HealthDay (4/30, Mann) reports that the use of selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs) “around the time of surgery may increase risks associated with the procedure, including bleeding, the need for a blood transfusion, hospital readmission and even death,” according to research published in JAMA Internal Medicine. Investigators looked at data on “more than half a million people who had surgery at 375 U.S. hospitals between 2006 and 2008.”

MedPage Today (4/30, Phend) reports that individuals “on SSRIs in the perioperative period had 20% higher odds of dying in the hospital after elective major surgery (95% CI 1.07 to 1.36) compared with all other patients.” The researchers also found that “bleeds and early readmission to the hospital also occurred more often among those patients.” However, these results did not “prove causality.”

Related Links:

— “Some Antidepressants Linked to Bleeding Risk With Surgery, “Denise Mann, HealthDay, April 29, 2013.

Medscape (4/30, Lowry) reports, “Emotional abuse experienced in childhood, especially in children aged five years and younger, confers an increased risk for bipolar disorder [BD],” according to research presented April 24 at the 14th International Congress on Schizophrenia Research. The study involved more than 700 patients and controls. “Regression analysis showed that children who were emotionally abused were more than twice as likely to develop bipolar disorder (odds ratio [OR], 2.14; 95% confidence interval [CI], 1.51 – 3.02).”

Alabama Live (4/30, Oliver) reports that people who follow a Mediterranean diet “were 19 percent less likely to develop problems with their thinking and memory skills,” according to a studypublished April 29 in the journal Neurology.

HealthDay (4/30, Reinberg) reports, “Using data from participants enrolled in a nationwide study on stroke, the researchers gleaned diet information from more than 17,000 white and black men and women whose average age was 64.” Study “participants also took tests that measured their memory and thinking (cognitive) skills.”

Related Links:

— “Mediterranean Diet Might Help Stave Off Dementia, “Steven Reinberg, HealthDay, April 29, 2013.

In an editorial, the New York Times (4/27, Subscription Publication) said that the US “is beginning to realize that it cannot enforce or imprison its way out of the addiction problem,” but in order to “create broadly accessible and effective treatment strategies for the millions of people who need them, it must abandon the ‘drug war’ approach to addiction that has dominated the national discourse in favor of a policy that treats addiction as a public health issue.” The Affordable Care Act “sets the stage for such a transformation by barring insurers from denying coverage to people with pre-existing conditions, including substance dependency.”

Related Links:

— “The Next Step in Drug Treatment, “The Editorial Board, The New York Times, April 26, 2013.

In the New York Times (4/28, Subscription Publication) Magazine, Linda Logan wrote about her own experience with bipolar disorder and how treatment is gradually shifting to address the lost sense of self that plagues patients. “For many people with mental disorders, the transformation of the self is one of the most disturbing things about being ill. And their despair is heightened when doctors don’t engage with the issue, don’t ask about what parts of the self have vanished and don’t help figure out strategies to deal with that loss.” She writes that too much of treatment is now medicine-based, “and a patient’s crisis of self is not very likely to come up in a 15-minute session with a psychopharmacologist.”

Related Links:

— “The Problem With How We Treat Bipolar Disorder, “Linda Logan, The New York Times, April 26, 2013.