The Week in Review: March 13-17

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This week, Psychiatric Times® covered a wide variety of psychiatric issues and industry updates, from an update on at-home ketamine therapy to the psychopharmacologic treatment of bipolar depression. Here are some highlights from the week.

Report Reveals More Than 50% of Americans Misuse At-Home Ketamine

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All Points North (APN) released its Future of Mental Health: Ketamine Therapy Report, which examined opinions on and experiences with ketamine therapy, including at-home ketamine treatments.

Researchers surveyed 2000 adults and found that 64% of those taking ketamine said it helped with their symptoms; however, 55% of all Americans and 58% of Millennials who tried at-home ketamine therapy reported accidentally or purposefully using more than the recommended dose. Additionally, more than one quarter (26%) agree they would rather use ketamine than antidepressants or anti-anxiety medications to treat their mental health symptoms. Continue Reading

Psychopharmacologic Treatment of Bipolar II Depression

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Once you have diagnosed acute bipolar II depression accurately according to the DSM-5 criteria (as we reviewed in detail in a recent Psychiatric Times column), you are confronted with the problem of what to select for an evidence-based medication treatment. The problem is that you do not have much evidence to rely on.

In a review of 11 US and international evidence-based treatment guideline recommendations for managing bipolar disorders, only 3 of the guidelines offered any specific recommendations for bipolar II disorder. The other 8 guidelines all implied—if mentioning bipolar II at all—or stated explicitly, such as in 1 case, that one should more or less use what was recommended for bipolar I depression. Continue Reading

Prisoner of the Brain: Recognizing the Serious Implications of Catatonia

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In this installment of Tales From the Clinic: The Art of Psychiatry, we discuss catatonia, originally described by Karl Kahlbaum, MD, a German psychiatrist. At the time, and as we understand it now, catatonia was described as a diagnostic label that combines different clinical presentations and often presents as an add-on to other psychiatric or medical illnesses.

Catatonic symptoms range from motoric immobility and mutism to purposeless excitement, which makes diagnosis challenging. Our understanding of the neurobiology and physiological underpinnings of this disease is woefully incomplete, and we hope this installment helps shed light on catatonia and draws readers’ attention to early diagnosis of this intriguing entity. Continue Reading

Diversity and Inclusion: A Daily Effort

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We Indians do not even have a name in the United States, so how can I have a defined identity? I am Indian, not Native Indian. Yes, I am Asian but not Chinese or Korean. I am South Asian but not Pakistani or Bangladeshi. As an ‘Indian Indian,’ am I a hybrid first generation, second generation, or fresh out of boat, or an honorary white? I am still figuring that out.

Handling a contrasted self-conception which leads to compartmentalization of personal and professional life makes my life ‘hybridly’ normal. I am an Indian woman and no it is not a norm to do well professionally or have a leadership position. I work as a program director where I get invited to do acculturation and diversity workshops on bias and micro- and macroaggressions. I learn and grow every day on these topics. To know where I am today, I must share my journey. Continue Reading

See more recent coverage from Psychiatric Times here. And be sure to stay up-to-date by subscribing to the Psychiatric Times E-newsletter.

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