According to Reuters (5/15, Carroll), after examining “the outcomes from more than 160,000 early pregnancies,” investigators “found that women taking benzodiazepines…were nearly twice as likely to miscarry.” The study revealed that “women who used benzodiazepines early in pregnancy were 1.85 times more likely than those who did not take the drugs to have a miscarriage.” The findings were published online May 15 in JAMA Psychiatry.

Psychiatric News (5/15) reports, “Additional analysis revealed that the risk of miscarriage was similar among pregnant women exposed to short-acting benzodiazepines (defined as a half-life less than or equal to 24 hours), such as lorazepam, and long-acting benzodiazepines (defined as a half-life greater than 24 hours), such as diazepam.”

Also covering the story are MedPage Today (5/15, Hlavinka), HealthDay (5/15, Reinberg), and Healio(5/15, Demko).

Related Links:

— “Benzodiazepines in early pregnancy tied to heightened risk of miscarriage, “Linda Carroll, Reuter, May 15, 2019

The Wall Street Journal (5/14, Abbott, Subscription Publication) reports the World Health Organization released new guidelines on how to reduce the risk of dementia. The guidelines recommend that people reduce their risk for dementia or cognitive decline through exercise, reduced use of tobacco and alcohol, and other means.

The AP (5/14, Marchione) reports the WHO also said that while age is a top risk factor for dementia, the condition “is not a natural or inevitable consequence of aging.”

Also covering the story are Reuters (5/14, Miles), CNN(5/14, Hunt), and Healio (5/14, Demko).

Related Links:

— “WHO Recommends Steps to Limit Risk of Dementia, “Brianna Abbott, The Wall Street Journal, May 14, 2019

Healio (5/13, Demko) reports researchers examined 35 studies in a meta-analysis and concluded that “methylphenidate use was significantly associated with sleep problems and several different types of insomnia.” The findings were published in the Journal of Clinical Psychiatry.

Related Links:

— “Methylphenidate treatment for ADHD tied to several types of insomnia, “Savannah Demko, Healio, May 13, 2019

In an opinion piece for The Hill (5/13), National Eating Disorders Association Chief Policy and Strategy Officer Chevese Turner writes that “second to deaths spurred by the opioid crisis, eating disorders have the highest mortality rate of any psychiatric diagnosis,” but “insurance companies resist covering life-saving treatment.” Turner says that “recent landmark court decisions and amendments to state legislation are setting precedent for parity coverage of eating disorders treatment,” but “we need to remain diligent in stoking insurers to provide equal coverage for eating disorders treatment across the country.” Turner concludes, “We must continue pressing insurers through legal action and policy until all Americans…have true coverage of eating disorder treatment.”

Related Links:

— “Mental health coverage needs to include eating disorders, The Hill, May 13, 2019

In the New York Times (5/13, Carroll) “The Upshot,” Aaron E. Carroll, MD, a professor of pediatrics at the Indiana School of Medicine, writes, “Legislators and gun safety advocates often focus on how guns are” bought, even though “many lives could be saved, especially among children, if they looked more at how they are stored.” Just in the past decade alone, “guns killed more than 14,000 American children.” In new research, investigators have found that “even a modest increase in owners who lock up their guns would pay off in an outsize drop in gun deaths.”

CNN (5/13, Scutti) reports, “US households with children do not safely store firearms in the way the American Academy of Pediatrics recommends: locked up and unloaded.” Were parents simply to lock up “all their guns, then up to a third of gun suicides and accidental deaths among children and teens could be avoided, researchers” estimated. The findings were published online in JAMA Pediatrics.

Related Links:

— “The Potentially Lifesaving Difference in How a Gun Is Stored, “Aaron E. Carroll, The New York Times, May 13, 2019

Reuters (5/10, Rapaport) reported that states which “require adults on Medicaid to work a set number of hours to get benefits may find many people lose coverage because behavioral health conditions and other chronic health problems make it hard for them to work,” according to a study published in Health Affairs. Data show only “23 percent of people with serious mental illnesses worked at least 20 hours a week, while only 43 percent of people with substance use disorders achieved this minimum number of work hours.” Among recipients “with both mental illness and substance use issues, only 32 percent worked at least 20 hours a week.” Meanwhile, “almost half of Medicaid enrollees without any identified health problems worked at least 20 hours a week.”

Related Links:

— “Medicaid work rules likely to penalize chronically ill: study, “Lisa Rapaport, Reuters, May 10, 2019

HealthDay (5/9, Reinberg) reports researchers found in two studies published in JAMA Dermatology that psoriasis “is often coupled with depression, anxiety and even bipolar disease, schizophrenia and dementia.” In one study, “Danish researchers collected data on more than 13,600 men and women with psoriasis,” and “over five years of follow-up, 2.6% developed mental problems, and over 10 years, that number rose to nearly 5%.” In the other study, “Korean researchers looked at more than 12,700 psoriasis patients,” and “found that the risk for anxiety, phantom medical problems, neurotic disorders and sleep problems was doubled and tripled among psoriasis sufferers compared to those without the disease.”

Related Links:

— “Psoriasis, Mental Ills Can Go Hand in Hand, “Steven Reinberg, HealthDay, May 9, 2019

U.S. News & World Report (5/8, Howley) explains what delusions and hallucinations are and how they differ. Hallucinations “are based in the senses,” while “delusions revolve around concepts, ideas and beliefs that are strongly held in the mind.” Psychiatrist Philip R. Muskin, MD, “outgoing secretary of the American Psychiatric Association, describes delusions as ‘a fixed idea that’s not consensually held’ in the person’s culture, and ‘is not consistent with the world at large.’” Both “delusions and hallucinations” are “two facets of psychosis, a condition the National Institute of Mental Health defines as ‘conditions that affect the mind, where there has been some loss of contact with reality.’”

Related Links:

— “What’s the Difference Between Delusions and Hallucinations?, “Elaine K. Howley, U.S. News & World Report, May 8, 2019

The Detroit Free Press (5/8, Kovanis) reports on a study published in the JAMA Psychiatry which found that buprenorphine treatment is prescribed 35 times more frequently to white patients. The article says that the findings are “especially interesting because research revealed earlier this year showed a spike in the number of African American deaths tied to fentanyl, the ultra powerful opioid that’s being cut into heroin, cocaine and other drugs.”

The Philadelphia Inquirer (5/8, Whelan) reports that the study examined over 13 million doctors’ visits during which the drug was prescribed from 2012 through 2015, and “found that 12.7 million of those visits were by white patients, compared to just 363,000 for all other races.”

HealthDay (5/8, Preidt) reports that investigators found “a large increase in the overall number of buprenorphine prescriptions written at outpatient clinic visits over the previous decade, but a decrease in the percentage of those visits where the patients were black.”

Related Links:

— “Poor, Minorities Shortchanged on Opioid Addiction Treatments, ” Robert Preidt, HealthDay, May , 2019

Kaiser Health News (5/7, Dembosky) reports that methamphetamine use “is surging in parts of the US, particularly the West,” but policymakers “haven’t kept up, continuing to direct the bulk of funding and attention to opioids.” According to UCLA addiction psychologist Steve Shoptaw, stories regarding methamphetamine overdoses “are very much muffled by the much louder story about the opioid epidemic” among congressional lawmakers. Deaths related to methamphetamine use in San Francisco have doubled since 2011, and the city’s meth-related emergency room visits “have jumped 600% to 1,965 visits in 2016, the last year for which ER data is available.”

Related Links:

— “Meth Vs. Opioids: America Has Two Drug Epidemics, But Focuses On One, “April Dembosky, Kaiser Health News, May 7, 2019