Psychiatric News (10/24) reported a study presented at the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry’s 2025 annual meeting found that “children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) are more than seven times as likely to be prescribed antipsychotics as a child without ASD, but they are not more likely to be diagnosed with a psychotic disorder later in life.” The researchers “used the TriNetX health care database to analyze five years of electronic medical record data among patients 18 and younger without a history of schizophrenia.” They observed that “children with ASD were two-and-a-half times more likely to experience hallucinations as the control group and three-and-a-half times more likely to experience aggression. Youth with ASD were also nearly eight times more likely to be prescribed antipsychotics and more than five times more likely to be prescribed nonstimulant attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) medications. However, there was no statistically significant difference in the risk of developing a primary psychotic disorder later in life between those with or without ASD.”

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— “Children With Autism More Likely to Experience Hallucinations but Not to Develop Psychosis, Psychiatric News , October 24, 2025

HealthDay (10/24, Thompson) reported a study found that “teenagers who didn’t get enough sleep on school nights or suffered from interrupted sleep had a significantly higher risk of suicide.” Study results indicated that “sleep problems at age 14 were linked to an increased likelihood of a suicide attempt at age 17, even after accounting for other suicide risk factors. In fact, poor sleep amounted to a stronger risk factor than depressive symptoms or other known risk factors, researchers said.” They theorized “sleep might increase a teenager’s impulsivity,” noting that “teens with stronger decision-making skills appeared protected against the impact of poor sleep on suicide risk, at least at first.” The study was published in Sleep Advances.

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— “Bad Sleep Could Be A Warning Sign For Suicide Among Teens,”Dennis Thompson, HealthDay , October 24, 2025

Psychiatric News (10/23) reports that “tools using large language models (LLMs) to provide psychotherapy – even those prompted to adhere to an evidence-based model – are prone to a slew of ethical violations, according to a new study [PDF] issued…at the Association for the Advancement of Artificial Intelligence and Association for Computing Machinery’s Conference on AI, Ethics, and Society.” The researchers “had conversations with peer counselors who conducted 110 self-counseling sessions with cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT)–prompted LLMs.” The researchers next “simulated 27 therapy sessions with an LLM counselor using publicly available transcripts of sessions with human therapists.” Afterwards, “three licensed clinical psychologists with CBT experience independently evaluated these simulations to explore how the LLMs might violate ethical standards.” Researchers ultimately found several ethical violations, including: rigid methodological adherence, poor therapeutic collaboration, deceptive empathy, unfair discrimination, and lack of safety and crisis management.

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— “Chatbot Psychotherapists Prone to Serious Ethical Violations,” Psychiatric News, October 23, 2025

MedPage Today (10/23, Firth) reports a study found that “adolescents and young adults were at greater risk of using opioids if their parents had multiple opioid prescriptions.” Researchers observed that “for more than 21,000 adolescents and young adults participating in a population health survey, those who had mothers who received two or more opioid prescriptions had an adjusted hazard ratio of 1.34 for any opioid prescription over 7-year follow-up, while those who had fathers with two or more opioid prescriptions had an adjusted hazard ratio of 1.19.” Furthermore, they found that “those with a mother or father who received two or more opioid prescriptions had more than double the risk of persistent opioid use compared with those whose parents did not receive any opioid prescriptions.” The study was published in PLOS Medicine.

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— MedPage Today (requires login and subscription)

The American Journal of Managed Care (10/22, Jeremias) reports, “Financial hardship – including poverty, food insecurity, and housing instability – was found to be common among US health care workers, particularly those in direct care and support roles, according to a new research letter.” The investigators “highlighted inequities within the workforce, noting that racial and ethnic minority groups were overrepresented in the lowest-paid health care occupations.” The findings were published in JAMA.

