Early Trauma, Social Stress Accompany Psychosis
Researchers at Emory University find that childhood trauma, sensitivity to psychosocial stress and a heightened biological response to stress are associated with the onset...
Discontinuing Psychotropics Reduces Falls in Elderly
Australian researchers look at the literature on the effect of psychotropics on falls in the elderly; largest effect of any randomized trial was achieved...
Evidence That Sadness When Bereaved is Not Illness
While the DSM-IV recognizes that depressive symptoms are sometimes normal in bereaved individuals, this "Bereavement Exclusion" is targeted for elimination from the DSM-V. However...
Pfizer Files to Consolidate Birth Defect Lawsuitsd
With at least 59 lawsuits pending over birth defects allegedly caused by Zoloft, Pfizer moves to consolidate litigation near its headquarters in New York.
Read...
J&J Earnings Down 89%
The Wall Street Journal reports that Johnson & Johnson's fourth-quarter earnings fell 89% following settlements for misrepresenting the risks and benefits of Risperdal, its...
Alarm About Antipsychotics as Sleep Aids
Canadian sleep researchers, writing in The Lancet, warn that weight gain, lipid and glucose dysregulation, restless leg syndrome, sleep-walking and eating while asleep, and...
Elevated Diabetes in Children Treated With Antipsychotics, Antidepressants
Researchers at the University of Massachusetts found that children are more than twice as likely to develop diabetes when treated with antidepressants, and more...
J&J Takes Hit on Wall Street for Its Corrupt Practices
In the wake of the Johnson & Johnson's settlements over its improper marketing of Risperdal, Forbes magazine comments on the company's "vulnerable and now...
J&J Settles Texas Medicaid Lawsuit for $158 Million
Johnson & Johnson has agreed to settle Texas' lawsuit for the company's fraudulent marketing of Risperdal. The is the first time J&J has settled...
Bipolar Office Visits Soar
The number of "visits" by bipolar patients 18 and older to office-based physicians in the U.S. rose from 3.7 million in 1998 to 7.8...
One in Five Americans Uses a Psychiatric Drug
Because of the increased use of generic drugs, there has been a slowdown in the growth of spending for psychiatric drugs in the United...
Nicotine Replacement Therapies Fail to Provide a Lasting Benefit
In clinical trials, nicotine gum and patches are effective in helping people quit smoking. However, researchers have found that nicotine-replacement therapies do not lower...
Texas Lawsuit Against J&J Underway
Texas' lawsuit against Johnson & Johnson for its off-label marketing of Risperdal, which the state alleges involved fraudulent claims about the drug's safety and...
Why Marijuana Can Trigger Psychosis
Brain scans by London researchers show why marijuana calms some people, but can cause psychosis or paranoid thoughts in others. They found that THC...
J & J to Pay More Than $1 Billion For Wrongful Marketing of Risperdal
In order to resolve a civil investigation into the marketing of Risperdal for unapproved uses, Johnson & Johnson will pay more than $1 billion...
Why Trials of Antidepressants Often Fail
In a review of seven clinical trials of duloxetine (Cymbalta), researchers found that the drug-treated patients fell into two groups: 76.7% "responded" to the...
Psychiatric Hospitalization of Children Soars
From 1996 to 2007, the number of children ages five to 13 discharged from a psychiatric inpatient unit nearly doubled on a per-capita basis....
Antipsychotic Drugs and the Risk of Hyperglycemia in Older Adults Without Diabetes: A Population-Based...
Objective: To determine whether current antipsychotic use among older persons without diabetes is associated with a higher risk of hospital visits for hyperglycemia, as...
Polypharmacy/Bipolar illness
A. Bipolar Illness Before the Psychopharmacology Era
Prior to 1955, bipolar illness was a rare disorder. There were only 12,750 people hospitalized with that disorder...
Wired Magazine on the DSM and Allen Frances
Article from Wired magazine in 2010 about Allen Frances, lead editor of the DSM-IV, and his criticism of both the DSM-IV and the upcoming DSM-5.
Article →