Schizophrenia and Psychosis

In the business of clinical trials, the most valuable commodities are the research subjects. Filling clinical trials is hard, and filling them quickly is even harder. That’s why in 2000 a clinical investigator told the HHS Office of the Inspector General that research sponsors were looking for three things from research sites: “No. 1—rapid enrollment. No. 2 — rapid enrollment. No. 3 — rapid enrollment.”

(This commentary originally ran on Beyond Meds) In his New York Times op-ed entitled “Our Failed Approach to Schizophrenia“ Paul Steinberg, a psychiatrist in private practice, proposes we...

The recent research scandals out of the University of Minnesota’s Department of Psychiatry may be alarming, but they are not new. Back in the 1990s, when the university was working its way towards a crippling probation by the National Institutes of Health (for yet another episode of misconduct (this time in the Department of Surgery), the Department of Psychiatry hosted two spectacular cases of research wrongdoing, both of which resulted in faculty members being disqualified from conducting research by the FDA.

The suicide of Dan Markingson at the University of Minnesota has brought notoriety to the CAFÉ study and its site investigators, Stephen Olson and Charles Schulz. But the “corrective action” recently issued by the Minnesota Board of Social Work against the CAFÉ study coordinator, Jean Kenney, has raised another disturbing question.

Ever since critics began asking questions about the death of Dan Markinson in a clinical trial at the University of Minnesota, the General Counsel for the university, Mark Rotenberg, has responded with a uniform message: the case has already been investigated many times, and no wrongdoing has ever been found. That's how Rotenberg responded to my article about the case in Mother Jones, and that's how he responded last week to the news that the Board of Social Work had issued a “corrective action” to the study coordinator for the clinical trial in which Markingson died.

The suicide of Dan Markingson at the University of Minnesota has brought notoriety to the CAFÉ study and its site investigators, Stephen Olson and Charles Schulz. But the “corrective action” recently issued by the Minnesota Board of Social Work against the CAFÉ study coordinator, Jean Kenney, has raised another disturbing question.

In the "agreement for corrective action" against CAFE study coordinator Jean Kenney last week, the Board of Social Work cited Kenney's failure to respond to "alarming voicemail messages" from family members of Dan Markingson. Presumably, the Board is referring to a message left by his mother, Mary Weiss, which warned, "Do we have to wait until he kills himself or someone else before anyone else does anything?" The failure of Kenney and Stephen Olson to take the warnings of Mary Weiss seriously has been one of the most disturbing aspects of this case. In a deposition for the lawsuit filed by Weiss, Kenney was questioned about her response. Here is an excerpt. (The initial questions come from Gale Pearson, an attorney for Mary Weiss.)

Jim Gottstein on Pressuring Parents to Drug Children

Researchers from Philadelphia and Baltimore find, in a study of Medicaid records for 50 states and the District of Columbia, that antipsychotic prescribing to...

Writing in the British Journal of Clinical Psychology, London researchers find that perceptions of lower social rank and inferiority amongst 24 individuals with early...

Dissociative Identity Disorder (DID) has a complicated and controversial history. In this study, published in PLoS 1, researchers from London and the Netherlands explore...

Researchers from London, writing in European Psychiatry, reviewed "all RCTs involving children and young people with a diagnosis of childhood onset schizophrenia comparing any...

A sample of 276 youth recruited from 2 juvenile detention centers found that the association between trauma exposure and callous-unemotional traits was mediated by...

"Mixed anxiety-depressive disorder," "attenuated psychosis syndrome," "obsessive-compulsive personality disorder," "antisocial personality disorder," and "nonsuicidal self-injury" were among diagnoses that met with disappointing results in...

The APA DSM-5 Development website announced today that "Psychosis Risk" and "Mixed Anxiety Depression" will not be included in the DSM-5 (apart from recommendations...

According to data drawn from 608 patients of an early intervention program in Dublin, presented at the 3rd Biennial Schizophrenia International Research Society (SIRS)...

Researchers from Australia and the UK found that people with a schizophrenia diagnosis almost four times more likely than controls to have a history of...

In the first analysis of 30 years of studies, including 46 studies (selected from 27,000) involving 80,000 subjects, researchers in the U.K. and Australia...

Researchers in Finland reviewed questionnaires filled out by 911 primary and psychiatric care patients over 16 years of age. They found that more than...

Article Abstract: Although research supports the stigma and labeling perspective, empirical evidence also indicates that a social safety net remains intact for those with mental...

Research by five U.K. universities across multiple sites for up to two years divided 288 young adults (14-35 years) deemed at risk for psychosis...

Jim Gottstein’s presentation March 29, 2012 at the APA’s Humanistic Division. Mr. Gottstein talks about the the legal and moral issues of the massive number...

Jim Gottstein’s presentation March 29, 2012 at the APA’s Humanistic Division. Mr. Gottstein talks about the the legal and moral issues of the massive number...

Hallucinatory experiences are common in childhood and adolescence, and most cases discontinue in the short-term, according to a review of the data conducted by...