Mental health research on Wellcome Open Research
| 31 July, 2025 | Jack Nash |
Millions of people are held back by mental health problems. Interventions aren’t effective enough for everyone, have trade-offs, and face challenges when scaling globally. Barriers to collaboration are hindering progress.
From improving our understanding of anxiety, depression, and psychosis, to developing new effective interventions, both pharmacological and non-pharmacological, the Wellcome Trust is working towards a world where no one is held back by mental health problems.
Wellcome Open Research acts as a collaborative space for Wellcome-funded researchers to share their ideas and contribute to an increased understanding of mental health science. In this blog post, we highlight some of the Gateways and recent research that are helping to further our understanding of anxiety, depression and psychosis.
Introducing the GALENOS Gateway
Mental health problems, especially anxiety, depression, and psychosis, are among the leading causes of global disease burden. While treatment and prevention options exist, they do not work for everyone, and there have been no significant advances in treatments for decades.
GALENOS aims to address these issues through a process of living evidence synthesis. The project will create a comprehensive and regularly updated summary of the research on the mechanisms, prevention, and treatment of anxiety, depression, and psychosis. This will be accomplished by publishing a series of living systematic reviews (LSRs) that will be available through this Gateway.
The GALENOS Gateway hosts all LSRs produced by the GALENOS project, as well as supporting publications such as Study Protocols related to the production of the LSRs. We’ve highlighted a couple of recent publications from the Gateway below.
The therapeutic potential of exercise in post-traumatic stress disorder and its underlying mechanisms: A living systematic review of human and non-human studies
Post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) is a mental health condition triggered by a traumatic event. It is characterised by symptoms such as reliving the trauma, nightmares, avoidance of trauma reminders, and heightened vigilance. Traditional treatments like Cognitive Behavioral Therapy are not effective for everyone, and relapse is common. Additionally, these treatments are costly and not widely accessible. Recently, exercise has been explored as a potential stand-alone or add-on treatment to improve PTSD outcomes and reduce relapse rates.
In this living systematic review, the authors examined evidence from both human and non-human studies regarding the effectiveness of exercise on PTSD symptoms and functioning. They found that non-human studies showed exercise is effective for PTSD; however, how exercise improves PTSD remains not fully understood. Results from human studies are inconclusive; nevertheless, they highlight the need for more high-quality research to determine whether exercise enhances psychotherapy effects for PTSD and the mechanisms behind it.
Read the full LSR here.
Towards an ontology of mental health: Protocol for developing an ontology to structure and integrate evidence regarding anxiety, depression and psychosis
To support living systematic reviews published as part of the GALENOS Gateway, the authors of the following Study Protocol have proposed an ontology (classification framework) of mental health. This ontology will include concepts (also called entities) that specify aspects of mental health, along with labels and definitions for these concepts and the relationships between them. An ontology of mental health can serve as a shared language and framework to communicate and organize evidence about mental health aspects, such as symptoms (e.g., insomnia) or different treatments (e.g., exercise interventions).
The authors present a proposed ontology for use in the GALENOS project. The ontology will be developed by identifying necessary concepts for systematic reviews within the GALENOS Project, refining these concepts based on existing classification frameworks. It will then be expanded by defining relationships between concepts and making it computer-readable and available online. This developed ontology could improve communication and understanding of evidence related to mental health, thereby helping to build a shared knowledge base on the subject.
Read the full Study Protocol here.
Introducing the ALSPAC Gateway
Based at the University of Bristol, the Avon Longitudinal Study of Parents and Children (ALSPAC), also known as Children of the 90s, is a world-leading birth cohort study. Between April 1991 and December 1992, over 14,000 pregnant women were recruited to be part of the study. Since the start of the study, the children arising from the pregnancy, and their partners, have been followed up intensively with for more than two decades.
The ALSPAC study is the most detailed longitudinal study of its kind in the world, providing information on the environmental and genetic factors that affect a person’s health and development – with the aim to inform policy and practices that can provide a better life for future generations.
The ALSPAC gateway publishes research articles and data notes authored by Wellcome-funded researchers who have collected or used ALSPAC data in their studies. We’ve selected a handful of Articles published as part of the ALSPAC gateway that focus on mental health research.
Maternal reports of morbidity during the index ALSPAC pregnancy
Research on mothers during pregnancy often relies on medical records or maternal reports. Generally, prospective data collection is preferred over retrospective recall because it tends to be more accurate. To this end, mothers participating in ALSPAC completed four questionnaires at different stages of pregnancy and one after the birth. Three of these questionnaires included questions about the mother’s health during specific periods, along with reasons for any medications taken.
In the following Data Note, the authors outline the questions that were asked to expectant mothers relating to the mother’s health during pregnancy. In addition, details of the reasons for the use of medications and the frequency with which she took analgesics such as paracetamol and aspirin. Elsewhere, the actual medications the mother reported taking during pregnancy are detailed, as are details of other sources of information such as the data abstracted from the medical records.
Read the full Data Note here.
Paternal health in the first 12-13 years of the ALSPAC study
ALSPAC collected information about the mothers’ partners as well as the mothers and children. Among this data were features concerning the health of the mothers’ partners. This was an important feature since the father’s physical and mental health can have a long-term effect on the family.
This Data Note reviews data on fathers’ health from pregnancy to 12 years after their child’s birth. It highlights the long-term effects of paternal health on family dynamics and child development, including anxiety and depression, enabling research on how paternal mental health influences upbringing.
Read the full Data Note here.
Are you researching mental health and receiving funding from the Wellcome Trust for your research? Submit your work to Wellcome Open Research today with no author-facing fees.