Around The Web

Updates on critical psychiatry postings across the Internet.

“Barry Takes Center Stage for World Benzo Day Launch”

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Mad In America contributor and prescription drug addiction reformer Barry Haslam has “taken his fight to the world stage by helping create an international...

“What Does Scientific Reproducibility Mean, Anyway?”

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The Watchdogs at STAT, Ivan Oransky and Adam Marcus, dive into the replication crisis in medicine and psychology ask wonder, “what does reproducibility really...

“F.D.A. Targets Inaccurate Medical Tests, Citing Dangers and Costs”

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Following an eye-opening FDA report, the Obama administration is attempting to pass tighter regulations on medical tests. “Inaccurate and unreliable medical tests are prompting...

“Why Can’t Doctors Identify Killers?”

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The New York Times posts a commentary by psychiatrist Richard Friedman, noting that "What most people don’t know is that drug and alcohol abuse...

Vail Place Focuses on Collective Work for Mental Health

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Minn Post did a feature story last week on Vail Place, an alternative mental health treatment center run on a community “clubhouse” model where the nearly 900 members and staff work side by side to run the center’s activities. Vail Place was founded in Hopkins, Minnesota in the early eighties by mental health activists and family members as a community for psychosocial rehabilitation. “The work isn’t therapy,” a member explains. “It’s growth. It’s ‘I cans’ rather than ‘I can'ts.’ And that’s important for mental health and survival.”

“Study Reveals Benzodiazepines Frequently Prescribed to High-Risk Patients”

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A new study in the Journal of General Internal Medicine found that benzodiazepines are prescribed at high doses to patients at a high rate...

Saturday Night Music: A Bridge Over Diagnosis

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-Satirist and scientist James McCormack and his band return with a parody of Simon & Garfunkel's Bridge Over Troubled Water.

Antipsychotic Use Linked to Increased Mortality Risk in Parkinson’s

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-A presentation at the International Parkinson and Movement Disorder Society Congress, that showed a doubling and tripling of the risk of dying within 6 months for people with Parkinson's if they were taking antipsychotics.

Three Psychiatrists Attempt to Distinguish Grief, Complicated Grief and Depression

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In Medscape, three psychiatrists discuss the new definitions in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders for grief, complicated grief, depression and major depression, and try to explain how to reliably distinguish between them all.

“Study on ‘Bah Humbug Syndrome’ Offers Cautionary Tale”

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“Throughout the world, we estimate that millions of people are prone to displaying Christmas spirit deficiencies after many years of celebrating Christmas,” write the...

“A Pharmacy Handed Out Antipsychotic Meds to Kids on Halloween”

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A Quebec City pharmacy claims it accidentally mixed antipsychotic drug pills into a candy basket that was distributed to trick-or-treating children.

“White Bread Could Lead to Depression, Research Finds”

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"Older women who eat white bread and rice found to have greater risk of depression, according to research ... But whole grain foods, roughage...

“You Could Be Paying More for Less Effective Medicine”

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A new study by Lisa Cosgrove, "Under the Influence: The Interplay among Industry, Publishing, and Drug Regulation," suggests that weak drug regulation can lead...

“Breaking News Consumer Handbook: Health News Edition”

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Listen: NPR’s On the Media talks about how bad health information ripples through the news. Gary Schwitzer of HealthNewsReview.org cautions against other problematic health reporting in a Breaking News Consumer's Handbook: Health News Edition.

“Poverty Shapes How Children Think About Themselves”

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-Children's ways of thinking and feeling are being strongly shaped and delimited, as early as the age of five, through the imposition of social categories and stereotypes.

RAISE Study Out Of Sync With Media Reports

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Writing on his 1 Boring Old Man blog, Dr. Mickey Nardo reflects on the media frenzy around the RAISE study and asks why the prescription data has not been released. He adds skepticism about the political motives of the potentially overblown results, which he sees as a clear push for increased mental health funding.

“Drop the Language of Disorder”

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Peter Kinderman, John Read, Joanna Moncrieff and Richard Bentall write, in Evidence-Based Mental Health this month, that "While some people find a name or...

“Are Understandings of Mental Illness Mired in the Past?”

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In The Psychologist, Vaughan Bell of Mind Hacks and John Cromby debate how we ascribe meanings and values to the biological elements of psychological...

Peer Specialists Needed! Research Survey at UIC

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The University of Illinois at Chicago (UIC) has launched a peer research survey and is looking for participants. “We invite peer workers and certified...

“Making a Choice: APA Reform or Business as Usual?”

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Former president of Psychologists for Social Responsibility (PsySR), Roy Eidelson discusses efforts to undermine the Hoffman report which revealed the American Psychologica Association’s collusion in torture. "First, from a familiar playbook, we have the obligatory attack on the patriotism of Hoffman and those who have criticized psychologists’ participation in abusive detention and interrogation operations,” he writes. “The most outrageous example comes from two retired military officers, David Bolgiano and John Taylor. In a recent piece they described the Hoffman Report as a ‘classic attack of cowards’ and also stated, ‘By the publication and release of this report, the APA becomes a willing co-conspirator to the likes of al Qaeda and ISIS.’”

This Most “Denigrated” of Professions: Lieberman Interviewed On NPR

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-Former American Psychiatric Association president Jeffrey Lieberman talks about "the most distrusted, feared and denigrated of all medical specialties."

Tailoring Teaching for Temperament Improves Engagement

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"A classroom program that helps teachers adapt their interactions with students based on individuals' temperaments may lead to more student engagement in kindergarten, more...

“Attention: A Muscle to Strengthen”

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Amit Sood of the Mayo Clinic discusses his efforts to educate the public about building "mental health" through "creating intentionality" in one's thinking and attention.

Early Brain Injury and Autism

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A pediatrician writing for The Daily Beast discusses a recent study in the journal Neuron that found links between autism and brain injury during...

Reminder: Taper Pets off their Psychiatric Medications

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Salon has published an excerpt from Laurel Braitman’s book Animal Madness, in which she notes that the U.S. market for pet pharmaceuticals was $6.68...