Top news: What everyone is reading on Healio Psychiatry
Click Here to Manage Email Alerts
The biggest news on Healio Psychiatry over the last month was the controversy over daylight saving time.
Other hot topics included video games to improve cognitive function in children, a dramatic increase in illicit fentanyl use in Minnesota, successful mindfulness-based stress reduction and an evaluation of antidepressants for major depressive disorder.
Q&A: ‘Nature has a better design’ than changing our clocks twice a year
Not everyone is on board with the biannual ritual associated with daylight saving time. Healio interviewed Abhinav Singh, MD, FAASM, medical review expert at SleepFoundation.org and medical director of the Indiana Sleep Center, to get his take on the perils and pitfalls of altering sleep patterns that come with changing clocks.
Video games shown to improve cognitive function in children
Children who played video games were shown to exhibit better cognitive function compared with those who did not, Bader Chaarani, PhD, of the department of psychiatry at the University of Vermont, and colleagues reported in JAMA Network Open.
Minnesota sees 400% increase in illicit fentanyl since 2019
Illicit fentanyl positivity in patient samples from substance use disorder treatment practices in Minnesota increased by 400% during the first half of 2022 compared with 2019, as reported in a press release from a drug testing laboratory.
According to the CDC, overdose deaths in Minnesota increased by more than 71% from 2019 to 2021, compared to a 51% increase nationwide, Millennium Health said in the release.
Mindfulness-based stress reduction noninferior to escitalopram for anxiety
Elizabeth A. Hoge, MD, the director of the anxiety disorders research program at Georgetown University School of Medicine, and colleagues found that mindfulness-based stress reduction was noninferior to escitalopram for treating anxiety disorders, they reported in JAMA Psychiatry.
Select antidepressants show balance in efficacy, acceptability in adults with MDD
Antidepressants desvenlafaxine, paroxetine, venlafaxine and vortioxetine were found to have reasonable acceptability, efficacy and tolerability in the treatment of adults with stable major depressive disorder, according to a study published in Molecular Psychiatry by Taro Kishi, MD, PhD, and colleagues.