The Los Angeles Times (1/9, Kaplan) “Science Now” blog reports, “Electronic cigarettes should be subject to the same taxes, marketing restrictions and limitations on public use as traditional tobacco products, according to new guidance” issued in a joint policy statement from the American Society for Clinical Oncology and the American Association for Cancer Research. The groups “acknowledged that e-cigarettes may improve public health by taking market share away from combustible tobacco products and helping smokers quit.”

However, “until the benefits are proved, the statement said, regulators shouldn’t distinguish between the two kinds of products.” The blog points out that CDC Director Dr. Tom Frieden “and other health experts say they fear that e-cigarettes will entice more kids and teens to try smoking.”

Forbes (1/9) contributor Robert Glatter, MD, writes that ASCO President Peter Paul Yu, MD, said, “We are concerned that e-cigarettes may encourage nonsmokers, particularly children, to start smoking and develop nicotine addiction. While e-cigarettes may reduce smoking rates and attendant adverse health risks, we will not know for sure until these products are researched and regulated.” Dr. Yu added, “The FDA has signaled its willingness to regulate e-cigarettes and other electronic nicotine delivery systems, and we urge the agency to follow through on this intention.” The policy statement was published in the Journal of Clinical Oncology.

Related Links:

— “Cancer groups urge health officials to be tougher on e-cigarettes,” Karen Kaplan, Los Angeles Times, January 8, 2015.

In a Baltimore Sun (1/7) op-ed, Laura Cain, Esq., a senior attorney with the Maryland Disability Law Center, Linda Raines, chief executive officer of the Mental Health Association of Maryland, and Mike Finkle, executive director of On Our Own in Maryland, contend that coercing patients with serious mental illnesses to undergo treatment may sometimes be more harmful than beneficial. The three write that “despite dramatic treatment advances, we do not have treatment that works for all.”

After quoting National Institute of Mental Health Director Thomas Insel, MD, who wrote of some study patients with schizophrenia, “Clearly, some individuals need to be on medication continually to avoid relapse. At the same time, we need to ask whether in the long-term, some individuals with a history of psychosis may do better off medication,” Cain, Raines and Finkle conclude that “coercion must be the last resort.”

Related Links:

— “Forced treatment not a panacea,” Laura Cain, Linda Raines and Mike Finkle, Baltimore Sun, January 7, 2015.

HealthDay (1/8, Dotinga) reports that according to a meta-analysis published in the February issue of the journal Pediatrics, children “involved in bullying are at higher risk of suicidal thoughts and actions.” After reviewing the results of “47 studies of bullying from around the world, including 18 from the” US, researchers also found that youngsters “who bullied others and were victims themselves were the most troubled of all.”

Related Links:

— “Bullies and Their Victims May Be at Higher Risk of Suicide,” Randy Dotinga, HealthDay, January 7, 2015.

TIME (1/8, Sifferlin) reports that according to a study published online Jan. 7 in JAMA Psychiatry, “women with symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) have a two-fold increased risk for type 2 diabetes.” An additional and “surprising” study finding was that “using antidepressants and having a higher body mass index (BMI) accounted for about half of the increased risk for type 2 diabetes in women with PTSD.”

Related Links:

— “The Link Between Mental Trauma and Diabetes,” Alexandra Sifferlin, Time, January 7, 2015.

The AP (1/7, Jackson) reports that under a settlement released Jan. 6 between the Pennsylvania Corrections Department and the “Disability Rights Network of Pennsylvania, which sued the state in federal court in March 2013,” Pennsylvania inmates with serious mental illnesses “who misbehave will be diverted to special treatment units instead of being put in isolated cells.” Potentially affected by the settlement will be some 4,000 of the “nearly 51,000 inmates in the state prison system.”

Related Links:

— “PENNSYLVANIA TO EXPAND TREATMENT FOR MENTALLY ILL INMATES,” Peter Jackson, Associated Press, January 6, 2015.

