One in 10 people over age 12 in the United States is taking an antidepressant, according to the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey, which is conducted by the Center for Disease Control. Women between the ages of 40 and 59 are the most likely group to take antidepressants. In this age range, 23 percent of U.S. women are taking one.
via Antidepressant use soaring among Americans 12 and over – MayoClinic.com.
ADHD Drugs and Serious Cardiovascular Events in Children and Young Adults — NEJM
In conclusion, in our study involving children and young adults with 2.5 million person-years of follow-up, there were 3.1 serious cardiovascular events per 100,000 person-years. Although the point estimates of the relative risks for ADHD drugs did not indicate increased risk, the upper limit of the 95% confidence interval suggested that a doubling in the risk could not be ruled out. However, the absolute magnitude of any increased risk would be low.
The entire article is worth reading given the potential serious side effects of the drugs in question.
Medical News: FDA Okays Generic Version of Zyprexa – in Psychiatry, Schizophrenia from MedPage Today
The FDA has approved a generic version of atypical antipsychotic drug olanzapine (Zyprexa) to treat schizophrenia and bipolar disorder.
According to the AP story:
Drugs like Zyprexa can cost up to $500 per month. Generic versions can cut the cost by up to 80 percent.
This is great news.
Markers of B12 insufficiency all predicted lower global cognitive scores over nearly five years of follow-up, Christine C. Tangney, PhD, of Rush University Medical Center in Chicago, and colleagues found.
Why We Don’t Take Care of Ourselves
Negative stereotypes about aging lead to the adoption of less healthy lifestyle choices that turn the negative stereotypes into a self-fulfilling prophecy.
Take Home Message:
Watch for signs of negative belief systems about aging in medical records.
Especially in the older population.
Mindfulness Meditation Is Associated With Structural Changes in the Brain [NCCAM Research Results]
Brain images in the meditation group revealed increases in gray matter concentration in the left hippocampus. The hippocampus is an area of the brain involved in learning, memory, and emotional control, and is suspected of playing a role in producing some of the positive effects of meditation. Gray matter also increased in four other brain regions (though not in the insula, a region that has shown changes in other meditation studies) in the meditation group. Responses to the questionnaire indicated improvements in three of the five aspects of mindfulness in the mediators, but not the control group.
The researchers concluded that these findings may represent an underlying brain mechanism associated with mindfulness-based improvements in mental health. Additional studies are needed to determine the associations between specific types of brain change and behavioral mechanisms thought to improve a variety of disorders.
Pot Use in Youth Ups Risk of Psychotic Symptoms in Later Life
The new findings are based on data on about 2,000 individuals in Germany who were 14 to 24 years old when they enrolled in the study, and who were then followed for 10 years.
None of the participants had ever tried marijuana before entering the study, nor had any experienced psychotic symptoms.
The researchers found that those who started smoking pot during the 10 years of the trial had double the risk of developing psychotic symptoms such as hallucinations, even after adjusting for factors such as age, sex, socioeconomic status, other drug use and other psychiatric diagnoses.
And the more persistent the use, the more persistent the symptoms.
In Women, Diabetes Plus Depression a Deadly Combo
Women who had diabetes had about a 35 percent increased risk of dying, and those with depression had about a 44 percent increased risk, compared with women with neither condition, the researchers calculated.
Those with both conditions had about twice the risk of dying, the study authors found.
The risk of all-cause mortality was elevated 67% for patients with coronary heart disease (P<0.05) and 2.10 times for those with depressive symptoms (P<0.001) in the long-running Whitehall II study of British civil servants.
But patients who had both conditions had a nearly five-fold risk compared with those who had neither (hazard ratio 4.99, P<0.001), Hermann Nabi, PhD, of the University of Versailles, France, and colleagues reported online in Heart.
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