The purpose of this study was to consider how to work with eating-disordered inmates incarcerated for shoplifting by looking at their social factors and characteristics of shoplifting behaviors by gender. The study site was a Japanese medical correction center to which many inmates were sent who were markedly underweight due to eating disorders. 80% of these inmates had been incarcerated for theft, mainly shoplifting. Results suggested that early interventions before incarceration and long-term support after release are important.

This study describes a patient with severe ischemic heart failure cured/cared by a psychosomatic physician to explain the productive clinical practice of psychosomatic medicine based on appropriate therapeutic relationships. Psychological approaches and themes such as 1) “meet a patient” before “see a doctor”, 2) question without subject, 3) therapeutic self, 4) belief in resilience, 5) solution-focused approach, and 6) utilization of resources with an ambivalent state of mind are beneficial to improve the quality of psychosomatic cardiology clinical practice.

Hypertension is the most important risk factor of cardiovascular disease. 24-h blood pressure control is crucial to prevent cardiovascular events while the pressor responses to stress could often become barrier to achieve it. Recent evidence has shown that white coat hypertension (WCH), showing hypertension in clinic but normal in the out-of-office, was associated with higher risk of cardiovascular mortality than sustained normotension. Therefore, careful follow-up and adequate intervention are required in the management of WCH. Masked hypertension (MHT), which shows normal clinic but high out-of-office blood pressure, has been reported to have equal or worse prognosis as compared with sustained hypertension. So it is mandatory to adequately find and manage MHT without missing.

Moreover, never experienced hard work could be a risk of long-term blood pressure elevation.

In this review, we describe blood pressure variability related to psycho-behavioral stress in office and out-of-office setting and how to well achieve the 24 hr blood pressure control considering the stress component. Then, we show our data on the effects of disaster experience on blood pressure elevation in public employees, which will be helpful for the management of disaster-related hypertension.

Although a psychosomatic approach to the patients with arrhythmia is important, this importance is not so widely recognized. The sensation of palpitation is most frequently encountered in cardiac patients but is not necessarily coincided with the occurrence of arrhythmia. Persons sensitive to body sensations or with many daily irritants are prone to feel palpitation. Anxious or depressive mood is associated with the symptom, therapeutic response and prognosis in patients with atrial fibrillation. Implantable cardioverter defibrillator (ICD) does not necessarily improve the quality of life in patients with ventricular arrhythmias. Moreover, patients with anxiety or depression are abnormally sensitive to the real and phantom shock delivered by ICD, indicating that multidisciplinary mental support to such patients is important.

Depression and anxiety, more prevalent in cardiovascular disease as well as cancer or diabetes, are associated with an increased risk of worse prognosis. Although there are various assessments for the psychological distress in heart disease, there are not sufficient original reports in Japan. To date, we will discuss the method of assessment of depression and anxiety in patients with ischemic heart disease and heart failure as common heart diseases and how to cope with these problems including the psychological distress in patients with implantable cardioverter defibrillator on clinical setting.

In order to improve the course of cardiovascular disease, long-term prognosis, and the quality of life, the prevention and management of heart disease and hypertension cannot be achieved by relying only on a physical approach, especially pharmacotherapy.

For this time, we will discuss stress control methods, relaxation methods, biofeedback therapy, and animal therapy as psychosomatic approaches to cardiovascular psychosomatic disorders.

Objectives : To clarify family approach method in the outpatient clinic for family support in general and family medicine.

Methods : The subjects were patients of the outpatient clinic for family support in a university hospital in Japan between April 1998 and February 2000. The study design involved a retrospective chart review. Doctors in charge carried out oral informed consents to the subjects.

Results : The subjects were 72 patients. The average age was 48.6±15.8 years old. The ratio of men to women was 5 to 67. Family conferences were held for two families (2/72=2.78%). 69 patients (95.8%) came through their doctor in charge. 3 patients came voluntarily (4.2%) because they wanted to hide their family issues in their community and consult to a distant university hospital. The results of family assessment by the ABCDE family assessment model were as follows : 20 families had some issue of Agency, and they were treated with the role chart. 15 families had some issue of Belief and Behavior, and they were treated with assertive training. 11 families had some issue of Communication, and they were treated with family conference and social skill training. 23 families had some issue of Development (Family lifecycle), and they were treated with normalizing. And 3 families had some issue of Environment and Economy, and they were treated with multidisciplinary collaborations.

Conclusion : The ABCDE family assessment model was effective and the outpatient clinic for family support was useful for the Japanese patients who wanted to hide their family issues in their community.

The paper reviews, a decade after the Great East Japan Earthquake and Tsunami of 2011, anthoponotic issues-looking at things in their relationship to the human person-life wellness, rehabilitation, recovery, of those who suffered as “victims” of the event. Physicians and Educators, as distinct from professional Historians, whose exercises center on gathering data, value more often psychosomatic and psychospiritual “person details” resulting from the tragic onslaught. It is by virtue of Oral Histories that one gains ecumenical grasp of the anguish, grief, love, and endeavor that moves men. The observations presented reflect continuation of work reported in this journal in 2015 (Vol. 55 : No. 1) now embracing reports and bulletins from Prefectural and Government sources, cases from medical journals, information from books describing the aftermath of the crisis, newspaper articles, and log notes from internet sources, often international in perspective. Methods of study have included translation of original materials from the Japanese language into English ; analyses of informed data ; syntheses and examination of patterns of events, psychic behavior, and population movements out of and back into disaster areas, as well as social responses to Administrations, and diverse views on leadership, policy, planning, and nature of projects in respect of funding and priority. We have include note of Typhoons that often assault the same regions of these studies, and deliver not dissimilar panic, stress burden, suffering, social isolation, depopulation, and evacuation of mothers, children, old-age citizens within the terms of Emergency Disaster management.

The dominant feature that appears importantly in most reports emphasizes the whole social mind of the citizens/people/persons and the absolute need for them to be brought into every level of management of the crisis. The profiles of oral histories—the person stories told—cite over and over again the blindness of Administrations reminiscent of the eras when physicians saw only the “disease” and never the “patient”. It was not until the “Patient Bill of Rights”, well after World War Ⅱ, that the “patient” generally was able to participate in his/her own illness! That dramatic situation exists today in the area of Disaster Tragedies—crisis events even governments and “management” should better acknowledge the will to recover and restore the community exerted by citizens themselves. Even as they have been devastated and struck down, the Will for Self-Help, Self-Will, and renewed enhancement of their community, it's culture, it's traditions, it's ways must be heeded by “Management” that often presumes to organize aid on its own precognition, that as reports here show, is often misjudged or wrong. Emergency Management Disaster should be undertaken in concert with community and citizens.

We are led to believe that a permanent Social Disaster Awareness Program, as part of everyday living must be set up. Communication Networks, Disaster Sanctuaries, Catastrophe Planning empowering Community Strength in harmony with both Prefectural and Federal Planning is long overdue.