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)

Psychiatric News (8/23) reports, “Youth in the foster care system are more likely to be prescribed two or more psychiatric medications than other youth covered by Medicaid,” investigators in a study that “included 719,908 youth in foster care and 31,473,608 youth covered by Medicaid who were not in foster care.” The findingswere published online Aug. 21 in a research letter in the journal JAMA Pediatrics.

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— “Youth in Foster Care More Likely Than Peers to Be Prescribed Multiple Psychiatric Medications, Psychiatric News , August 23, 2023

Healio (8/22, Leiser) reported, “Anxiety and depression are prevalent psychiatric comorbidities among individuals with hemophilia, according to study results.” The research “included 90 patients who underwent screening for anxiety and depression during annual clinic visits.” Researchers found that “three-quarters…of patients met criteria for significant anxiety symptoms and one-quarter…met criteria for significant depressive symptoms.” The findings were published in The International Journal of Psychiatry in Medicine.

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— “Anxiety, depression prevalent among people with hemophilia,”Mark Leiser, Healio, August 22, 2023

MedPage Today (8/22, Ingram) reports, “States that recently adopted less-restrictive policies surrounding the use of telepharmacy had fewer pharmacy deserts in the following year, a cohort study involving a dozen states showed.” Published in JAMA Network Open, the study found that “of the 80 pharmacy deserts where a telepharmacy opened during the study period, 37.5% no longer met that definition a year later; of the 3,892 pharmacy deserts where a telepharmacy did not open, only 1.8% no longer had that designation the following year.”

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— MedPage Today (requires login and subscription)

HCPlive (8/22, Kunzmann) reports, “Contrary to popular belief, rates of posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and workplace trauma exposure was lower among first-year medical residents during the COVID-19 pandemic than in years prior,” investigators concluded in a study that “sought to analyze differences in PSTD symptoms among first-year medical residents training during versus before the first COVID-19 pandemic wave, defined as March – June 2020.” Included in the study were 1957 residents who “completed the PC-PTSD-5 survey.” The findings were published online Aug. 22 in a research letter in JAMA Network Open.

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— “PTSD, Workplace Trauma Lower Among First-Year Residents During COVID-19,”Kevin Kunzmann, HCPlive, August 22, 2023