Substance Abuse/Addiction

“In 2014, the number of people who died from drug overdoses in the United States reached 47,055 — an all-time high, according to a disturbing report published Friday by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC),” but “the effort to get physicians to curb their prescribing of these drugs may be faltering amid stiff resistance from drugmakers, industry-funded groups and, now, even other public health officials.”

"What was going on inside Turning Point was an experiment: a community-based treatment center designed to serve low-income African-Americans. After a few bumpy early...

A former pharma executive has broken ranks with the industry in a new book by reporting how multiple psychiatrists, schools, and his desperate hopes pressed him to allow higher and higher doses of antipsychotic medications. The result: his 15-year-old son's death from Seroquel.

Critical psychiatry researcher, anthropologist and NYU professor Helena Hansen writes: “Opioid maintenance acts as a kind of pharmaceutical prosthesis which promises to return white ‘addicts’ to regaining their status as full human persons and middle-class consumers. Meanwhile, black and brown users are not deemed as persons to be rescued, but rather dangerous subjects to be pharmaceutically contained within the public discipline of the state.”

A new poll, published in the Washington Post, explores the public’s connection to prescription pain killer abuse. “A surprising 56 percent of the public say...

US news coverage has primarily framed the opioid drug abuse epidemic as a criminal justice issue rather than a public health problem, according to new research published ahead of print in the Journal of Psychiatric Services. The media’s framing of the epidemic may increase stigma against those who develop a dependency on prescription drugs and distract political attention from public-health oriented solutions, such as increased access to substance abuse recovery treatments.

“Groundbreaking research in New Zealand shows sexual abuse may cause schizophrenia.” "The biggest myth about schizophrenia is that it's a solely biological disorder," co-author...

A review of treatment guidelines published in Psychotherapy and Psychosomatics found that guidelines “shy away from stating clearly that SSRIs/SNRIs, like BDZs, are often (though...

The abuse of ADHD drugs on college campuses has reached epidemic proportions, according to the authors of a recent review in the journal of Ethical Human Psychology and Psychiatry. ADHD drugs, like Ritalin and Adderall, have become so commonplace on college campuses that students abusing these drugs for studying, weight loss and partying have underestimated their risks. As a result, we have seen exponential increases in emergency room visits, overdoses, and suicides by students taking these drugs.

“In America, medication is becoming almost as much a staple of childhood as Disney and McDonald’s,” writes Sarah Boseley in the Guardian. In this piece photographer Baptiste Lignel follows six boys and girls to examine the long-term effects of these drugs.

More than ten-percent of adults in the United States are currently prescribed at least one psychiatric medication but there is currently a lack of research on the prevalence of adverse drug events (ADEs) associated with these prescriptions outside of clinical trials.

Different types of child abuse have equivalent psychological effects, according to a study in JAMA Psychiatry. It has previously been assumed that emotional and verbal abuse could have different or less harmful impact on a child’s psychology than physical or sexual abuse, but research now suggests that these forms of abuse can be just as damaging.

Reuters covers a new study in JAMA Psychiatry that suggests that children exposed to physical abuse and emotional abuse suffer from similar psychological and behavioral problems. “Even though doctors and parents often believe physical or sexual abuse is more harmful than emotional mistreatment or neglect, the study found children suffered similar problems regardless of the type of maltreatment endured.”

ServiceNet, a mental health and human service agency in western Massachusetts, received a three year, two million dollar grant to launch a program designed to support young adults who have recently experienced their first episode of psychosis. The Prevention and Recovery Early Psychosis (PREP) program is funded by the Massachusetts department of mental health and is designed to treat psychosis as a symptom, not an illness, resulting from other illnesses, substance abuse, trauma, or extreme stress.

In the Boston Globe, Sarah Schweitzer tells the story of a young boy brutally abused by his parents then given to his grandparents who struggled with extreme poverty and homelessness. “Researchers now understood that trauma could alter the chemistry of developing brains and disrupt the systems that help a person handle stress, propelling a perpetual state of high alert. The consequences could be lifelong. As an adult, he’d be more likely to suffer anxiety and depression and heart disease and stroke. His ability to hold a job, manage money, and make good decisions could be compromised. And there was evidence, controversial but mounting, that he could pass on these traits to his children.”

The German news agency DW features a video report on whether cannabidiol, an active substance derived from marijuana, can help relieve the symptoms of schizophrenia.

New York Times columnist, Nicholas Kristof, relates the story of Andrew Francesco, a boy who began taking Ritalin at age five and died from complications with Seroquel when he was fifteen. His father, a former pharmaceutical industry executive, reveals the industry’s greed in his memoir “Overmedicated and Undertreated.” Now the industry is pushing for a first-amendment right to market its drugs for off-label uses.

In 2014, then National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH) director, Thomas Insel, speculated that ketamine “might be the most important breakthrough in antidepressant treatment in decades.” A recent review of the research suggests that while ketamine may produce a rapid short-term improvement in depression, the effect is short-lived and the potential for addiction and dependence warrants considerable caution.

A small study of 30 participants in Germany claims that cannabis can be used to treat “ADHD” because it increases the availability of dopamine. "This then has the same effect but is a different mechanism of action than stimulants like Ritalin and dexedrine amphetamine, which act by binding to the dopamine and interfering with the metabolic breakdown of dopamine." According to the report, 22 of the 30 participants opted to discontinue their prescriptions in favor of medical marijuana.

The UK Independent reports that Ireland is moving toward a policy of decriminalizing small amount of drugs like heroin, cocaine, and cannabis in what amounts to a “radical cultural shift.” While it would remain a crime to profit from the sale of these substances, users will have specially designated areas for safe use. The chief of Ireland’s National Drugs Strategy told the paper: “I am firmly of the view that there needs to be a cultural shift in how we regard substance misuse if we are to break this cycle and make a serious attempt to tackle drug and alcohol addiction.”

NPR interviews Dr. Lance Dodes, author of The Sober Truth: Debunking the Bad Science Behind Twelve-Step Programs and the Rehab Industry. Despite the fact...

ProPublica explains why a university mental health center contacted the estranged parents of a student over eighteen without her consent, and why another student’s personal counseling records were used against her in a sexual-assault investigation.

This week the drug monitoring and patients' rights website, RxISK, launched the Centre for Medication Withdrawal, a page dedicated to establishing what causes dependence and how to treat it.

ITV features and article and video today about the widespread problem of addiction and withdrawal from benzodiazepine drugs used to treat anxiety, including Ativan, Librium, Diazepam and Temazepam. Mother of three Sandra Minshull shares her story and discusses how Ativan “robbed her of her life.”

While a great deal of the excitement about advances in psychological treatments comes from the potential for research in neuroscience to unlock the secrets of the brain, many mental health experts would like to temper this enthusiasm. A special issue of the Behavior Therapist released this month calls into question the predominant conception of mental illnesses as brain disorders.