Will Baum, LCSW

It’s that time again:  the free CBT clinic at the Southern California Counseling Center runs from 2 to 6pm today, August 1st.  My quick interview with clinic founder, John Tsilimparis, is here.  The clinic website is here.

NYT:  The New Dating Tools: A Card and a Wink

Move over, Match.com. This is the next generation of online dating. Unlike traditional dating sites where members spend hours on computers writing autobiographies and scrutinizing photographs, a raft of newfangled dating tools are striving to better bridge the gap between online and real-world romance.

This Sunday, July 11th, 2-6pm, at SCCC.  From the Free CBT Clinic’s Facebook page:

Results from a giant Consumer Reports mental health survey, reported earlier, have been posted.  Here are the bullet points they came up with:

Talk therapy helps

Some drugs have an edge

Anxiety rises [is on the rise, that is, since 2004]

Side effects shift

Type of therapist doesn’t matter

Details on the site.

NYT Business article about the efforts to make and market a female sex pill.

Regulators and doctors tend to be less tolerant of side effects in quality-of-life drugs than they are in medicines intended to mitigate life-and-death diseases. Some industry critics, meanwhile, contend that in the quest to find new and treatable quality-of-life problems, drug makers are not so much identifying unmet needs as they are stoking existing social anxieties to weld to their medicines.

One computer can detect depression in blog posts.  Another can win at Jeopardy!

Next:  ?

Used to be there was no way to diagnose Alzheimer’s disease during a patient’s lifetime.  Now, maybe, change.

A PET scan showed amyloid exactly where it would be expected. The Swedish doctors were convinced they were seeing actual plaque. They told Dr. Mathis it was time to celebrate.

In case you missed it:  Ron Artest Thanks Psychiatrist After Lakers Win.

“Breathing, talking to yourself, and having key words – some word you train your mind and body to stay under control,” [says Dr. Nicole Miller.]  ”Athletes come to us to increase performance. It’s one of the last legal drugs.”

UPDATE: She’s a psychologist.

NYT:  Add Psyche of Gulf Workers to Spill’s Toll.

Beyond the environmental and economic damage, the toll of the mammoth spill in the Gulf of Mexico is being measured in hopelessness, anxiety, stress, anger, depression and even suicidal thoughts among those most affected, social workers say.

British people hate clowns, get help:  UK Circus Offers Therapy for Clown-Fearing Adults.

A circus touring Britain has launched a unique “clownselling” service aimed at overcoming peoples’ fears associated with its show’s starring duo, a spokesperson told NewsCore on Wednesday.

The free workshops allow those suffering from Coulrophobia — the fear of clowns, rated as Britain’s third biggest phobia behind spiders and needles in a recent poll — to confront their feelings and even access their own “inner clown.”