Recent News Archives
Psychosis as a Basic “Disturbance of Self”
February 22, 2012
Researchers in Australia and the U.K. found that a basic disruption of the sense of ownership of one’s experience and a lack of self-agency differentiated 49 patients at “ultra high risk” for psychosis from 52 matched healthy controls. This finding, …
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Categorized in: Alternative Approaches, Critique of Psychiatry, Disorders, In the News, Industry News, Literature, News Archives, Research, Resources
Criticism of the DSM Goes Mainstream
February 21, 2012
Criticism of the upcoming revision of the DSM has gone mainstream, with Forbes Magazine weighing in on the economics of medicalizing grief, and Fox News questioning the wisdom of calling shyness a disorder. Allen Frances, committee chair of the previous DSM revision, writes …
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Categorized in: Critique of Psychiatry, Disorders, In the News, Industry News, Research
Psychosis in the General Population
February 21, 2012
Schizophrenia Bulletin explores “the extended psychosis phenotype,” finding that affective dysregulation, psychotic experiences, motivational impairments, and cognitive alterations are distributed throughout the population, and suggestive of a continuum of vulnerability for psychosis more than a categorical phenotype. In assessing rates of …
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Categorized in: Alternative Approaches, Alternative Approaches, Disorders, In the News, Industry News, Literature, News Archives, Research
Psychosis Overlaps With Anxiety and Depression
February 21, 2012
In a representative community sample of 3021 adolescents and young adults, researchers in The Netherlands, Germany, Switzerland, and the U.K. found that 27% of those with anxiety and depression exhibited one or more psychotic symptoms. Further analysis suggests that psychosis, …
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Categorized in: Alternative Approaches, Disorders, In the News, Literature, News Archives, Research, Resources
Schizophrenia Bulletin Questions the “Psychosis Phenotype”
February 21, 2012
In an editorial introducing its March issue, Schizophrenia Bulletin explores the categorical distinctions that have defined and directed research into psychotic disorders since the late 19th century. Findings from cognitive, neurobiological and epidemiological research, they say, may support a more unitary concept …
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Categorized in: Alternative Approaches, Critique of Psychiatry, Disorders, In the News, Industry News, News Archives, Research
Promoter of Early Intervention Programs for Psychosis Reverses Course
February 19, 2012
Australian psychiatrist Patrick McGorry, who had championed early intervention in those ”at risk” of developing psychosis, has reversed course and, concerned about over-medication and over-diagnosis in young people, argues against the inclusion of “pre-psychosis” in the DSM-V. Read more
Categorized in: All pediatric disorders, Alternative Approaches, In the News, News Archives
Some Avoid Antipsychotics Because They Value Psychosis
February 17, 2012
Side effects, mistrust, stigma, forgetfulness and lack of insight have all been studied as reasons that up to 75% of people with a schizophrenia diagnosis discontinue antipsychotic medication. Researchers in Germany, Switzerland and the U.K. explore the possibility that this …
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Categorized in: Alternative Approaches, Alternative Approaches, Disorders, Drugs, In the News, Research
Mindfulness-Based Cognitive Therapy is Effective in Bipolar Disorder
February 14, 2012
Researchers at Massachusetts General Hospital and Harvard Medical School found that Mindfulness Based Cognitive Therapy increased mindfulness, lowered depressive mood symptoms, lessened attentional difficulties, and increased emotion-regulation abilities, psychological well-being, positive affect, and psychosocial functioning in a sample of 12 …
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Categorized in: Alternative Approaches, Alternative Programs, Disorders, Holistic and trauma Informed Programs and Literature, In the News, Research
Childhood Maltreatment Reduces Hippocampal Volume
February 14, 2012
Researchers at Harvard University, in the largest and most detailed study on the topic to date, found that childhood maltreatment is significantly associated with reduced hippocampal volumes. Reduced hippocampal volumes have been implicated with chronic and first-episode schizophrenia, depression, dissociative identity disorder, …
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Categorized in: Alternative Approaches, Disorders, In the News, Literature, News Archives, Research
Benzo Discontinuation Improves Quality of Life and Reduces Symptoms of Schizophrenia
February 14, 2012
Researchers in Japan find that tapering or reducing benzodiazepines has a positive effect on quality of life, verbal and working memory, and psychiatric symptoms in people with a schizophrenia diagnosis, with no adverse effects. The study found that a daily …
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Categorized in: Disorders, Drugs, In the News, Medication Reduction Guides, Medication Withdrawal Research, Research, Withdrawal Guides and Protocols
Hopelessness Predicts Suicide in First-Admission Psychosis “Above and Beyond” History of Suicidality
February 13, 2012
Researchers in Canada, The United States, and Israel found in a retrospective study of 414 first admissions for psychosis that high baseline score of hopelessness reliably predicted attempted suicide 4 to 6 years later. Read more
Categorized in: Disorders, In the News
Antidepressants Have No Effect On Bipolar Depression
February 10, 2012
In a review of 68 articles published between 2005 and 2011, Israeli researchers found that most well-controlled studies failed to show a significant effect of antidepressants on bipolar depression. Read more
