HealthDay (4/12, Preidt) reports, “US veterans who suffered major limb injuries in combat showed little improvement with mental health problems such as depression, anxiety and post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) in the two years after receiving treatment for their wounds,” according to research presented yesterday at the annual meeting of the American Academy of Pain Medicine. For the study, researchers “conducted phone interviews with nearly 300 veterans who suffered major combat-related limb injuries.” Notably, “at various points during the interview period, nearly 14 percent of the veterans reported generalized anxiety disorder, 14 percent reported depression and five percent had suicidal thoughts.” Almost half (46%) struggled with low-level PTSD, while another 12% said they suffered from higher-level PTSD.

Related Links:

— “Severely Injured Vets May Need Ongoing Emotional Care, “Robert Preidt, HealthDay, April 11, 2013.

Medwire (4/11, Grasmo) reports that “study findings published in PLoS One reveal that over one-third of parents and step-parents who murder their children – known as filicide – have a mental disorder.” For the study, researchers analyzed “a national index of homicide perpetrators to identify 297 filicides and 45 filicides that were followed by suicides that occurred in England and Wales during 1997 through 2006.” Investigators found that “a history of mental illness was present in 40% of perpetrators, and this was more common in mothers than in fathers (66 vs 27%).”

Related Links:

— “Mental disorders prevalent among parents who commit filicide, “Ingrid Grasmo, Medwire News, April 10, 2013.

Medscape (4/11, Keller) reports, “Cannabis use not only increases the risk for schizophrenia but new research suggests it is associated with more severe schizophrenic psychosis,” according to research presented at EPA 2013: 21st European Congress of Psychiatry. After performing “a longitudinal study of 50,087 male Swedish army conscripts aged 18 to 19 years between 1969 and 1970,” researchers found that “schizophrenia patients with a history of cannabis use had longer hospital stays, a higher rate of hospital readmission, and a type of schizophrenia ‘that may be more severe than schizophrenia cases in general,’ according to study investigator Peter Allebeck, MD, PhD, professor of social medicine in the Department of Public Health Sciences at the Karolinska Institute in Stockholm, Sweden.”

According to the New York Times (4/10, Reynolds) “Well” blog, research recently published in the Journal of Aging Research suggests that “regular exercise can substantially improve memory, although different types of exercise seem to affect the brain quite differently.” In a small study of 86 elderly women between the ages of 70 and 80 who had mild cognitive impairment who were randomized to weight training, brisk walking, or simple stretching and toning exercises and then were evaluated six months later, researchers found that “women who had exercised, either by walking or weight training, performed better on almost all of the cognitive tests after six months than they had before.” Interestingly, “while both exercise groups improved almost equally on tests of spatial memory, the women who had walked showed greater gains in verbal memory than the women who had lifted weights.” Women who stretched and performed toning exercises scored worse on memory tests.

Related Links:

— “Getting a Brain Boost Through Exercise, “Gretchen Reynolds, The New York Times, April 10, 2013.

HealthDay (4/10, Preidt) reports, “Internet searches for information about mental illnesses follow seasonal patterns, which suggests that there may be a stronger association between mental disorders and changing seasons than previously believed,” according to a study published in the May issue of the American Journal of Preventive Medicine. “Researchers analyzed data from Google searches for mental health information made in Australia and the United States from 2006 through 2010. The analysis revealed that the number of such searches in both countries was consistently higher in winter than in summer.”

Related Links:

— “Google Search Trends Suggest Mental Woes Vary by Seasons, “Robert Preidt, HealthDay, April 10, 2013.

USA Today (4/9, Kucinich) reports, “Mental health advocates, heartened when their cause took center stage in the wake of the mass shooting in Newtown, Conn., are now looking past the gun debate with the hope of having a more positive discussion about the issue.” That’s because “the focus [has been] primarily on how to prevent mentally ill people from obtaining weapons rather than improving care.” To urge a new focus, “the VERA Institute of Justice issued a policy paper warning that mental health should be dealt with as a public health issue, rather than a criminal justice issue.” And “Congressional advocates of expanding mental health said Tuesday that…the push to make changes to the mental health issue would continue.” In addition, the President’s budget proposes “$235 million for new mental health programs.”

Related Links:

— “Mental health advocates worry about gun legislation, “Jackie Kucinich, USA Today, April 9, 2013.

Medscape (4/10, Melville) reports, “Individuals with post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) have an increased risk for earlier onset of some health conditions compared with those without the disorder,” according to research presented at the Anxiety and Depression Association of America (ADAA) 33rd Annual Conference. “For the study, researchers evaluated data on 34,653 community-dwelling adults older than 20 years from Wave 2 (2004-2005) of the National Epidemiologic Survey on Alcohol and Related Conditions (NESARC).” The data revealed that “those with PTSD had greater odds of having conditions, including gastrointestinal disorders, across all age groups and of having conditions such as arthritis at a younger age compared with those without the disorder.”

USA Today (4/9, Kennedy) reports, “People younger than 65 are twice as likely to skip medications than older Americans, according to a study released today by the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The new CDC study found that about 13% of the Americans younger than 65 did not take their medications as prescribed to save money, while 6% of the older group skipped medications.” Approximately “6% of both groups tried alternative therapies to avoid prescription drug costs.”

Bloomberg News (4/9, Edney) reports that “Americans spent $45 billion out-of-pocket on retail prescription drugs in 2011, the CDC said. The Affordable Care Act is expected to expand access in 2014 when medication coverage is considered an essential benefit of any health plan offered in new insurance marketplaces called exchanges.”

The Newark (NJ) Star-Ledger (4/9, Livio) reports that the study “found the most popular cost-cutting strategy – employed by one out of every five patients at any age – was to ask doctors to prescribe a cheaper drug, according to responses from 33,000 people who participated in the CDC’s National Health Interview Survey in 2011.”

Related Links:

— “Study: Younger patients more likely to skip medications, “Kelly Kennedy, USA Today, April 9, 2013.

The Denver Post (4/8, Robles) reports than in an effort to integrate health services for patients, an increasing number of primary care physicians (PCPs) in metropolitan Denver, CO are providing on-site mental health counseling services. Patients are able to undergo instant consultations while at the doctor’s office. The piece points out how some physical and mental health conditions may overlap. By way of example, some patients who have had a heart attack will end up with a serious depression, or some people may have difficulty learning to cope with diabetes or asthma. Other people who are substance abusers may also have a comorbid physical problem.

Related Links:

— “Primary care doctors welcome mental health professionals, “Yesenia Robles, The Denver Post, April 8, 2013.

The Minneapolis Star Tribune (4/7, Spencer) reported that a class-action lawsuit filed against UnitedHealth Group will test the Federal law that says insurance companies cannot treat “mental health claims differently from medical and surgical claims.” The lawsuit was brought by the parents of a child with bipolar disorder, “two other individuals and the New York State Psychiatric Association,” and “could set a major precedent for mental health coverage in the era of healthcare reform.” The case is notable because it does not rely solely on state law for an individual claim but instead “relies heavily on the federal parity law, as well as the federal Affordable Care Act.” UnitedHealth, based in Minnetonka, Minnesota, “declined to discuss the suit, which was filed in New York on March 11.”

Related Links:

— “Suit against UnitedHealth tests mental health coverage rules, “Jim Spencer, The Minneapolis Star Tribune, April 7, 2013.