HealthDay (3/9, Preidt) reported, “Mental health problems can last into adulthood for girls who start having their periods at an early age,” researchers concluded after following some “8,000 US girls for about 14 years, generally from adolescence until their late 20s.” The study revealed that “the younger the girls were when their periods started, the more likely they were to have depression and antisocial behaviors,” problems that “persisted at least until the girls were in their late 20s.” The findings were published online Dec. 26 in Pediatrics.

Related Links:

— “Early Periods Tied to Mental Health Issues Into Adulthood,” Robert Preidt, HealthDay, March 9, 2018.

Healio (3/8, Demko) reports, “A high school peer-to-peer depression awareness program in Michigan that encouraged students to both learn about and educate other students about mental illness reduced stigma and increased knowledge about depression, perception in identifying those who may have depression and willingness to get help for themselves,” researchers concluded after examining data from “the 2015 to 2016 outcome data from 10 high schools involved in the Peer-to-Peer Depression Awareness Program.” The findings of the 878-participant study were published online March 1 in Psychiatric Services, a publication of the American Psychiatric Association.

Related Links:

— “Student-led awareness program boosts teens’ knowledge of depression,” Parikh SV, et al., , March 8, 2018.

Medscape (3/7, Davenport) reported, “Electroconvulsive therapy (ECT) for severe depression does not appear to raise long-term dementia risk,” researchers found in a “large, retrospective registry analysis of more than 1600 patients who underwent ECT.” The study found that “the procedure conferred no additional risk for cognitive impairment relative to matched control persons who did not undergo ECT, even after up to 40 years of follow-up.” The findings were presented at the European Psychiatric Association 2018 Congress.

Related Links:

— Medscape (requires login and subscription)

In a front-page story, the Wall Street Journal (3/8, A1, Whalen, Subscription Publication) reports the opioid crisis is creating a financial crisis for many families taking on huge debts to finance treatment and rehab. The Journal spotlights the highly fragmented rehab field offering expensive services which insurers often do not cover.

Related Links:

— “After Addiction Comes Families’ Second Blow: The Crushing Cost of Rehab,” Jeanne Whalen, Wall Street Journal, March 8, 2018.

The Washington Post (3/7, Moyer) reports, “Nationwide, suicides among black children under 18 are up 71 percent in the past decade, rising from 86 in 2006 to 147 in 2016, the latest year such data is available from the” CDC. During “that same period, the suicide rate among all children also increased, up 64 percent.”

Meanwhile, the Washington Post (3/7, Moyer) reports according to experts “parents should be on guard for an array of warning signs” that might indicate their child is thinking about suicide. One expert lists “risk factors” to be aware of, including “abuse, head trauma, chronic pain, addiction, mental illness and a family history of mental illness or suicide.”

Related Links:

— “‘HE WAS HAPPY. SO FAR AS I KNOW’,” Justin Wm. Moyer, Washington Post, March 7, 2018.

Medscape (3/7, Yasgur) reports, “Rates of breast cancer are higher in women with schizophrenia than in women in the general population,” researchers concluded in a meta-analysis, the findings of which were published online March 7 in JAMA Psychiatry.

Psychiatric News (3/7) points out that 12 “cohort studies that included 125,760 women were included in the meta-analysis.” Healio (3/7, Demko) also covers the story.

Related Links:

— “Women With Schizophrenia May Be at Greater Risk of Breast Cancer, Meta-Analysis Finds,” Psychiatric News, March 7, 2018.

The CBS Evening News (3/6, story 6, 2:10, Glor) reported, “New numbers out today show America’s opioid crisis is getting worse.” Emergency department visits for opioid overdoses “in 45 states” have risen “30 percent in a year.”

The Washington Post (3/6, Bernstein) reports there were 142,557 ED visits for opioid overdoses over a recent 15-month period, according to a report from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

CNN (3/6, Howard) reports on its website that opioid overdoses increased about 30% between July 2016 and September 2017, according to the report, which was based on data collected by the CDC from 45 states. Anne Schuchat, the acting director of the CDC, said, “This is really a fast-moving epidemic that’s getting worse.”

CNBC (3/6, LaVito) reports on its website that opioid overdoses increased 70% in the Midwest, 40% in the West, 21% in the Northeast, 20% in the Southwest, and 14% in the Southeast. The report said that opioid overdoses increased 30% among men and 24% among women, while overdoses increased by similar amounts among different age groups.

NBC News (3/6, Siemaszko) reports on its website that opioid overdoses increased 54% “from July 2016 through September 2017 in the major metro areas of 16 states.” The article suggests that “the opioid epidemic is fast becoming a big city problem.”

Related Links:

— “Emergency room data shows the opioid crisis continues to accelerate,” Lenny Bernstein, Washington Post, March 6, 2018.

Healio (3/6, Demko) reports, “Among children and teenagers with major depressive disorder [MDD], those with comorbid dysthymia and higher levels of residual symptoms after acute treatment are at greater risk for relapse,” researchers concluded in a study involving “102 youth aged 7 to 18 years with major depression who responded to 12 weeks of fluoxetine and then were randomly assigned to continue or switch to placebo for six more months.” The findingswere published online Feb. 20 in the Journal of Clinical Psychiatry.

Related Links:

— “Depression severity at baseline, end of treatment predict relapse among youth,” Kennard BD, et al., Healio, March , 2018.

Reuters (3/6, Rapaport) reports, “Adults who were pressured by their parents to diet during adolescence may have a higher risk of obesity and eating disorders as adults than people who weren’t urged to lose weight as teens,” researchers found after examining “data from eating surveys that 556 participants completed in school when they were 15 years old on average, as well as results from online surveys they completed as adults 15 years later.” The findings were published online in Pediatrics. The study provides “fresh evidence that even well-intended efforts by parents to encourage kids to slim down can backfire, said” the “co-author of an accompanying editorial.” HealthDay (3/6, Gordon) also covers the study.

Related Links:

— “Dieting pressure in teen years tied to food and weight problems later,” Lisa Rapaport, Reuters, March 6, 2018.

The New York Times (3/5, Frakt, Subscription Publication) reports that opioid abuse is not the only “significant drug problem” in the US, because “among illicit drugs, cocaine is the No. 2 killer and claims the lives of more African-Americans than heroin does.” The story cites a recent study published in The Archives of Internal Medicine where “researchers from the National Cancer Institute and the National Institute on Drug Abuse found that drug-related deaths have grown across all racial groups and among both men and women.”

The analysis indicates” that between 1999 and 2015, overdose deaths of any kind of drug for Americans 20 to 64 years old increased 5.5 percent per year.” Among “non-Hispanic black Americans, cocaine has been a larger problem than heroin for nearly 20 years.”

Related Links:

— “Overshadowed by the Opioid Crisis: A Comeback by Cocaine,” Austin Frakt, New York Times, March 5, 2018.