Categorized in: Disorders, Drugs, In the News, News Archives
Negative Symptoms Have Greater Impact Than Positive on Outcomes in Schizophrenia
February 10, 2012
In a Schizophrenia Research article study of 1447 people diagnosed with schizophrenia as part of the NIMH CATIE study, researchers in Israel, Switzerland and the U.K. found that improvement in negative symptoms had a distinct and independent effect on outcome …
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Categorized in: Disorders, In the News, News Archives
African-Americans More Likely to be Diagnosed Schizophrenic
February 10, 2012
In a study of 610 psychiatric inpatients and outpatients from six academic medical centers across the United States, African Americans were almost three times more likely to receive a diagnosis of schizophrenia than non-latino white individuals, even after controlling for …
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Categorized in: Disorders, In the News, News Archives
England Seeks to Stop Antipsychotics For Dementia
February 9, 2012
English health minister Paul Burstow is seeking to outlaw the ‘silent scandal’ of inappropriate antipsychotics for dementia by proposing legislation that imposes up to five years in prison for prescribing the drugs without permission. Read more
Categorized in: Disorders, Drugs, In the News, Industry News, News Archives
Antipsychotic Use Does Not Correlate With Conversion to Psychosis
February 9, 2012
Researchers in Brazil find, in a meta-analysis, that only 30% of youth deemed to be of ultra high risk of psychosis do in fact become psychotic, with 30% recovering. While a high level of positive symptoms and low social functioning …
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Categorized in: Disorders, Drugs, In the News, News Archives, Uncategorized
David Healy Critiques Gibbons’ Reanalysis of Antidepressants and Suicide
February 8, 2012
David Healy critiques the reanalysis by Robert Gibbons of antidepressants and suicidality in children and adolescents that was reported on this page yesterday. He points out many failures of the study, including that factors other than antidepressants account more plausibly …
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Categorized in: Drugs, In the News, Industry News, News Archives
Cognitive Therapy Shown to be Effective For Schizophrenia
February 7, 2012
Researchers report in the February issue of Archives of General Psychiatry that cognitive therapy improved both positive and negative symptoms in “low-functioning” patients with schizophrenia. An accompanying editorial elaborates on society’s historical concern with positive symptoms, while the principal concerns …
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Categorized in: Disorders, In the News, News Archives
Suicidal Thoughts and Behavior With Antidepressant Treatment: A Reanalysis
February 7, 2012
In 2004 and 2006, the FDA concluded that SSRI antidepressants increased the risk of suicidal ideation in children and adolescents. However, in this month’s Archives of General Psychiatry, Robert Gibbons and four other researchers report that they have re-analyzed the …
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Categorized in: Drugs, In the News, News Archives
Lawsuit Filed for Alleged Zoloft-Related Birth Defects
February 7, 2012
Lawyers in St. Louis have filed a lawsuit against Pfizer that alleges 18 children were born with birth defects caused by the antidepressant Zoloft taken by their mothers while pregnant. The plaintiffs allege that Pfizer knew of the drug’s association …
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Categorized in: All pediatric disorders, Drugs, In the News, Industry News, News Archives
Eli Lilly To Freeze Base Pay in 2012
February 5, 2012
Citing financial pressure from the loss of its patent on Zyprexa, Eli Lilly announced that it will freeze base pay for most of its employees in 2012. Read more
Categorized in: Drugs, In the News, Industry News, News Archives
Voice Hearing as a Dissociative Rather Than Psychotic Phenomenon
February 5, 2012
Researchers in England review in depth the evidence for voice hearing as dissociation, rather than psychosis, and suggest that voice hearing is a common experience that should be viewed in the context of trauma and the struggle to give words …
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Categorized in: Disorders, In the News, News Archives
First Personal Injury Lawsuit Over Risperdal Starts in New Jersey
February 3, 2012
Gary Skala’s claim that 14 years of Risperdal caused his diabetes went to trial in New Jersey yesterday in the first personal injury lawsuit against Johnson & Johnson to be presented to a jury. The trial follows J&J’s losses in …
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Categorized in: Drugs, In the News, Industry News, News Archives, Uncategorized
Adverse Childhood Events Contribute Significantly to Most Mental Health Problems
February 2, 2012
John Read and Richard Bentall write in the British Journal of Psychiatry about the growing understanding and acceptance of the significant role adverse childhood events play in most mental health problems, and the theoretical, clinical and primary prevention implications of …
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Categorized in: All pediatric disorders, Disorders, In the News, Industry News, News Archives
Bribery Alleged in Largest Antidepressant Study Ever Conducted
February 2, 2012
A 2011 whistleblower complaint that was unsealed on January 20 of this year alleges that Forest Pharmaceuticals bribed a principle investigator of the STAR*D (Sequenced Treatment to Relieve Depression) study to fix the results in favor of the company’s drug …
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Categorized in: Drugs, In the News, Industry News, News Archives