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— “Many US Health Care Workers Face Poverty, Food Insecurity, and Housing Instability,”Skylar Jeremias, The American Journal of Managed Care , October 22, 2025

HealthDay (10/22, Solomon) reports a study found that “among survivors of drug overdose, fewer than half visited the emergency department.” The researchers “examined service use following a nonfatal overdose (NFOD).” They found that “25.7 percent of participants had experienced at least one NFOD in the prior year. During the most recent NFOD, use of naloxone was reported by 82.1 percent of survivors, while calls to 911 were reported by 61.3 percent and visits to the emergency department were reported by 47.0 percent.” Researchers highlighted the “most common reasons cited for not calling 911 were that the person regained consciousness without naloxone (28.6 percent) or that a bystander administered naloxone (26.8 percent). Of those going to the emergency department, most (61.5 percent) received take-home naloxone in the hospital, while fewer reported receiving buprenorphine (21.9 percent) or methadone (16.2 percent) before discharge.” The study was published in JAMA Network Open.

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— “Fewer Than Half of Drug Overdose Survivors Go to the Hospital,”Lori Solomon, HealthDay, October 22, 2025

HealthDay (10/21, Gotkine) reports a study found that “school disengagement (SD) rates were higher during the pandemic years, especially for children with mental health conditions (MHCs).” The researchers “examined temporal changes in SD and SD rates among children with MHCs in a representative sample of U.S. children aged 6 to 17 years from 2018 to 2022.” They found that “the rates of SD were higher during pandemic years versus 2018, especially for children with MHCs. Higher odds of SD were seen in 2020, 2021, and 2022 versus 2018; there were no differences between 2018. “Higher SD odds were observed in boys, those with overall health status lower than very good, those with special ed programs, those who repeated a grade, those with high rates of absenteeism, those who experienced food insecurity, those who had high residential mobility, and those from lone-parent/unmarried households.” The study was published in Pediatrics.

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— “School Disengagement Increased During Pandemic Years,”Elana Gotkine, HealthDay , October 21, 2025

The New York Times (10/21, Shakin) reports, “A new large-scale analysis found that the short-term cardiovascular and metabolic side effects of antidepressants vary widely by” medication. However, “the ones most commonly prescribed in the United States are linked to relatively mild issues.” Investigators came to this conclusion after analyzing “data from more than 58,000 participants across 151 studies and 17 Food and Drug Administration reports.” The findings were published in The Lancet.

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— The New York Times (requires login and subscription)

KFF Health News (10/20, Leys) reports, “Companies running private Medicare and Medicaid insurance plans inaccurately list many mental health professionals as being available to treat the plans’ members, a new federal watchdog report says.” Investigators with the HHS’ Office of Inspector General “allege that some insurers effectively set up ‘ghost networks’ of psychologists, psychiatrists, and other mental health professionals who purportedly have agreed to treat patients covered by the publicly financed Medicare and Medicaid plans.” The report “found that 55% of mental health professionals listed as in-network by Medicare Advantage plans were not providing such care to any of the plans’ members. The figure was 28% for Medicaid managed care plans.” The report “recommends government administrators make more use of medical billing data to confirm whether health professionals listed as in-network are providing care to patients covered by private Medicare and Medicaid insurance plans.”

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— “Private Medicare, Medicaid Plans Exaggerate In-Network Mental Health Options, Watchdogs Say,”Tony Leys, KFF Health News , October 20, 2025

Psychiatric Times (10/19, J. Bender) reports a study found that the “first antipsychotic that is selected for a patient could influence the weight gained in subsequent years.” Researchers observed “that patients receiving either aripiprazole, quetiapine, olanzapine, or risperidone in the first year of treatment are most likely to have experienced weight gain in 5 years from a normal body mass index (BMI) at baseline. No significant weight gain from the normal baseline was found in that period after initial prescriptions of perphenazine, fluphenazine, or amisulpride.” The investigators also “concluded that, in addition to differences between agents in relation to the weight gain measured at 5 years, the interaction between drugs and disposition to weight gain is complex.” The study was published in Neurology and Therapy.

Related Links:

— “Can the Initial Antipsychotic Influence Years of Weight Gain?,”Kenneth J. Bender, Psychiatric Times , October 19, 2025