MedPage Today (9/23, Lopalito) reported, “While patients with major depressive disorder [MDD] and childhood trauma had more severe depressive symptoms, they benefited from treatment as much as those without childhood trauma,” researchers concluded in a 29-study systematic review and meta-analysis that encompassed “6,830 participants.” The findings were published online Sept. 22 in The Lancet Psychiatry. Healio (9/23, Herpen) also covered the story.

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— MedPage Today (requires login and subscription)

HCPlive (9/23, Grossi) reported researchers have provided “evidence that nightmares occur frequently among adolescent patients with” major depressive disorder (MDD). What’s more, the study revealed a “statistically significant association…between suicide risk and nightmare frequency.” The findings of the 499-patient study were published online Sept. 22 in the journal Nature and Science of Sleep.

Related Links:

— “Higher Risk of Suicide Observed in Adolescents Suffering from Nightmare Distress “Giuliana Grossi, HCPlive, September 23, 2022

HealthDay (9/22, Reinberg) reports a study published in eClinical Medicine found “people aged 35 to 64 who had bad dreams weekly were four times more likely to have cognitive decline over the following 10 years, and older people were twice as likely to develop dementia.” Researchers evaluated data “on more than 600 adult men and women between the ages of 35 and 64” as well as “2,600 adults aged 79 and older who didn’t have dementia” and “also found that the risk for dementia tied to nightmares was stronger among men than women.”

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— “Lots of Nightmares in Middle Age Might Be Warning Sign of Dementia “Steven Reinberg, HealthDay, September 22, 2022

According to Psychiatric News (9/22), “Participating in at least two sessions of a telephone-delivered intervention may help reduce total alcohol consumption, alcohol problem severity, and risky drinking patterns among patients with alcohol use problems,” a study published Wednesday in JAMA Psychiatry shows. The findings of the 344-participant study, researchers wrote, “demonstrate the potential benefits of this highly scalable telehealth model of alcohol treatment, with potential to reduce the treatment gap for problem alcohol use.”

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— “Telephone Intervention May Reduce Risky Alcohol Consumption, Psychiatric News, September 22, 2022

Healio (9/22, Herpen) reports a “relapse of schizophrenia symptoms was associated with higher rates of adverse socioeconomic outcomes” among military veterans, researchers concluded in a retrospective cohort study published in the Journal of Clinical Psychiatry. Investigators “also found the relapse cohort had a higher frequency of unemployment (75.4% vs. 71.4%), divorce (35.6% vs. 33.7%), homelessness (38.9% vs. 23.7%), incarceration (0.6% vs. 0.4%), and premature death (23.3% vs. 16.9%) compared with non-relapse counterparts.”

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— “Relapse of schizophrenia in US veterans linked to higher rate of adverse social outcomes “Robert Herpen, Healio, September 22, 2022

Healio (9/22, Herpen) reports a study found that “depression and PTSD were highly prevalent 5 years after the onset of the water crisis in Flint, Michigan, suggesting that public-works disasters have large-scale, long-term psychological impacts.” The results, published in JAMA Network Open, “showed that 435 (22.1%) respondents met DSM-5 criteria for presumptive past-year depression, 480 (24.4%) for presumptive past-year PTSD, and 276 (14%) for both disorders.”

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— “Five years after Flint water crisis – depression, PTSD highly prevalent “Robert Herpen, Healio, September 22, 2022

MedPage Today (9/21, Lopilato) reports, “Maternal depressive symptoms were associated with an increase in the number of unhealthy adolescent behaviors,” researchers concluded in a 213-participant, “15-year longitudinal study,” the findings of which were published online Sept. 21 in the journal Pediatrics.

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MedPage Today (9/21, DePeau-Wilson) reports, “Patients with post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) are often treated for symptoms of the condition before ever receiving a formal diagnosis,” investigators concluded in “a retrospective analysis” that “identified 26,306 adult patients in the IBM MarketScan Commercial Subset database who were diagnosed with and treated for PTSD from 2015 to 2020,” and then analyzed “data for each patient in the six months before and the 24 months after diagnosis.” The findings were presented in a poster at the Psych Congress 2022.

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— MedPage Today (requires login and subscription)

According to CNN (9/20, McPhillips), not only have “overdose deaths in the United States increased sharply throughout the COVID-19 pandemic, reaching record levels in 2021,” but “the burden on different racial and ethnic groups has changed,” researchers concluded in findings published online Sept. 20 in a research letter in JAMA Network Open. After analyzing data “from the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s National Vital Statistics System” that “compared semiannual drug overdose deaths between the months of March to August for 2018, 2020 and 2021,” researchers found that overdose death rates appeared to be highest among American Indian and middle-aged Black men.

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— “Drug overdose death rates highest among American Indian people and middle-age Black men, study shows “Deidre McPhillips, CNN, September 20, 2022

Bloomberg Law (9/20, Subscription Publication) reports, “The Office of Minority Health has awarded more than $3 million in grants to eight organizations as part of a three-year initiative surrounding Black youth mental health policies, the Department of Health and Human Services” announced on Sept. 20. The project period of this initiative “begins Sept. 30, the HHS said.”

Related Links:

— “HHS Grants $3 Million for Black Youth Mental Health Initiative Bloomberg Law, September 20, 2022