HealthDay (10/23, Thompson) reports, “Tasty flavors entice young people to try e-cigarettes, getting them hooked on what can become a lifetime habit,” researchers concluded after assessing “data collected in 2013-2014 to see whether people are more likely to first try a flavored e-cigarette or other tobacco product,” then examining “data gathered a year later to see if those who first tried a flavored product were still using tobacco.” The study revealed the “seven out of 10 kids who were new users of tobacco first tried a flavored product, as well as more than half of young adults.” The findings were published online in JAMA Network Open.

Related Links:

— “Flavors Draw Young People to Lifetime Habit of Vaping, Study Shows, “Dennis Thompson, HealthDay, October 23, 2019

On its “Morning Edition” program and in its “Shots” blog, NPR (10/23, Daley) reports, “Though there are websites, hotlines, therapists and coaches to help teens manage nicotine cravings, there’s been little research to show what” really works. Now, “some programs have turned to texting to help kids find resources specific to vaping cessation.” For example, this past July, “National Jewish Health in Denver launched a” vaping “cessation program tailored to teens’ needs” called “My Life, My Quit.” That program, which “has a traditional phone helpline…also offers coaching by text and chat.” Meanwhile, “the Truth Initiative, a nonprofit public health group aimed at helping young smokers quit tobacco use, has also expanded its resources to include a program focused on e-cigarettes,” using “a free text messaging program ‘tailored by age group’ to give teens and young adults appropriate recommendations about quitting.”

Related Links:

— “Teen Vapers Who Want To Quit Look For Help Via Text, “John Daley, NPR, October 23, 2019

Healio (10/22, Gramigna) reports, “Patients with autism spectrum disorder [ASD] and co-occurring ADHD can safely and effectively take medication for” attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (AD/HD), research indicated. Investigators arrived at this conclusion after selecting “60 adults with” AD/HD “and comorbid ASD from an outpatient clinic and compared treatment outcomes of similar regimens with 226 adults from the same clinic with only” AD/HD. The findings were published online Oct. 18 in the Journal of Attention Disorders.

Related Links:

— “Patients with comorbid autism and ADHD can safely take ADHD medication, “Joe Gramigna, Healio, October 22, 2019

HealthDay (10/22, Gordon) reports, “The commonly used antidepressant Prozac [fluoxetine] doesn’t appear to help reduce obsessive-compulsive behavior in children and teens with autism,” researchers concluded in a study that “recruited nearly 150 children and teens with autism,” only 109 of which “completed the study.” The findings were published online Oct. 22 in JAMA.

Medscape (10/22, Anderson, Subscription Publication) reports that all “study participants had ‘significant problems’ with obsessive-compulsive behaviors, with a total score of six or more on the Children’s Yale-Brown Obsessive Compulsive Scale–Modified for pervasive developmental disorders (CYBOCS-PDD).” But, “commenting for Medscape Medical News, Gabrielle L. Shapiro, MD, clinical professor of psychiatry at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai in New York City, and chair of the American Psychiatric Association…council on children, adolescents and families, described the study as ‘somewhat flawed.’” Besides “the CYBOCS, the inclusion of other outcome scales ‘more specific’ to” children with autism “in the primary analysis may have produced different results, said Shapiro, who was not involved with the current study.”

Healio (10/22, Gramigna) reports that the author of an accompanying editorial “emphasized the nullification of the overall findings by the prespecified analyses.” He wrote, “Despite the limitations, the outcome…is consistent with similar trials and contributes new evidence that SSRIs do not add any value over placebo for repetitive behaviors in children and adolescents with ASD as captured in the CYBOCS-PDD.” The editorialist called for “additional rigorous studies…both to identify other potential treatments for core symptoms and, for SSRIs, to determine whether clinical indications other than repetitive behaviors might account for their persistent widespread use in ASD.”

Related Links:

— “Antidepressant Doesn’t Ease Obsessive Behaviors of Autism, “Serena Gordon, HealthDay, October 22, 2019

The Washington Post (10/21, Wan) reports, “In the face of rising rates of depression, anxiety and suicide among young people, some states and school systems have” now begun “allowing students to take mental sick days off from school.” For example, in 2018 “Utah changed its definition of valid excuses for absences to include mental health issues,” and this past summer, “Oregon enacted a law – driven by a group of high school student activists – that allows students to take days off for mental health.” Meanwhile, “students in other states, including Colorado, Florida and Washington, are attempting to get similar laws passed.”

Related Links:

— “Schools now letting students stay home sick for mental-health days, “William Wan, The Washington Post, October 21, 2019

The NPR (10/21, Hamilton) “Shots” blog reports neuroscientists “are offering a new reason to control blood sugar levels: It might help lower your risk of developing Alzheimer’s disease.” This past Sunday, at the Society for Neuroscience meeting in Chicago, investigators presented “new research exploring the links between Alzheimer’s and diabetes.”

Related Links:

— “Keeping Your Blood Sugar In Check Could Lower Your Alzheimer’s Risk, “Jon Hamilton, NPR, October 21, 2019

Patients taking high doses of loperamide in an attempt to self-manage opioid withdrawal or to achieve a euphoric high may be at risk of severe cardiac events. If you suspect that a patient is misusing loperamide, ask your patient: Have you been taking loperamide? How much loperamide do you take and how often? Are you aware of the severe heart risks associated with loperamide misuse? Learn more about loperamide misuse, including the right questions to ask your patients, at LoperamideSafety.org.

Related Links:

— “Understanding Loperamide Abuse

Healio (10/21, Gramigna) reports, “Children whose fathers have poor mental health are more than twice as likely also to have poor mental health,” researchers concluded after using “data for 75,879 children from the 2011 to 2012 National Survey of Children’s Health” to estimate “prevalence and odds of poor mental and physical health among children based on the overall and mental health status of fathers, as well as pertinent sociodemographic covariates.” The findings were published online Oct. 9 in the journal Health Equity.

Related Links:

— “Child mental health status may be closely linked to father’s, “Joe Gramigna, Healio, October 21, 2019

The New York Times (10/21, Klass) reports on the work of University of Pittsburgh postdoctoral scholar Frances Wang to understand the role of genetics in adolescents’ risk for developing alcohol use disorders and other “conduct problems, like aggression and antisocial behavior, which can be predecessors of alcohol problems.” Dr. Wang helped to author “a study published in 2018 in the journal Development and Psychopathology, which looks at a particular biological attribute – the functioning of serotonin, a neurotransmitter – determined by a combination of genetic factors.” Dr. Wang said that “for most people it’s the interaction between already having that genetic risk and an environment that increases genetic risk or makes genetic risk come out.” In another study, Dr. Wang and her colleagues “found that the serotonin function may be related to a tendency to become impulsive in the face of negative emotion, a trait called negative urgency.”

Related Links:

— “When Teen Drinking Becomes a Disorder, “Perri Klass, M.D., The New York Times, October 21, 2019

Healio (10/18, Gramigna) reported, “States with more behavioral health workers experienced a minor reduction in adjusted firearm suicide rates,” researchers concluded after conducting “a time-series cross-sectional analysis to compare firearm suicide rates in states with more available treatment professionals with rates in states with fewer professionals.” The findings were published online Oct. 7 in the journal Health Affairs.

Related Links:

— “, “Joe Gramigna, Healio, October 18, 2019