain. Then imagine that this ‘rare’ disorder in fact effects up to fifteen thousand people in the UK and Ireland, with around 200 babies being born with the disorder every year. How can such a common disorder still
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Increase understanding of autism and stop wrongly blaming parents

Posted on 11 August 2017 by Professor Susan Leekam

Sue Leekam and Catherine R.G. Jones As many as 1.1% of the population of the UK has autism spectrum disorder (ASD), making it a relatively common condition. Yet ASD can still go undetected and be misunderstood. In some children the signs of ASD are obvious while in others the signs present in more subtle and
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Could data science revolutionise mental health care?

Posted on 2 August 2017 by Kathryn Excell

One in four people are affected by mental illness each year, with often devastating impacts on their lives. And whilst mental illness is gaining increasing attention in the media and political debate, our understanding of what causes conditions ranging from anxiety to schizophrenia is still woefully inadequate, with research lagging far behind that of other
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My Cardiff diary

Posted on 24 July 2017 by Dr Niran Okewole

Why was I in Cardiff? Eighteen years ago, while still in medical school, a Cameroonian geneticist took a few of us in our Genetics club (which I had joined out of a natural impulse) to a laboratory in Cotonou, Benin republic, where he introduced us to the Sanger sequencing that was soon to revolutionise the
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Why mindfulness matters in medical education

Posted on 18 July 2017 by Dr Craig Hassed

This post is based on a paper that appears in the second issue of The British Student Doctor Journal, an imprint of Cardiff University Press. There are many challenges associated with being a young doctor. These include managing stress, burnout, and maintaining good mental health and a healthy approach to self-care. There are also other
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