Conference report: Doctors in performance, Tallinn, 1-3 September 2021

This report chronicles the author’s participation in the Doctors in Performance (DiP) Festival Conference, September 2021, at the Estonian Academy of Music and Theatre, Tallinn. It is the fourth edition of DiP since its inauguration in 2014 at the Sibelius Academy, Uniarts Helsinki. Since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic in Europe in early 2020, most conferenceshave been either postponed, cancelled or held online. This Conference is one of the first to be held as an in-person event as Europe starts to move towards a post-pandemic period. Some participants gathered in person (including the author), while parallel online participation was also enabled as a hybrid event. This report records the conference events as DiP enters into maturity with a focus on artistic research and music performance. It also describes the author’s impressions regarding issues of ‘liveness’ in varied categories, including spoken presentations, music performances, their online equivalents, live or prerecorded presentations and online or live participations.

Prevalence of Comorbid Personality Disorder in Psychotic and Non-psychotic Disorders

Introduction: The burden of personality disorders (PDs) in China is large and the focus on mental health services is increasing. However, there is a lack of sufficient evidence regarding the prevalence of comorbid PD in psychotic and non-psychotic disorders, and whether PDs have different distributions. We aimed to investigate the PD comorbidity distribution pattern between psychotic and non-psychotic disorders using a clinical population-based study.Materials and Methods: We conducted a cross-sectional study of 1,497 patients in Shanghai. PDs were screened using the Personality Diagnostic Questionnaire Fourth Edition Plus (PDQ-4+). All patients were interviewed using the Structured Clinical Interview for Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, fourth edition (DSM-IV) Axis II (SCID-II). We compared the differences in PD comorbidities classified as the 10 types of PDs in the DSM-IV, in 531 patients with psychosis and 966 patients with non-psychotic disorders.Results: More than one-third (37%) of patients with psychotic disorders met the criteria of at least one PD. Approximately half (46%) of patients with non-psychotic disorders met the criteria of at least one PD. Patients with non-psychotic disorders were more likely to meet the criteria of borderline (χ2 = 20.154, p < 0.001) and obsessive-compulsive PD (χ2 = 21.164, p < 0.001) diagnoses compared to those with psychotic disorders. In contrast, patients with psychotic disorders were more likely to meet the criteria of paranoid (χ2 = 11.144, p = 0.001) and schizotypal PD (χ2 = 14.004, p < 0.001) diagnoses than those with non-psychotic disorders.Discussion: PD comorbidity is common and comorbidity distribution pattern is varied in patients with psychotic and non-psychotic disorders, implicating the development of specific strategies that could screen and assess PDs in psychiatric clinical practice.

Norsk Høifjeld [1911]

This is the fourth edition of Norsk Høifjeld, published in Kristiania (Oslo) in 1911 with illustrations by A. Bloch, Th. Holmboe, Th. Kittelsen, Eiv. Nielsen, and Karl Uchermann.

The Observation and Analysis of Stellar Photospheres

This textbook describes the equipment, observational techniques, and analysis used in the investigation of stellar photospheres. Now in its fourth edition, the text has been thoroughly updated and revised to be more accessible to students. New figures have been added to illustrate key concepts, while diagrams have been redrawn and refreshed throughout. The book starts by developing the tools of analysis, and then demonstrates how they can be applied. Topics covered include radiation transfer, models of stellar photospheres, spectroscopic equipment, how to observe stellar spectra, and techniques for measuring stellar temperatures, radii, surface gravities, chemical composition, velocity fields, and rotation rates. Up-to-date results for real stars are included. Written for starting graduate students or advanced undergraduates, this textbook also includes a wealth of reference material useful to researchers. eBook formats include color imagery while print formats are greyscale only; a wide selection of the color images are available online.