In an 1,800-word article, USA Today (10/5, Zoroya) reports that the US “Army, which recorded an average of six suicides per week last year, now stands at the edge of a science-driven answer” to the problem of military suicides “as radical as it is uncomplicated: predicting which soldiers are likely to kill themselves so they can be stopped before it’s too late.” The National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH), along with researchers from several US universities have developed a “computer code…designed to” help predict which soldiers are likely to commit suicide. USA Today added, “NIMH epidemiologist Michael Schoenbaum, a lead scientist in the effort, says he and others on the team applied a complex set of risk factors – such as psychiatric illness, deployment history or drug or alcohol abuse – to a computer assessment of soldiers, producing a rating that’s a ‘flag for whom do you target for special care.’”

Related Links:

— “Army explores predicting suicides as way to prevent them, “Gregg Zoroya, USA Today, October 7, 2013.

The Time (10/2, Park) “Healthland” blog reports that research published in Mayo Clinic Proceedings suggests that statins may be associated with a reduced risk of cognitive decline. Investigators analyzed data from “16 studies that involved people taking statin medications who were also tested on memory, attention and organizational skills,” and found “that longer term use of the drugs may prevent dementia.” Additionally, the researchers “found that use of statins for less than a year did not have any adverse effects on cognitive functions.” The article points out that last year, the FDA said that statins labels must carry warnings about an increased risk of memory problems.

Related Links:

— “Statin Drugs Linked to Lower Risk of Cognitive Decline, “Alice Park, Time, October 1, 2013.

Reuters (10/2, Kelland) reports that, according to a study published in the British Journal of Psychiatry, evaluation tools to predict the probability of a psychopathic inmate’s likelihood of committing another offense appear to have little or no value. After analyzing data on some 1,396 incarcerated males in the UK, researchers found that the accuracy rate of three various assessment tools was under 50 percent. The study authors concluded that court officials and probation boards should not rely on these test scores.

Related Links:

— “Predicting violence in psychopaths is ‘no more than chance’, “Kate Kelland, Reuters, October 2, 2013.

The New York Times (10/3, Bakalar) “Well” blog reports that, according to a study published online Oct. 2 in the journal Neurology, “depression may be an independent risk factor for Parkinson’s disease.” For the study, investigators “followed 4,634 patients with depression and 18,544 matched controls for” an entire decade. The study excluded individuals “who received a diagnosis of depression within five years of their Parkinson’s diagnosis.” This exclusion was made to rule out any possibility that depression itself could be an early symptom of Parkinson’s.

On its website, CBS News (10/3, Jaslow) reports that people “who had depression were more than three times more likely to develop Parkinson’s than those who were not depressed.” The study’s lead author “pointed out to CBS News.com that the study showed two groups in particular appeared to be at higher risk for Parkinson’s: elderly people over 65 with depression, and people with difficult-to-treat-depression, who were defined as having to alter their antidepressant treatment regimen two or more times.”

Related Links:

— “Depression Tied to Parkinson’s Risk, “Nicholas Bakalar, The New York Times, October 2, 2013.

Medscape (10/3) reports that, according to a study published online Sept. 25 in JAMA Psychiatry, “researchers confirmed the strong link between preterm birth and the risk for autism and attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (AD/HD).” The study, which “identified all individuals born in Sweden from 1973 to 2008 (3,300,708 offspring of 1,736,735 mothers) and linked them with various outcomes through 2009,” also revealed that “other problems that have previously been closely linked to preterm birth, including severe mental illness, learning problems, suicide, and economic woes, may instead be more closely related to other conditions that family members share.”