Ritalin Increases Risk-Taking in Women
Women who were asked to play a gambling were significantly more likely to keep betting when the stakes increased if they had taken Ritalin...
Woman “Jacked Up” on Zoloft Kills Baby
Saying that she had been "jacked up" on a new medication (Zoloft) and had not slept for five or six days, a Milwaukee man...
2nd-Generation Antipsychotics Cause Extrapyramidal Side Effects as Much as 1st-Generation
According to researchers from Yale and the U.K., the improvements in extrapyramidal side effects expected from 2nd-generation antipsychotics has not been realized, while the...
Sales of Antipsychotics Predicted to Drop, Then Hit a High by 2021
After a drop to $6.5 billion in 2014, due to the loss of patent protection by the Seroquel, Zyprexa, and Abilify, sales of antipsychotics...
Texas Teen’s Lawyers Seek Testimony From J&J CEO
Lawyers for a Texas teenager whose lawsuit, one of 400 Johnson & Johnson faces over personal injuries caused by Risperdal, is set to begin...
Class Action Lawsuit Granted Over Pfizer Antidepressant’s Effects on Heart, Liver and Profits
Pfizer will face a class action lawsuit by investors who claim that the drugmaker's Wyeth unit failed to disclose information about its antidepressant Pristiq's...
J&J CEO Avoids Testimony in Philadelphia Risperdal Case
Chief executive Alex Gorsky was once proud enough of Risperdal to put its sales numbers on his resume, according to the Philadelphia Inquirer today,...
Risperdal Whistle-Blower Honored in Texas, Fired in Pennsylvania
Allen Jones, the whistle blower whose testimony resulted in a $158 million settlement by Johnson & Johnson for fraudulent marketing of Risperdal in Texas,...
Active Engagement More Important Than Type of Treatment
Researchers (including Irving Kirsch) in the U.S., Israel and the U.K. find that a combination of psychotherapy and antidepressants may provide a slight benefit...
Death of a Child Linked to Onset of Psychosis
Using data from the National Comorbidity Survey, researchers found that individuals with a psychotic disorder who had lost a child had a significantly later...
Benzodiazepines Associated With 3.5x Greater Dementia Risk
Researchers in the U.K. find in a 22-year prospective study of 1134 men, 103 of whom took benzodiazepines regularly for one or more period...
Why Most Biomedical Findings Echoed by Newspapers Turn Out to be False
Researches in France and the United States found that seven of the top ten most reported-upon studies on ADHD in newspapers in the 1990s...
Misrepresentation of Research in the News
French researchers, publishing in PLoS Medicine, find that the mismatch between perceived and real beneficial effects of new treatments is related to the presence...
Antidepressants Associated With Increased Driving Risk
Researchers from the Taiwan and the United States find through a study of 5,183 subjects with motor vehicle accidents (MVAs) and 31,093 matched controls...
Psychotropics Drive Record 4.02 Billion U.S. Prescriptions in 2011
With drugs for ADHD increasing 17%, and an "unprecedented increase in patients taking antidepressants and antipsychotics," overall prescription drug sales in the United States...
Thomas Szasz, April 15, 1920 – September 8, 2012
Thomas Szasz, relentless "critic of coercive psychiatry, the 'therapeutic state,' and the war on drugs," died at his home in Manlius, N.Y. over the...
Off-Label Antipsychotic Use Among Children Soaring
Researchers from Philadelphia and Baltimore find, in a study of Medicaid records for 50 states and the District of Columbia, that antipsychotic prescribing to...
J&J Settles Risperdal Lawsuit on Opening Day
Johnson & Johnson settled one of about 420 Risperdal-related lawsuits on the trial's opening day. "The case is resolved and the client is satisfied,"...
Link Between Childhood Adversity and Psychosis Withstands Scrutiny
Researchers from Spain, Belgium and the Netherlands find, in a study of 226 monozygotic twins, that where there is a correlation between childhood adversity...
Louisiana Court Rejects J&J’s Bid to Throw Out $258 million Risperdal Award
The state appeals court of Lake Charles, Louisiana found that "the trial court was not manifestly erroneous in casting (Johnson & Johnson owner) Janssen...
More Evidence That Antipsychotics Shrink the Brain
European researchers who reviewed 43 imaging studies of first-episode psychosis found evidence that antipsychotics cause a decrease in gray matter volumes in the brain....
Cortisol Levels Increased in Youth at Risk for Psychosis
Researchers from Columbia University and the Institute of Neurosciences in Barcelona assessed cortisol levels in 33 patients at clinical high risk of psychosis. Cortisol...
Type of Treatment for Depression is Less Important than Engagement
An international team of researchers (including Irving Kirsch) found in a review "of 62 pivotal antidepressant trials consisting of data from 13,802 depressed patients"...
Pediatric Drugs: More Illness, But Less Research
An international team of researchers identified all drug trials registered in ClinicalTrials.gov between 2006 and 2011 and tracked the resulting publications, finding that although...
Happiness and First-Episode Schizophrenia
Canadian researchers find that 31 people with first-episode schizophrenia diagnoses were as happy as 29 controls, according to a self-reported questionnaire measuring happiness, life...
