HealthDay (8/5, Preidt) reported that adolescents “struggling with mental health disorders are more likely to smoke cigarettes, drink alcohol and use marijuana,” researchers found. The findings of the 4,000-student study were published online in the American Journal on Addictions.

Related Links:

— “Mental Illness May Make Teens Vulnerable to Drugs, Alcohol,” Robert Preidt, HealthDay, August 5, 2016.

Medical Daily (8/5, Dovey) reported that “a recent study” published in the Journal of Developmental & Behavioral Pediatrics “has found evidence that the risk of a child developing an autism spectrum disorder (ASD) is 14 times higher if an older sibling has ASD.” The study’s “findings are based on the results of the medical records of 53,336 children born from 2001 to 2010.”

Related Links:

— “Children With Autism May Increase Siblings’ Risk Of Developing The Disorder,” Dana Dovey , Medical Daily, August 5, 2016.

TIME (8/4) reports, “Psychiatrists and mental health advocates say America today needs more than 30,000 child and adolescent psychiatrists, and has only 8,300,” a need that continues to increase, particularly in rural or underserved areas. Telepsychiatry has now “emerged as a practical approach to reaching more young people.” And, “despite any potential downsides…the American Psychiatric Association, the American Psychological Association and the American Academy of Pediatrics all acknowledge its prominence and offer resources for patients and” healthcare professionals “on how to practice it.”

Related Links:

— “For Some Rural Teens, Psychiatric Help Is Now Just a TV Screen Away,” Emma Ockerman, Time, August 4, 2016.

The Washington Post (8/3, Guo) reports in “Wonkblog” that a study published in the Journal of Family Psychology found that “getting married causes both men and women to drink less often compared to being single” and “also causes both men and women to cut down on the number of drinks they have in a single sitting — men in particular.” In addition, “getting a divorce doesn’t seem to make people drink more often, but both men and women have more drinks in each sitting.” Researchers evaluated “nearly 2,500 pairs of male and female twins from the state of Washington, who answered questions how often and how much they usually drink.”

Related Links:

— “Marriage changes how men drink in weird ways,” Jeff Guo, Washington Post, August 3, 2016.

Medical Daily (8/3, Dovey) reports, “Dementia and Alzheimer’s disease may share many of the same symptoms, but the two are not different names for the same condition.” The article goes on to explain that “dementia is a syndrome, or a group of symptoms that consistently occur together,” and “is not a specific disease.”

Related Links:

— “Alzheimer’s vs. Dementia: How They Differ And What To Do,” Dana Dovey, Medical Daily, August 3, 2016.