Category: mentalhealth

WSJ Staff
Roche’s Genomics Bet: Roche’s $6 billion hostile bid for DNA-sequencing company Illumina represents a bet that the technology will filter down from academic and government research centers to doctors’ offices and hospitals, the WSJ reports. Roche believes sales of genetic mapping machines will almost double to $2.1 billion by 2015, but some […]

MEwens
J&J Settles With Texas: Johnson & Johnson said it would pay $158 million to settle claims by Texas that the company promoted its antipsychotic drug Risperdal for unapproved uses, resulting in overcharges to the state’s Medicaid program, the WSJ reports. J&J said the settlement, to be paid to a plaintiff who filed a […]

MEwens
Can Facebook help prevent suicides?
The social-networking behemoth is launching a new feature that will let users connect their Facebook friends with suicide-prevention support services.
As this announcement from the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA) describes it, if users see a comment from a friend that seems to threaten suicide, they can […]

MEwens
Drug Reps and Overtime: The Supreme Court will consider whether pharmaceutical sales reps are eligible for overtime pay in a case that the drug-industry trade association says could cost companies billions of dollars, the WSJ reports. Two appeals courts have split on the issue, with one agreeing with the Labor Department’s argument that […]

MEwens
The American Psychiatric Association’s years-long efforts to revamp its big book of diagnoses has been fraught with controversy.
Critics have said that the committee charged with the fifth full revision of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual for Mental Disorders, known as the DSM, is being too secretive and trying to make too many changes, among other […]

MEwens
Killing Fat Cells in Monkeys: A study published in Science Translational Medicine finds that a drug previously shown to cause weight loss in obese mice by killing certain fat cells can do the same in obese monkeys, raising hopes it might also work in humans, the WSJ reports. The drug was developed at […]

MEwens
By S. Mitra Kalita
The foreclosure crisis may be making Americans sick.
A study published online yesterday in the American Journal of Public Health surveyed nearly 2,500 homeowners over the age of 50 who were asked if they had fallen more than two months behind on their mortgage payments since 2006.
Of those who had, 22% […]

MEwens
Prozac Nation, indeed — 11% of Americans aged 12 and up now take an antidepressant medication, though less than one third of them have seen a mental-health professional in the past year.
So say stats from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention that paint a portrait of who used the medications in 2005-08. […]

MEwens
Most people exposed to the 9/11 terrorist attacks didn’t develop post-traumatic stress disorder or other types of mental illness, underscoring people’s general psychological resilience in the face of trauma, according to Sandro Galea, chair of the epidemiology department at Columbia University’s public health school.
Galea spoke today at a Columbia conference discussing science, policy […]

MEwens
Weighing Bone Drug Safety: An FDA advisory panel will Friday consider whether women taking certain bone-building drugs called bisphosphonates should limit their treatment period or take a so-called drug holiday in order to prevent rare instances of thigh fractures and jaw-bone decay, the WSJ reports. Manufacturers of the drugs, including Warner Chilcott, Roche […]