Psychopharmacology

This article summarizes clinically relevant advances in the psychiatric care of women during and after pregnancy, including recent changes in how the FDA classifies pregnancy risk for medications, and best practices in perinatal psychopharmacology.

Information about the performance of clozapine compared with other treatment strategies in usual practice may impact on its use in routine clinical settings. Here: findings from US national Medicaid data in a cohort of patients with treatment-resistant schizophrenia.

Researchers conducted a clinical trial comparing light therapy with antidepressant monotherapy. Here's what they found.

What is behind the glaring lack of controls over prescription drug costs, even for everyday medications?

Intended for short-term use, this treatment is associated with specific diagnostic and symptom characteristics, with anhedonia being a stand-out.

If serotonin was once American psychiatry’s “high school crush,” the field now appears wedded to a more mature model of biological and psychosocial understanding.

This article reviews a wide array of medicolegal, risk management, regulatory, and forensic mental health issues in the older population, which is growing at an accelerated rate.

Food taken with which atypical antipsychotics discussed here may increase absorption?

Flibanserin is a breakthrough. We will finally be able to talk to women with hypoactive sexual desire disorder about a treatment that has FDA approval.

Treatment with a selective estrogen receptor modulator in adjunct to antipsychotics was associated with improvements in attention and memory in men and women with schizophrenia in a recent trial.

Do cholinesterase inhibitors lead to weight loss in older adults with dementia? Here's a wrap up of a large study of patients in a real-world setting who had newly started these medications.

Details here about a protocol for opioid abusers and the mentally ill that helped avoid deaths from drug overdose after psychiatric hospitalization.

Dose escalation is often applied in the management of psychosis when patients do not initially respond to therapy, but a recent study brings this strategy under question.

Experts summarize data on the role of inflammation in psychiatric disorders, emphasizing that evidence for anti-inflammatory treatment for mood disorders is limited, and mixed.

A recent study from the Bipolar-Schizophrenia Network on Intermediate Phenotypes (B-SNIP) investigated the genetics of the auditory event-related potential, a putative psychosis biomarker.

The authors explore ways to address aggression in clinical practice and examine the potentially dangerous impulsivity-violence link across a broad range of conditions.

The challenges of recognizing behaviors such as hypersexuality, gambling, and excessive buying in Parkinson disease are discussed, as are ways to address them while still managing the underlying condition.

Internet-based CBT has shown promise to improve access to therapy for patients with OCD, which is associated with a profoundly diminished quality of life and social isolation.

Dr David Osser offers compelling reasons why you might want to take a look at these 7 algorithms, each of which offers actionable consultations-usually in under 2 minutes.

An overview of the largest study to examine persistent pulmonary hypertension in newborns (PPHN) exposed to antidepressants late in pregnancy.

The need to stay up-to-date with the most current evidence-based information is becoming harder than ever. For this reason, the authors identify and evaluate published research that may have a direct bearing on clinical practice.

Psychiatrists who treat women and adolescent girls may find it necessary to discuss with their patients reproductive planning and the role of contraception in setting comprehensive treatment goals. Here's why.

How do foods containing tyramine (eg, aged cheeses, fermented foods, cured meats) interact with some psychiatric medications?

Is prevention of bipolar disorder possible? What happens before a manic or hypomanic episode that identifies this illness? Researchers asked whether there are any signs or symptoms that predict later diagnosable bipolar disorder with reasonable accuracy.

Many of us are seeing patients who have been prescribed potentially addicting medication by another physician, and our level of vigilance needs to be high.

Although a number of observational studies point to an association between conventional antipsychotic agents and increased risk in older patients, new research suggests such findings may have been flawed.

The prevalence of chronic hepatitis C virus infection is among the highest in patients with severe underlying mental illness. Here: clinical information on the interface of HCV infection and psychiatric disorders.

Psoriasis, a chronic inflammatory, autoimmune skin disorder, is associated with both genetic and environmental factors. It has important treatment implications for patients who have psychiatric disorders.

A review of the pharmacological and symptomatic effects of various classes of designer drugs, including stimulants, hallucinogens, and sedatives.

There are probably few health care professionals who are unaware of the concerns about the apparent overprescription of opioids. However, we have had only limited information on how good a job physicians may actually be doing in prescribing these medications.