MedPage Today (3/30, Monaco) reports, “Bipolar disorder and its treatments may have very different implications for bone health,” investigators concluded. In the “retrospective cohort study,” researchers found that “among nearly 23,000 patients with bipolar disorder, the incidence rate of osteoporosis was 8.70 per 1,000 person-years compared with 7.90 per 1,000 person-years for an age- and sex-matched reference group.” The study also revealed, however, that “certain treatments for bipolar disorder appeared to not only offset this risk, but significantly reduce it.” In fact, “in a fully adjusted model, those with bipolar disorder who were on lithium – 38.2% of patients – saw a reduced risk for osteoporosis compared with those not on lithium.” The findings were published online March 30 in JAMA Psychiatry.

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MD Edge ObGyn (3/29, Haelle) reports, “Children prenatally exposed to opioids alone have an increased risk of attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder” (AD/HD), “but interactions between opioids and both cannabis use and alcohol use were linked to varying levels of” AD/HD “risk as well,” investigators concluded in a study that included “3,138 children (50.4% of whom were male) with at least two years of follow-up, excluding children from multiple-gestation pregnancies, in vitro fertilization pregnancies, and deliveries involving major maternal trauma or major chromosomal anomalies.” The findings were published online in JAMA Network Open.

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— “ADHD link to prenatal opioid exposure shifts with other substances “Tara Haelle, MD Edge ObGyn, March 29, 2022

Healio (3/29, Herpen) reports, “Long-term cannabis users showed deficits in cognition and smaller hippocampal volume by midlife,” investigators concluded in a study involving “a representative cohort of 1,037 people born in Dunedin, New Zealand, between April 1972 and March 1973, who were followed through the age of 45 years.” Study “participants were assessed for cannabis use and dependence at ages 18, 21, 26, 32, 38 and 45, with IQ gauged at ages 7, 9, 11 and 45 years.” The study revealed that “long-term cannabis users’ IQ declined from childhood to midlife (mean = 5.5 IQ points), with resultant poorer learning and processing speed relative to their childhood IQ, as well as memory and attention problems.” The findingswere published online March 8 in the American Journal of Psychiatry, a publication of the American Psychiatric Association.

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— “Long-term cannabis use linked to cognitive deficits, lower hippocampal volume in midlife “Robert Herpen, Healio, March 29, 2022

The New York Times (3/28, Hughes) reports, “Analyzing survey responses of more than 84,000 people of all ages in Britain,” investigators have “identified two distinct periods of adolescence when heavy use of social media spurred lower ratings of ‘life satisfaction’: first around puberty – ages 11 to 13 for girls, and 14 to 15 for boys – and then again for both sexes around age 19.” The findings were published online March 28 in the journal Nature.

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— “Does Social Media Make Teens Unhappy? It May Depend on Their Age. “Virginia Hughes, The New York Times, March 28, 2022

MedPage Today (3/28, Bassett) reports that patients with cancer “are at a particularly high risk of mental health disorders and suicide, two studies showed.” In one study, investigators found that patients with cancer “have nearly twice the risk of suicide compared with the general population, and about a 3.5 times greater risk if their cancers are known to have a poor prognosis.” The other study “showed that the high proportion of” patients with cancer “with psychological disorders subsequently have a higher risk of self-harm and mortality, compared with other patients with cancer.” The studies were published in Nature Medicine.

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