A new CDC report on alcohol poisoning deaths in the US was covered by at least two major US newspapers and by several wires and online sources. All sources feature quotes from one or more CDC officials. USA Today (1/7, Painter) reports that a new report from the CDC indicates that approximately six times per day, “someone in the USA dies of alcohol poisoning after drinking too much in a single binge.” Ileana Arias, the CDC’s deputy principal director, said, “Alcohol poisoning is caused by consuming a very large amount of alcohol in a very short amount of time.” Arias added, “The more your drink, the more you are at risk.”

According to the New York Times (1/7, A12, Tavernise, Subscription Publication), this “report is the first in a decade by the” CDC “to tally alcohol poisonings for the entire American population. Most previous analyses looked at certain groups, in particular young people.” The CDC “found that an average of 2,221 people died of alcohol poisoning annually between 2010 and 2012.” The agency “described death from alcohol poisoning as ‘a bigger problem than previously thought,’ but said it was impossible to tell whether the death rate had risen because researchers had changed how they track the data in recent years.”

Related Links:

— “Report: Binge drinking kills 6 a day – and most are men,” Kim Painter, USA Today, January 6, 2015.

TIME (1/6, Sifferlin) reports that research “published in the journal JAMA Pediatrics suggests the primary cause of the increase of autism spectrum disorder is actually due to changes in how the disease is diagnosed.” The study, which involved 677,915 Danes born between the years 1980 and 1991, revealed that “significantly more children were diagnosed with autism in 1995 and on, and the team was able to determine that 60% of the increase could be attributed to” broadened changes in diagnostic criteria that took place in 1994 in Denmark. Time also points out that “in May 2013, the American Psychiatric Association published new guidelines for diagnosing autism spectrum disorders in” the fifth edition of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-5).

Related Links:

— “This May Explain the Rise in Autism Diagnoses,” Alexandra Sifferlin, Time, January , 2015.5

On the front of its Marketplace section, the Wall Street Journal (1/6, B1, Walker, Subscription Publication) reports on new technology, including smartphone apps and software designed to analyze voices to help treat people with mental health disorders or to determine when depression may be interfering with treatment compliance for another medical condition, such as diabetes or heart disease. Recently, the National Institutes of Health awarded investigators at the Harvard School of Public Health some $2.42 million for the development of an app that will help track patterns of sleep in people with mental health issues.

Related Links:

— “Can a Smartphone Tell if You’re Depressed?,” Joseph Walker, Wall Street Journal, January, 2015. (Subscription required)

The AP (1/5) reported that psychiatry professor Anthony Tobia, MD is using a “Psy-feld” teaching tool to instruct medical students at the Robert Wood Johnson Medical School at Rutgers University about psychiatric disorders. Using the television series Seinfeld, “Tobia has created a database of teaching points from all the show’s episodes.” Medical students in their third and fourth years “are assigned to watch two episodes a week and then gather to discuss the psychopathology demonstrated on each.”

The Newark (NJ) Star-Ledger (1/2, Clark) reported that the premise behind “Psy-feld” is that “students have an ‘aha’ moment, the kind that doesn’t come from a PowerPoint presentation, said Tom Draschil, one of the psychiatric department’s chief residents.” Dr. Draschil explained that “the funnier a program is, the more teaching points it has for psychiatry.”

Related Links:

— “AT MED SCHOOL, ‘SEINFELD’ ABOUT MORE THAN NOTHING,” Associated Press, January 2, 2015.

Reuters (1/3, Seaman) reports that a JAMA Psychiatry study researchers found that US teens say they have easy access to guns even if they have a risk of suicide or known mental health problems. In the study, 41 percent of teens in general stated that they had easy access to guns, the same percentage of teens with a history of suicide attempts or mental illness that reported having easy access to guns. According to Reuters, the study collected data during a three-year period from 2001-2004 and involved 10,123 US teens between 13 and 18 years old. The Fox News (1/4) website also covered the story.

Related Links:

— “U.S. teens have same firearm access regardless of suicide risk,” Andrew M. Seaman, Reuters, January 2, 2015.