HealthDay (8/25, Solomon) reported, “Extreme heat exposure can disproportionately undermine cognitive health in later life for socially vulnerable populations,” researchers concluded after merging “data from seven waves of the Health and Retirement Study (2006 to 2018) with historical temperature data to assess the role of extreme heat exposure on trajectories of cognitive function among U.S. adults aged 52 years and older.” The findings were published online in the Journal of Epidemiology and Community Health.

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— “Extreme Heat Exposure Tied to Faster Cognitive Decline in Vulnerable Populations,”Lori Solomon, HealthDay, August 25, 2023

KFF Health News (8/25, Szabo) reported on the problem of social media’s “role in escalating gun violence.” The article interviewed a number of experts who “note that social media can have a particularly pernicious effect in communities with high rates of gun violence.” Now, “at a time when virtually every teen has a cellphone, many have access to guns, and many are coping with mental and emotional health crises, some say it’s not surprising that violence features so heavily in children’s social media feeds.” For that reason, police departments “search social media after the fact to gather evidence against those involved in violence,” and certain programs “monitor influential social media accounts in their communities to de-escalate conflicts.”

Related Links:

— “‘All We Want Is Revenge’: How Social Media Fuels Gun Violence Among Teens,”Liz Szabo, KFF Health News , August 25, 2023

The New York Times (8/25, Barry) reported, “Use of mental healthcare increased substantially during the coronavirus pandemic, as teletherapy lowered barriers to regular visits, according to a large study of insurance claims published” online Aug. 25 in a research letter in JAMA Health Forum. The study revealed that “from March 2020 to August 2022, mental health visits increased by 39 percent, and spending increased by 54 percent.” Additionally, the “examination of 1,554,895 claims for clinician visits…identified a tenfold increase in the use of telehealth.” This “rise in use of mental health services reflects both receding stigma and a lowering of practical barriers to mental health visits, said” Robert L. Trestman, PhD, MD, “chairman of the American Psychiatric Association’s council on healthcare systems and financing.”

Psychiatric News (8/25) quoted the study’s authors, who concluded, “These findings suggest that telehealth utilization for mental health services remains persistent and elevated.” But, should “this increased utilization” affect “spending, insurers may begin rejecting the new status quo,” a concern that “is particularly relevant when considered against the backdrop of telehealth policies that expired alongside the national [public health emergency] declaration.”

HCPlive (8/25, Kunzmann) also covered the study.

Related Links:

— “Mental Health Spending Surged During the Pandemic,”Ellen Barry, The New York Times , August 26, 2023

MedPage Today (8/24, George) reports, “A novel 14-year risk score helped identify people from age 50 onward at risk for all-cause dementia, a large U.K. study” revealed. The “U.K. Biobank Dementia Risk Score (UKBDRS), was developed and validated in two U.K. cohorts.” Included in the UKBDRS are “11 predictive variables: age, education, parental history of dementia, material deprivation, history of diabetes, stroke, depression, hypertension, high cholesterol, household occupancy (living alone), and sex.” The findingswere published online in BMJ Mental Health.

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— MedPage Today (requires login and subscription)

MedPage Today (8/23, George) reports, “High-performance brain-computer interfaces…decoded brain activity into speech faster, more accurately, and with a bigger vocabulary than existing technologies, two early trials…showed.” Researchers found “in the BrainGate2 study, speech-to-text BCI that recorded activity from intracortical microelectrode arrays…decoded the speech of a woman with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis…at 62 words per minute, more than 3 times faster than the previous record.” Meanwhile, “in the BRAVO study,” investigators “reported success in three modalities – text, speech audio, and facial-avatar animation – using high-density surface recordings of the speech cortex.” MedPage Today adds, “Decoding the text of a woman with a brainstem stroke reached a median rate of 78 words per minute, and the participant was able to ‘speak’ through a digital avatar with software that simulated facial movements.” The findings were published in Nature.

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— MedPage Today (requires login and subscription)