Yearly Archives: 2019
Overdose Epidemic Sending More and More Children to Foster Care
From Mother Jones: The total number of foster care entries has slowly dwindled, but entries due to parental drug use jumped from roughly 40,000 in 2000 to nearly 100,000 in 2017.
āFlimsy Evidenceā for Esketamine as Depression Treatment
A new article documents the āflimsy evidenceā behind the recent FDA approval of the party drug esketamine for the treatment of depression.
Abandoned in VA Purgatory ā Misdiagnosed, Overprescribed & Fighting for Answers
Today Iāve recovered a semblance of my old life, and I, like millions of others, deserve answers. What have these drugs actually done to us? Everything Iāve learned thus far shows that antidepressants were poorly researched, and society, especially our military service members and veterans, were used as test subjects.
Canada’s Decision to Make Public More Clinical Trial Data Pressures FDA
From NPR: Canada's move follows a similar policy enacted by the European Union, but the FDA continues to treat this information as confidential to companies and rarely makes it public.
Reforming Schools to Prevent Mental Health Issues
New research explores the use of broad-based school-integrated resiliency and mindfulness interventions to prevent mental health concerns before they occur.
Groundbreaking Program Supports People Without Force in Belgium
From Human Rights Watch: "There are only two rules...We donāt abandon someone, and we donāt force someone. When people call us, theyāre a citizen. Not a sick person, not a patient, not a user, not a client.ā
Veterans Find A Path to Healing Through Shakespeare
Veterans struggling with a diagnosis of PTSD, or depression and other difficulties find that learning to perform Shakespearean monologues, and developing their own dramatic monologues, can help them "unwire" from the traumas of war.
‘Clearly a Game’: Opioid Lawsuit Settlements Give Tax Breaks to Drug Firms
From USA TODAY: "When corporations deduct settlements for wrongdoing [from their taxes], the public is doubly harmed," said a report by the U.S. Public Interest Research Group Education Fund.
The Sisyphus Cycle: How Everyday Stress Leads to Suicide
If you wanted to capture my mindset at the peak of suicidal longings ā crushing odds, repeated failures, futility of existence, huge obstacles weighing me down ā the story of Sisyphus would be it. After one too many trips around this block, enter suicide: the fail-safe tactic for escaping unbearable pain and suffering.
Dog Assisted Psychotherapy Most Effective With Children
Dog assisted psychotherapy is mostly used within the psychodynamic theory. It's especially useful in treatment with children and adolescents, where dogs seems to pass "under the radar" of children's logical defense.
Jury Says J&J Must Pay $8B in Risperdal Male Breast Growth Case
From ABC News: "Johnson & Johnson and Janssen chose billions over children... [This] is a company which has lost its way," attorneys for the plaintiff said.
New Review Finds Lancet Global Mental Health Report Misguided
A new critical review of the latest Lancet global mental health report finds that while the movement claims to take a public health approach in its rhetoric it continues to focus on culturally inappropriate individual-level interventions.
Youāre Trapped. Theyāre Cashing In: North Tampa Behavioral Health
From Tampa Bay Times: AĀ Tampa Bay TimesĀ investigation has found that North Tampa Behavioral makes huge profits by exploiting patients held under Floridaās Baker Act.
Deep Brain Stimulation and Depression
A new paper is touted as showing that deep brain stimulation "provides a robust antidepressant effect." Among the 28 patients in the study, 56 serious adverse events were reported, including infection, hemorrhage of the cortex and post-operative seizure. Yet the authors conclude that the results "support the long-term safety and sustained efficacy" of DBS.
UN Expert Calls for Major Shift in Suicide Prevention Efforts on World Mental Health...
On World Mental Health Day, UN expert Dainius PÅ«ras calls for a shift away from medical solutions toward a rights-based approach to make life āmore liveable.ā He calls for states to address societal determinants of mental health, promoting autonomy and resilience.
Discrimination Leads to Mental Distress for Gender Diverse People
Researchers seek to identify adaptive coping responses to discrimination for the transgender and gender diverse community.
Fighting Unjustified Commitment in Wisconsin: Leslieās Story
Leslie was not experiencing any depression, psychosis, or suicidal or homicidal ideation. She was not a danger to herself or others. Yet she had been picked up by police, placed in handcuffs, and brought to the hospital, and her social worker intended to have her placed in a group home.
Non-Gender Affirmative Treatment Detrimental to Mental Health
Gender identity conversion efforts impact psychological distress and lifetime suicidality in transgender people.
Beyond Well: Science, Ep.11 – Why Hearing Voices Support Groups Heal
From Open Excellence: Psychologist and researcher Gail Hornstein, PhD, talks about her research into what makes the Hearing Voices peer support group approach so healing.
Loneliness Increases Risk of Severe āCommon Mental Disordersā
Loneliness was found to both predict and be reinforced by severe common mental disorders.
Free to Check In, But Not to Leave: WA State’s For-Profit Psych Hospitals
From The Seattle Times: For-profit psychiatric hospitals in Washington routinely have held patients by claiming they wouldnāt be safe if released, only to be contradicted by government evaluators who find no grounds for committing them.
International Experts Call for Services for Millions Coming Off Psychiatric Drugs
From the International Institute for Psychiatric Drug Withdrawal: The 40 experts attending last weekendās meeting of the International Institute for Psychiatric Drug Withdrawal voted to endorse the recent Public Health England recommendations on prescribed medicines.
Humanizing Mental Healthcare by Reducing Coercive Practices
A review of the literature demonstrates that coercive practices lack empirical support and violate human rights.
Hi, Iām David. Iām a Drug Addict
From Los Angeles Times: "Most people arenāt prepared for the changes these drugs can cause to the body," says Adam Bisaga, professor of psychiatry at Columbia University Medical Center.
Infancy and Early Childhood Matter So Much Because of Attachment
From The Conversation: What we learn throughout infancy and childhood are aĀ set of behaviours and ways of thinking and feeling about ourselves and others, or what psychologists call aĀ working model of the world.
