| Article
Can psilocybin—a hallucinogenic chemical obtained from mushrooms—improve mental health in struggling Veterans? Arizona’s legislature may grant $30 million to help researchers find solutions via controlled trials. By studying whole mushrooms and their 100s of compounds, vs the synthetic, 1 molecule...
| Article
While the disease of addiction knows no boundaries, unfortunately treatment for opioid use disorder seems to. In yet another example of healthcare inequity, Black and Latin patients have less access than Whites to buprenorphine. Why? That’s what researchers at the University of Washington hope to...
| Article
The journal of Anesthesiology featured a special article in which a new concept is presented: a prescription opioid ecosystem. The need for this ecosystem stems from the “opioid paradox” that, even though the past 10 years has seen a drop in opioid prescribing of about 38%, deaths from opioids have...
| Article
In an effort to address the healthcare needs of military personnel with traumatic brain injury (TBI), the College of Nursing at the Florida Atlantic University has initiated the M.O.M. project. Mind Over Matter aims to help those with this “invisible wound of war”: TBI affects about 30% of those in...
| Article
In a study presented at the ANESTHESIOLOGY annual meeting, the concerns of postsurgery opioid use, and the groups most at risk, were highlighted. For patients using opioids for the first time for pain management after surgery, certain groups—people who smoke, those who suffer from depression, and...
| Article
JAMA reports a noted increase in opioid use disorder treatments in those enrolled in Medicaid. The study looked at over a million enrollees from 11 states: medication treatment prevalence in 2014 was 47.8% and in 2018, 57.1%. Of note, use of OUD medication was higher in pregnant women and white...
| Article
How much of a problem is doctor shopping? “Doctor shopping” is defined as ≥1 day of getting overlapping prescriptions for opioids from ≥2 prescribers and going to ≥3 pharmacies to have them filled. A recent article published in the Journal of Pain Research looked at patients with chronic noncancer...
| Article
The Non-Opioids Prevent Addiction in the Nation (NOPAIN) Act was recently introduced into the House of Representatives, after working its way through the senate. Its goal? To make it easier to access non-opioid pain management treatments. The Act hopes to “address payment disincentives for...
| Article
The lamprey is an eel-like creature in which researchers have found a protein called parapinopsin. This discovery was part of the research used to determine how brain neurons work, and may be controlled. The parapinopsin inhibited neurons, and turned off brain circuits. A similar system could be...
| Article
Medication and/or psychotherapy does not work for approximately 30% of patients with major depression. How can practitioners help those who are unresponsive? Brain stimulation may help, but for every person with a mental disorder, there may be a different manifestation and potential response to...